What wine for dinner date with a Central American influence?

WINE TALK
1

Help! [cheers.gif]

I’m not much of an expert on Carribean / Central American food. What varieties / styles would go well? I need to bring wines to a dinner and I have no idea what is going to be served (other than 1 inch pork chops). I’d like to bring a local Paso Robles wine, but we don’t have much here in the way of rieslings or gewurz or gruner, which would all be my first choices. Maybe a viognier and a … grenache?

2

Be warned in advance, 90% of “what wine to pair with this kind of food” threads on WB end up with everyone proclaimng you can’t drink wine with that kind of food and should just drink beer, and/or saying you can only go with offbeat white varietals.

As one of those few of us who are willing to say that wine lovers can enjoy wine with many foods that don’t derive from Europe, I would say that a big fruited and low tanning Paso red (zin, grenache, syrah) would work well with most foods in that category (though that is a broad category). My favorite Paso whites are from Tablas Creek, and I could imagine something like their Grenache Blanc being a suitable pairing. Or their rose.

Turley made an excellent and very lean/tart/fresh Zin rose last year, but I think it may have been a one-time deal and that it’s pretty hard to find now. If you could find that, it would probably be great.

3

Lots of seafood in that cuisine. A low oak chard would be my pick.

4

Tough one since I assume the flavors of the cuisine are very diverse, fruit and spice influenced with seafood to boot? It would help if you could elaborate more on what will be served.

5

Can you be more specific? Central American and Caribbean cuisine are quite different, for Panamanian cuisine (which is almost similar to most Central American cuisine) I’d go Pinot Noir or Grenache; as our Afroantillian community (which I will call Caribbean) rely much more on seafood, coconut milk, fresh herbs, amongst other things, which to me adds a whole different dimension of complexity. Here I would probably go Riesling, or Chenin Blanc.

I once did a dinner with Mondongo (cow tripe) and white rice, one of many vernacular dishes here in Panama, and tried to pair various wines. The winner seemed to be Lopez Heredia Tondonia Reserva 01 or Bouchard L’enfant Jesus 02.

If you can elaborate some dishes or at least some country, perhaps we could help more?

6

I can’t. As I explained in my question, I have no idea - and no one else will either - until we arrive for dinner. It’s one of those one-table, prix fixe places where the chef creates the menu the day of. So I have only the vaguest notion. Would viognier be too heavy, I wonder?

7

Kinero has a lovely Grenache Blanc
Denner Theresa is a white Rhone blend a bit bigger
Herman Story cranks it up a bit further with Tom Boy, Viogner/Roussanne
And Sans Liege’s Call to Arms at 16% is bigger than a lot of reds, Grenache Blanc/Roussane
Bring one of each and see what people think,

8

Thanks, Bill! Saves me a lot of running around. [cheers.gif]

Three of the rose’s I’ve asked after are already sold out … it’s not even June, yikes.

9

IMHO, a CA Viognier might very well be too heavy. I think a safer (better?) play might be a Grenache Blanc (Graves Winegrowers; Kinero; Ranchero Cellars), or white Rhone blend (Ranchero Cellars; Tablas; Kinero (I think he does a Rhone blend); Booker; Summerwood; Denner). Let us know what you go with … I hope all is well with you, Mary. [cheers.gif]

10

Just down the 101 from Paso Robles - in Arroyo Grande - Laetitia makes some outstanding sparklers.

Their Brut Rose would probably pair with just about any Caribbean/Mesoamerican food which you might throw at it:

http://www.laetitiawine.com/laetitia-sparkling-wines/laetitia-brut-ros

.

11

Enjoy the date and report back about what was served and what worked or didn’t work in the wine pairing arena.

12

Thank you all! I’m narrowing it down to a Tablas Creek white and a Laetitia rose sparkler … excellent suggestions! Plus, since I’m going to be in Tucson for four days of wining and dining I will of course have to schlep (actually ship) some of my personal favorites for general aloha purposes. :wink:

13

Another wine from your general neck of the woods, which is pretty much guaranteed to shine with the spiciest of foods, would be the Arcadian Sleepy Hollow Chardonnay.

Although it can get a little pricier.

14

Mary, you Dating Roberto now? [wink.gif]

15

No, heck, he hangs out with Hollywood starlets and Brazilian models! flirtysmile