Frequently Asked Questions - Wine and Cheese

For years, we have consumed young wines, low vinified and poor in tannin. Structure meshed well with cheeses. With the evolution of technics and tastes, red wines have become more tannic, rich and no longer suitable for cheese. A sip of red wine on cheese that leaves an unpleasant bitter aftertaste? It is a chemical reaction: the wine tannins are hardened fat cheese.

Bright white wines! Vinification of white wines do not have the maceration step in the fermentation broth. Or is this step that gives the wine its color and also its tannins. White, poor wine tannins support so much better cheese.

A tip: Prefer a wine from the same region as the cheese. As a general rule:

• Soft cheeses and washed rind (Munster, Maroilles) with very typical, rich and aromatic wines like Gewurztraminer or a Chateauneuf du Pape.
• Pressed cheeses uncooked / cooked: with white wine round and structured like white Burgundy.
• Goat cheese: as the cheese is fresh or cooked him go dry fruity white like a Sauvignon wines from the Loire.
• Blue cheeses: with a Sauternes or other sweet. A test also with a good old Banyuls or Porto.
• Soft cheese and rind (Camembert, Chaource): no wine, even white! Too fat, too creamy, they dégagerons an unpleasant bitterness. Pick a cider.

If you really want to serve red wine, use a soft, round little tannic wine. Saint-Nicolas de Bourgueil, some Beaujolais or black Alsatian Pinot.

Who said the cheeses had to serve with the wine? Many people agree with champagne, cider and even beer.

For strong cheeses: choose Champagnes vinous and mature.
For hard cheeses (Gruyere or County): Choose Champagne fruity and quite young ...

Soft cheese and crust flowers: use with semi-dry cider.

• Washed rind cheeses (Livarot, Pont l'Eveque): these powerful aromatic cheeses level demanded raw cider, rich flavors.
• Cheese cooked pressed cheeses (Comté, Beaufort, French Emmental) serve with raw cider.
• Hard cheeses uncooked (Reblochon, Saint-Nectaire, Morbier) serve with cider rather sweet and fruity, semi-dry or sweet.

Some advice: do not taste the cider too cold! Ideal temp between 10 and 12 °.

It is still a well-kept secret: the beer is consistent with the cheese as well as wine. "The agreement beer-cheese is traditional in countries like Belgium and Denmark. Serve cold beer but not ice, not to kill the flavor.

While in France, the cheese is traditionally eaten with wine, growing gourmets initiate agreements with tea. Teas vary depending cheese and serve still warm at the time of tasting.

• With Camenbert: Use of Japanese green tea torriffié bancha hojicha with aromas of toast, dry wood and fruit.
• With Pont-Eveque : use a Darjeeling Spring Indian black tea a very rich aroma, with floral notes and plant.
• With Comté: use a Chinese pu-erh tea or pu'er or a summer fruit aromas and dry cooked darjeeling.
• With blue cheese: Use a black tea from China Yunnan, flowery and sweet, with notes of honey and wax wood