Five fresh wines to make Christmas dinner lighter – 12/23/2023 – Red or White

Shall we look for fresher wines for Christmas dinner? Nothing against full-bodied wines, but in this heat, fresh wines are better. It’s not just Santa Claus, in his snow suit, who suffers during Brazil’s hot Christmas season. Traditional foods and that expensive and heavy red wine, saved for drinking on special occasions, don’t match the Brazilian climate at all and we regret it. The heat of the night, the lateness of the hour, the fatty food and the weight of the wine, at least for me, are the right recipe for getting stuffed, having a drop in blood pressure and feeling sick.

After supper, I always feel like I ate too much, but that’s not always true. In general, I stop before the main course. And, look, I’m not a person who stuffs myself easily. The problem is the heat and the choice of menu and wine. I confess, I often chose the label just because it was “the coolest in my cellar”, without considering that the thermometer was reading 28 degrees at midnight.

What can you do to avoid that feeling of having eaten an ox? Introducing salads and light foods to the menu is always a good option, but we know how difficult it is to let go of family traditions. So, for those who can’t give up tenders and stuffed turkey, one idea is to pair Christmas dishes with lighter, fresher (sour) wines, which can be served at a lower temperature. They can even transform supper into something lighter.

Tender and malvasia: sweet wine can be great

The average consumer is terrified of liking a sweet wine, as they have heard it said a million times that only people who don’t understand wine like sweet wine. Deep down, many people like sweet wine, but few have the courage to accept it. However, a dish like California, which has peach, pineapple and cherry in syrup, that is, it is full of sugar, is unlikely to go well with a dry wine, much less a red one.

A wine with good acidity and some sugar can be the perfect combination for this dish. If it’s sparkling, even better. The bubbles cleanse the palate of fat. As it’s Christmas, you might want to invest in something special like the Cava Freixenet Malvasia 2011, which costs R$219.00.

In addition to being 12 years old, this traditional method sparkling wine uses an expedition liqueur prepared with wines that spent more than 20 years in wood. Expedition liqueur is a mixture of wine and sugar (in different quantities according to the producer’s objective) with which bottles are usually filled after removing the lees and before sending them to the market, to complete the space which was empty.

These old expedition liquor wines give this sparkling wine aromas of dried fruits and (positive) notes of oxidation. It even reminds me of a sherry. I tried it without putting much faith in it and loved it. I suggest that the tender is cut very thin and served as a starter with this sparkling wine or a good Brazilian muscatel. There are many on the market, at great prices.

Cod also goes well with white

Portuguese people cannot stop eating cod on Christmas Eve. It’s very traditional. As, according to them, cod is not a fish, it is very common to drink red wine to accompany it. I’m sorry to disagree, but yes, cod is fish. And, like fish, in my opinion, it goes better with white than red. This is because the iodine found in sea fish combines with tannins and causes an unpleasant metallic taste.

Of course, the harmonization rules are not set in stone. In fact, they are not rules, they are suggestions. And the pairing of wine and food needs to take into account the various ingredients in a dish. So, an oven-baked cod, with roasted olives, tomatoes and peppers, for example, goes well with reds.

The lagareiro cod, which only contains cod fillet, olive oil and garlic, is certainly better with a good white like Carmim Régia Colheita, which costs R$ 151.90 at Casa Flora. A cut of antão vaz and arinto, this Alentejo has good acidity, that sourness that breaks down the fat of the dish a little, with a medium to high body, which means it doesn’t disappear in the mouth when it meets the cod and olive oil. . If it’s not him, any white guy with these characteristics should do well. The aromas here are of white fruits and a light citrus.

Rosé from Provence brings delicacy to Peru

Turkey is one of the most difficult dishes to make. It’s hard not to stay dry. The secret is to fill it with liquid and fat. Water the bird with orange juice, for example, several times while it is roasting. Place bacon or butter between the skin and meat.

To cope with all this fat, a wine needs good acidity and cannot be heavy or unctuous. Red, no way. It goes over the delicate flavor of the meat and doesn’t stand up to the fat of the seasoning. I would go with rosé.

Inside the turkey is some crumble – preferably very moist. A farofa with green olives, onion and more fat (olive oil or bacon), maybe a little homemade chicken broth, is what comes to mind. All of this pairs well with a rosé from Provence. Château Sainte Béatrice Cuvée des Princes is my suggestion.

From the same group that makes the prestigious Château Roubine, this is a typical Cotes de Provence. Made with a blend of cinsault, grenache and syrah, it has aromas of red fruits, some aromatic herbs and delicious lavender. Super fresh in the mouth. It costs R$ 118.00 on La Pastina e-commerce.

Red meat calls for red, but it doesn’t need to be heavy

At your family party, can’t you miss some meat? Does your dad love a picanha barbecue? So, let’s think about a red to go with it. It doesn’t have to be a big deal, full of alcohol and tannins. Tannins are plant defense substances, which are mainly concentrated in the skin and seeds. They are there to scare away insects and other animals. Tannins are. difficult to digest. So let’s try a wine that helps the food go down, something with less tannin.

The thinner the grape skin, the less tannin the wine will have. Pinot noir is the best-known example of a grape with a thin skin and little tannin. So does gammay. Another factor that influences the quantity and quality of tannins is the age of the vines. The older ones tend to concentrate more of everything, tannins, aromas, coloring material, but everything tends to be elegant.

The winemaker, however, has a good amount of latitude in regulating the amount of tannins in a wine. If you want to increase the amount of tannins, look for a wine with more body and structure, leaving the must (grape juice) in contact with the skins for longer. This way, you extract more tannins from them. If that’s not enough, you can even throw in the stalks (stems) to macerate along with the must and peel.

If you want less tannin, even with a thick-skinned grape, simply reduce the contact time between the must and the skin. The Sicilian nerello mascalese grape, for example, whose wines have been placed on the same team as great Italian ones such as Montalcino brunello and barolo, usually yields wines with a reasonable amount of tannins. In general, thinner, which is good. Still, the winemaker can decide on a lighter wine, especially if it is made from younger vines. In this case, leave the skins in contact with the must for a very short time.

Oak barrels also add tannins to wines. So, at Christmas, avoid them. Nicosia Nerello Mascalese, for example, does not go through barrels. It is a fresh and fruity nerello, which goes very well on a hot night. It does not carry the name Etna Rosso, to which the most famous nerellos belong. It is a Terre Siciliane IGT (indicazione geographica tipica). This means that it follows less strict rules. On the producer’s website, we found information that it is made from grapes from the slopes of Mount Etna, so, in order not to receive the DOC Etna, something else it has to do is outside the DOC rules. Perhaps the vines are younger, the yield per hectare is higher, or some other rule is not met. The important thing is that it is a very tasty wine, which goes down easily. It costs R$134.00 at Zahil.

A Setúbal Moscatel can accompany the French toast or be the dessert itself.

Brazilians love sugar, but have lost the habit of drinking dessert wines. This was common from the time of colonization until the first half of the 20th century. We became the largest importers of port wine, after England. Today we are not even among the main importers. Other dessert wines, then, almost no one knows they exist. To drink with French toast, however, only dessert wines are good. Even semi-dry sparkling wines don’t have enough sugar and can cause that cake-and-soda sensation in your mouth.
Dessert wine has a lot of alcohol. Be careful, don’t overdo it or your body temperature will rise. Serve at a lower temperature and look for a dessert wine with higher acidity. Some of them, such as the Portuguese Madeira wines and Setúbal Moscatels, stand out for their acidity. Muscat is delicious and tends to cost less than port or Madeira. The Alambre by José Maria da Fonseca, for example, costs R$ 147.51 at Decanter. It has aromas of orange peel and spices that should go very well with the French toast.