I like to follow Eric Asimov’s“Wine School” feature in the New York Times.  Each month the wine critic chooses a topic or style of wine.  Readers are encouraged to explore the wines on their own and often write in with reactions.  These provide fodder for a follow-up piece. Recently the topic was Riesling, and his articleabout the month’s selected wines provides a wonderful “part two” on the topic of sweetness in wine that I began in my last post.  Describing one of the American Rieslings he assigned in August’s Wine School, Asimov wrote:

The wine seemed dry when I first tasted it. But then I paired it with a meal: pork chops topped with a sauce of cooked fresh tomatoes and a little garlic, with sautéed peppers and onions on the side. With the meal, the wine seemed unexpectedly bright at first, and then a bit sweet.

Was it the food? Cooked ripe tomatoes can seem sweet. Caramelized onions do for sure. The dish seemed to enhance the sweetness of the [wine].

And so he found himself unexpectedly writing this month’s Wine School column about sweetness in wine! 

The perception of sweetness in wine is subjective enough to surprise even the super-trained palate of a NY Times wine critic.  I have seen tasters call ripe fruit-driven California wines “sweet,” even though they are drinking technically dry wines.   Conversely, the tartness of an acidic Riesling may make its significant residual sugar content difficult to taste.  Add in the possibilities of food pairings and it gets even more complicated.

The world of wine is so vast and varied that we cheat ourselves if we reject any of it without giving it a chance.  A lot of people seem to avoid sweet wines just because they are sweet.  But why not consider them along with a meal that they particularly complement?  I enjoyed a moderately sweet Kabinett from Mosel with a poke bowl at a before-theater picnic this summer – and it was a refreshing combination.  (The wine’s lower alcohol content also kept me from falling asleep after the houselights dimmed!)  I am looking forward to a chance to pair the same wine with spicy food.