For the "Big Game" -- Super Bowl Wine

I know; you drink beer on Super Bowl Sunday. But maybe you're not really a beer drinker. Perhaps you like wine better. But it's so hard to figure out what to drink with your Super Bowl food.

Why is that? There is so much variety. If you're eating at the Super Bowl the way lots of other gluttonous Americans who plan to take Monday off from work do, you've got a huge variety of foods at your disposal. Let's go through them and see some of the problems:

• Chips and salsa -- salty and acidic
• Chips and veggie dip -- salty and green
• Barbecue of one type or another -- salty, a little spicy or a lot spicy, and likely somewhat fatty
• Wings -- spicy or lemony or garlicky or fried and maybe with blue or some combination
• Veggie platter -- somewhat bland, but the dips will change that
• Charcuterie platter -- fatty, sometimes spicy meats and cheeses that do or do not go with the meats
• All kinds of sandwiches usually with meats that fit into some of the catgories above
• Pizza
• More fried stuff

That's a tough pairing job. 

I'm going to start by annoying all the traditional American wine drinkers. You don't want fancy and expensive because you don't know what you're drinking by halftime. And you don't want Cabernet Sauvignon or Chardonnay because they go with very little of that food.

I can see people saying already -- what else is there besides Cabernet and Chardonnay? Well, there's the entirely non-descriptive red blend which could be any wine with at least two red grapes in it and they need not be particular red grapes.

On that note, time to digress.

I run across people all the time who tell me that their favorite wine is a red blend. A red blend of what? And did you know that most red wines that you drink are probably red blends? Even if the label says Cabernet Sauvignon, if it's American, as much as 25% of the grapes could be something else. Some red blends that are Cabernet-based are very big and tannic. Others that heavily laden with Grenache, for example, might be far softer and more acidic. So unless you are specifying the wine, don't tell me your favorite wines are red blends. That's like saying your favorite foods is meat or your favorite food is fruit. They are simply not all the same.

Returning to our regularly scheduled programming now. 

So, what wines am I choosing? As I said, I don't want them to be too expensive because you're probably drinking too much. I don't want them to be too full-bodied because that doesn't go with this type of food. And I want them to be something everyone can find in a store close by.

We're going with one red grape, one white grape, and one additional style.

The Super Bowl LIX (that's pronounced like licks if anyone asks you since why the fascination with Roman numerals that I don't expect we teach in school anymore) grapes are going to be food friendly.

For our white grape, we are choosing Riesling. Why? It's fresh, it's acidic, and it's easy on the palate. Riesling goes with almost anything. And if you're having lots of people over and you want to make sure you can handle the whole crowd, you can have some dry Riesling and some off-dry (that's a fancy term for a little bit sweet) Riesling. 

Between those two styles, we can likely handle every food type we noted above. It will go wonderfully with all the vegetables, will handle any of the wings no matter how spicy (Riesling is a really good choice with Three Mile Island or Chernobyl wings) or lemony (another great pairing) or sweet. Riesling is a good choice with a random charcuterie platter or sandwiches and it will handle almost any ribs just fine. No, it is not the single best pairing with most of the dishes you'll have, but it might be the best pairing to handle all of your food.

For our red grape, we're going with Sangiovese. And if you want to be more specific, go with a Chianti where the bottle is neatly inserted in a fiasco. 

All right John, what in the world are you talking about? Why would I want a fiasco at my Super Bowl "licks" party? In the wine world, a fiasco is that straw basket in which you sometimes see a bottle of Chianti. It's very cool looking and the shape of the bottle when it's put in a fiasco makes it stand up better so that rowdy guests won't make a mess of your new white furniture and countertops.

Sangiovese is a great grape. It's medium-bodied, can be very inexpensive and has great acidity. And, it goes with food. It has just enough tannins to carry fat and salt, the acidity to handle acidic foods and it won't overwhelm most vegetables. Finally, it is such a natural pairing with your random charcuterie board that it feels like a have-to-have.

You'll notice I haven't talked much about the fried food. Fried food, and the deeper the fry, the bigger the challenge is notoriously challenging for wine. Fear not, my friends. Do you know what goes with fried food? Sparkling wine, particularly those that are not 100% Chardonnay. The acidity and even more so the bubbles cut through the batter and richness of the food. The acidity does it by cleansing the palate and the bubbles somewhat prepare you for the crunch (yes, sparkling wine and crunch are a great pairing). 

There are lots of sparkling wines out there, so how will we choose? Choice #1 is sparkling Riesling. Up above, if you didn't cheat and skip to the bottom, you read me heaping praise on Riesling. Take the same reasons and add the bubbles and you have something special with crispy, fatty, greasy, deep-fried chicken. 

Unfortunately, sparkling Riesling is probably not something you have at home (I do and you should, but that's for another day) and might not be something you can get at the local store, so staying on the theme of easily accessible and not at all pricy, what should you do?

Well, if you like sparkling wine at all and you don't like to spend a ton of money, you probably have some sparkling Glera at home and you should serve that to go with your fried foods. 

What? You don't have sparkling Glera? How about Prosecco?

I couldn't resist; sparkling Glera, in almost every case is Prosecco (most of the sparkling Glera in the world is made in Veneto and called Prosecco).

Finally, I'm going to offer you a bonus grape for those of you skipping work and needing a big comfort breakfast tomorrow morning. You're going to have a feast of waffles and pancakes and maybe throw in some bacon and breakfast sausage and to go with it, you want a bit of the hair of the dog that bit you.

What do you put on your pancakes and waffles in addition to things like butter? Maple syrup perhaps?

Well, then I have the grape for you -- Pedro Ximines, which unfortunately you can't find at your local convenience store. But, this is the ultimate breakfast grape if you're not going for more bubbly.

I know; I don't write here as often as I used to. But I'll be back when I have another idea.