Publication: I'm Not Martha
Cooking with wine. | |
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I'M NOT MARTHA - Tuesday, February 27, 2007
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Hi! I'm Lizzy!! and I'm not Martha!!!
*Lizzy, I really enjoyed your column on champagne. I learned
a lot that I never even thought about before. That got me
to thinking about cooking with wine.
I've never had much success with that. Part of the problem
is that I don't know what wines to use. I don't want to
spend a lot of money and don't know what to look for when
a recipe calls for a "dry white wine" or even red wine. Do
you have any suggestions on what to look for? I also was
wondering about how long can it be kept after opening?
Thanks for your help and all your great information!!
Regards,
Denise
Great question!!!
Centuries ago, cooks made sauces from wine to mellow what
were then strong-tasting chickens or to rescue meats gone
bad. Wine in a sauce tenderizes the meat and infuses it
with flavor.
Thank goodness for refrigeration! As with pairings, the
general rules of wine and food apply. Reds go with meat.
Whites go with chicken and fish. But salmon, a heartier
and oilier fish, stands up to a red wine sauce. Pork is
versatile. Some recipes will call for a red, some a rose,
and some pair with port. Vegetarians can find delight in
a mushroom casserole made with red wine.
All this being said...White wine is probably more versatile
for cooking than red.
Think of all the flavors of wine and their differences:
Zinfandels can have a raisin-like quality; a lighter-style
white wine can be apple-like and citrus-flavored. Reds add
depth of character to foods that can stand up to challenge.
These flavors contribute to the flavors of a sauce. If you
change the wine, you could have a sauce that tastes dif-
ferent.
There's a saying that "what grows together, goes together"
— if possible, choose wine from the region your recipe
comes from for a guaranteed flavor pairing. This of course
falls apart as a theory on a region-less recipe but there
you go.
You don't need to use the same wine in the sauce as the
wine that will be served at the table. Since you're cooking
the wine, grape variety isn't a big deal. Use whatever wine
you have on hand. It's silly to use a fancy bottle to
braise with. Reach for a bottle that is both drinkable and
intended for drinking. The best features of an expensive
wine disappear in the cooking.
Another put another way -- Pick a decent, but not stellar
wine for cooking. Don't use a wine that you wouldn't want
to drink and don't use a wine that you really want to drink.
Avoid using "cooking wine" or "cooking sherry" from the
supermarket; it contains added salt. When it reduces, your
dish will be too salty...yick. And a great waste of time
and everything else.
If you don't drink wine, buy half-bottles. They are more
expensive ounce for ounce but then you aren't being wasteful
on a grander scale.
Wine will hold its flavor for a week if corked and in the
refrigerator.
How about using a Sauvignon Blanc, known for its herbaceous
quality as a wine, in a dish highlighting herbs. Zinfandels
have a berry or cherry character, which would be a nice
background to a fruit sauce for duck. A buttery Chardonnay
is the perfect base for a beurre blanc. If you want a
sweeter sauce, choose a sweet wine; if you want a jammier-
tasting sauce, choose a fuller-bodied wine.
When making a wine sauce, add butter at the end for a rich
taste. Sometimes additional wine is added at the end, too,
when its raw taste will reinforce its identity.
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* What happens when you cook with wine?
The final result depends on when you add the wine and what
you do after. The alcohol, having a lower boiling point,
will evaporate before all the liquid is gone. The alcohol
content in wine evaporates at 178 degrees F. Water boils
at 212 degrees F. So if you deglaze a hot pan with wine,
initially more alcohol will evaporate than water.
As the amount of alcohol decreases in proportion to the
water, less alcohol evaporates. This is called reducing
or making a reduction. When you reduce, you decrease the
volume and increase and amplify all the flavors.
Depending on how much you let the wine reduce (and if other
liquid is present), 0-60% of the alcohol could still remain.
Extended cooking time will also decrease the amount of
alcohol.
* Many people think that the sulfites in red wine cause them
headaches or a flushing and they say they are allergic.
In most cases, true allergic reactions to sulfites is man-
ifested in respiratory problems. It probably isn't the
sulfites causing the symptoms, but rather the tannins in
the red wine.
Second, there are actually more sulfites in white wine than
in red. The same sulfites used to prevent oxidation in
wine are used to keep the lettuce on a salad bar or a fast
food french fry from turning brown, usually in much higher
quantities. If you can eat or drink these, it isn't the
sulfites affecting you.
When cooking with wine containing sulfites, you do not con-
centrate them as you would flavor, but rather they evaporate
like alcohol.
Typically, in a recipe that serves 4, you may add 1/4 to 1/2
cup of wine. That is approximately 1/2 to 1 glass, if you
were drinking it.
You are then going to heat this, so some (or all) of the
alcohol evaporates, and then divide it among 4 people. As
you can see, the amount of alcohol consumed per person
eating the dish is not very large, and in fact may not
even be there at all.
Remember W.C. Fields said: "I cook with wine. Sometimes I
even add it to the food."
Lizzy
Questions...Comments...? email Lizzy
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