Doing This One Thing Makes Wine Taste Better With Food, According to Amanda McCrossin

Want to know a foolproof method for pairing wine with food and making it work almost every single time? Make sure the acidity in your glass is higher than on your plate.

Case in point: the timeless combination of fried chicken and Champagne. Champagne, at approximately 2.5 pH, has a much higher acidity level than, say, a Chardonnay or a Sauvignon Blanc, which both hover at around the 3.3 pH mark — making Champagne pair incredibly well with fried chicken and other fried foods, most of which are typically low in acid but high in oils and fats. Think: french fries, kettle chips, and all manner of fritters. (Note that the lower the number, the higher the acidity.)

Similarly, high-acid white wines — like Albariño, Riesling, Chablis, and Gewürztraminer — work beautifully with low-acid, fat-forward dishes, as do high-acid reds such as Barbera, Chianti Classico, and Gamay.

“Here’s the deal: The acid of your wine must be as high or higher than the food that you’re pairing it with. So if you’ve got something like a vinaigrette dressing — or just something that’s got vinegar in it — that means the wine that you’re pairing with it has to be that level of acid or higher,” says Amanda McCrossin, a certified sommelier and host of the Wine Access Unfiltered podcast, who is hosting a series seminars on pairing wine with Southern cuisine at the Food & Wine Classic in Charleston this weekend. “When I’m thinking about different pairings across the board, the wines that have the most acid are sparkling wines.”

So, without dipping a pH strip in your wine, how do you know when something is acidic enough? It all boils down to learning how to taste and paying attention to how your tongue reacts, according to McCrossin.

“We feel acidity through salivation. So the more you’re salivating, the higher the acid that’s in the wine,” she says. “That is because when you’re salivating, what that’s doing is trying to reset the palate back to neutral, and we’re doing that through salivation. So our mouths are producing saliva to coat it and to recalibrate. The same rule applies across all beverages, not just wine. This occurs with water, and it occurs with coffee, milk, all the things, everything that has a pH.”

The same phenomenon that causes these acid-focused pairings to work is also behind why so many of us love to dip fried foods in ketchup, barbecue sauce, honey-mustard, or even Chick-fil-A sauce — all of which are vinegar-based. “Why do we do that? Because french fries are fried and we want some vinegar to cut that,” says McCrossin. “This is exactly what we’re doing with fried chicken and Champagne. You’re basically just using Champagne as a sauce.”

“When we’re talking about fried foods, we’re talking about super low acidity — we’re talking about dishes that really want acid. You can feel how that acidity just coats over, letting your palate feel super fresh after,” continues McCrossin. “We’ve all had fried chicken before. I’ve sat with a bucket of KFC and I’m like, I need a Coke — because soda is a weak acid. And you want that acidity — that’s why fried chicken is delicious with soda, but Champagne is obviously better. We all have fatty foods, knowing that we want something to brighten it up. This is why we add lemon to our cream sauce. We want to brighten things up; we want to leave our palates feeling refreshed. With chips, it’s same idea: fried foods. French fries, fried chicken, fried oysters, fried clams, fried everything. This all works in the same way.”

Obviously, the pairing strategy isn’t relegated to fried dishes. Whatever you’re eating, the principle of pairing a lower-acid meal with a higher-acid wine applies across the board, whether you’re having roasted or braised meats, tomato- or cream-based pasta, or even vinegar-forward Asian dishes such as a spicy cucumber salad or a traditional Filipino adobo.  

“There is this thing across the wine industry that we know as ‘Pork and Pinot,’” McCrossin says of Pinot Noir, which are classically lower in tannins and higher in acid. “When people ask me, ‘What should I pair with ham? What should I pair with roast pork?’ The answer is always pork and Pinot. Never forget it. Whenever you’re confused about something pork, go with Pinot. That’s what works.”