Natalie MacLean's Drinks Matcher

Here's a little still life that I painted in oil. The best part about doing a study like this is that you get to eat and drink the props when the painting is done!

• Art, food, wine . . . they all go together! That’s why I posted Natalie MacLean’s Wine & Food Matcher widget on my blog. It is a great tool for figuring out what to serve. You can either start your search with the type of food you want to serve, and find a wine to pair with it, or you can search on a type of wine and find the food that best matches it.
  
  I’ve posted the tool on the left side of this blog. It doesn’t display quite correctly—you’ll see that the right side of the buttons are cut off a bit—but don’t worry, it will work anyway.
  
  Natalie left a comment, asking if I had a favourite match. Well, there are two matches that I particularly like, both of which I found using the tool. Here they are:

• The Matcher suggests pairing an off-dry or white zinfandel with barbeque chicken, but also suggests light salads, and spice such as curry powder. So . . . I tossed grilled chicken with a curried-lime dressing to make a salad, and served it with the Cave Spring white zinfandel. Tasted like a summer evening!


• The Matcher also suggested pairing a baco noir with vegetables and chili peppers. That suggestion made me think that baco noir might stand up well to a bowl of chili, which can be difficult to match wine with. Every time I ask for a recommendation of which wine to serve with chili, the answer is invariably “beer.” Not being a beer drinker, I wanted to find a wine to serve with chili instead. I served the chili with Ancient Coast and think the pairing worked well.