What To Drink With Your Thanksgiving Feast

We are mere days away from what often amounts to the most wine-soaked holiday of the year: Thanksgiving. Whether you are using your imbibing as a buffer against the chaos of a family gathering or in celebration of completing another ring around the sun with the people you love, wine is here to help. It’s also good with food.What to drink, though? It’s a question that has plagued the masses for 401 years. The options are plentiful, which only increases the pressure to pick the right wine. So here are three things to consider to help ease you into your decision and leave the fretting for the unprepared.What are you eating?Every family has their own traditional dishes, but one common theme on a Thanksgiving table is diversity. Finding a wine that pairs with meat, veggie, starchy, sugary, salty, fatty, tart, spicy, cheesy, gooey, stuffed, and sauteed dishes sounds like a nightmare. Really, though, it’s a blessing because it narrows down your options considerably. The goal is to find something that pairs well with the meal and doesn’t make you any fuller than you need to be. You only need two words: simple and cutting. Look for wines that are delicious, but avoid complex or intense flavors. Don’t bother attempting to match all the variations on the table. Instead, think of wine like another tasty but understated side dish. If you are looking for complexity, pick out a few different styles of wines rather than really showy, loud bottles. Grapes like gamay, styles like rosè or sparkling, or whites from Italy are all great starting points that you can find anywhere. A good wine person should also be able to offer direction to alternatives for the more adventurous drinkers out there.By cutting, I’m referring to the structure of the wine. You want acidity, but I would avoid excessive alcohol or tannin. Acid provides levity to wine, making it refreshing and helping slice right through all the rich, starchy portions of your meal. High-acid wines usually come from cool climate places: Northern Europe, New Zealand, coastal California, Australia, and Chile, or high altitude vineyards in places like Greece, Argentina, and the Canary islands.High alcohol, usually more than 14 percent, can make a wine feel weighted and dense. Couple that with low acidity, which often accompanies high alcohol, and they can be downright syrupy. The last thing needed on a Thanksgiving table is another overly dense side dish. Tannins are trickier. They go really well with fatty and high-protein foods, but can quickly overpower any of the lighter dishes, making them a poor candidate for such disparate styles of food. Leave the Cabernet Sauvignon and Tuscan and Piedmontese wines for your next steak dinner.Bonus option: Something with a little sugar in it. Sugar is the great equalizer and just a touch of RS, residual sugar, can really balance out a meal. Look for Kabinett Riesling (also with high acid), Bugey Cerdon (high acid, rosé, and slightly fizzy), Lambrusco (red, high acid, low tannin, and fizzy), or a high-quality white zinfandel (yes, they really exist, and they are insanely delicious). Who and how many people are drinking?You know your friends and family better than most, but it is hard to please everyone. Having a diverse offering of wines is a good way to appease the masses, and can be fun. Trying new wines and getting people excited about them can also distract from less desirable dinner conversation. The recommendation for wine serving is one bottle per person for every four hours. Hosting 12 adults who all drink wine, get a case (saving you 10 percent most places). Is everyone staying over and partying far into the night? Then get two. Are only four guests wine drinkers, with the rest going for beer, wine, cocktails or apple juice? Grab four bottles and maybe an extra for anyone who changes their mind.What is it going to cost?Don’t be afraid to tell your local retailer what you are looking to spend. Whether you want to splurge or save, knowing your budget allows them to get you the absolute best bang for your buck. There are a lot of light-bodied, high-acid, simple well-made wines in the $10-$15 range. In fact, spend more than $35 and you are probably looking at something more complex than you need for these purposes.The holidays are stressful. Wine should be the fun part. Consider the questions above before you buy, find a retailer you trust, and all you’ll have to worry about is not burning the pie.

What To Drink With Your Thanksgiving Feast

More from the New York Sun

Pam Bondi Plows Past ‘Paperwork Mistake’ To Revive Criminal Prosecutions Against Letitia James and James Comey

How Margot Robbie Made Girlboss Cinema a Brand

Judge Blocks Trump Administration From Cutting Funds to California for Not Disclosing Students’ Gender Transitions to Parents

More from the New York Sun

Pam Bondi Plows Past ‘Paperwork Mistake’ To Revive Criminal Prosecutions Against Letitia James and James Comey

How Margot Robbie Made Girlboss Cinema a Brand

Judge Blocks Trump Administration From Cutting Funds to California for Not Disclosing Students’ Gender Transitions to Parents

‘Wuthering Heights’ Is a Mad, Bad, and Sexy Romp That Makes Brontë ‘Brat’

Pro-Hamas Activist Provokes Outrage — by Insisting Dogs Should Be Homeless

The Democrats Beyond the Water’s Edge

Student Sues University of Michigan, Claiming It Mistook Her Anxiety-Ridden Writing Style for AI

Bipartisan Group in Congress Warns of ‘Serious Safety Risk’ From Illegal Biolabs