Why You Shouldn't Pair White Wine With Nuts

There are a lot of snack foods that taste lovely with a glass of crisp, cool white wine. Potato chips (see how our favorites ranked), popcorn, briny olives, and even chips with guacamole taste fantastic with a bright wine. And while you might even include a bowl of nuts in this picture, there may be a better way to go. The Takeout recently spoke with master sommelier and editor-in-chief of Planet Grape Wine Review, Catherine Fallis, who believes that, when it comes to pairing wines with nuts, reds are a much better choice.

She noted, "Nuts are bold, rich and oily [without] salt or added seasonings. Most whites and rosé wines are too delicate and their flavors and silky textures would be lost. Red wines have more 'bite' if you will, usually from time spent in [the] barrel, and therefore are on more even footing." If it's white wine you want, however, Fallis suggests giving some unconventional pairings a try for some surprisingly delicious results — "french fries and champagne; Doritos and riesling; Cheetos and rosé."

Fallis also specified that happy hour-favorite, mixed nuts, which typically include peanuts, walnuts, cashews, almonds, and pecans, "are rich enough to move into lighter reds, such as bardolino from Italy or pinot noir from Chile." By the way, if you don't finish those mixed nuts, you can use them to make homemade orgeat. 

Nuts are full of interesting flavors and textures. They can be creamy, crunchy, toasty, even a little bitter or kind of sweet. In a way, they are just as nuanced as wines are, with the latter's endless flavor profiles and mouthfeels. Just like matching wine with any type of food, there may be some pairings that are better than others. Consider walnuts, which have a bitter, almost sour quality from the skins. To balance this out, a red on the sweeter side would be a good choice. Port wines and sweet Lambruscos would taste lovely with walnuts. At the same time, if you have a very dry or robust cabernet sauvignon or malbec, the bitterness in the nut may even complement the heavy tannins in the wines.

Pinot noir is a fantastic red varietal to pair with a number of nuts, as it tends to be on the lighter side with bright fruit flavors. It will stand up to flavored nuts like rosemary cashews, truffled almonds (truffles clearly aren't just for fine dining anymore), spicy peanuts, and pecans flavored with butter and sage. Many merlots can be described as having a soft mouthfeel, which makes them a wonderful partner to nuts that have a creamy texture, like pecans, Brazil nuts, and roasted chestnuts. With that said, roasting brings out excellent flavors in any kind of nut, making them richer and toastier, which may, generally, make them better suited for pairing with red wine.