Fortifying your cooking

After yesterday's screed against recipes that don't sufficiently specify fortified wines in their lists of ingredients, today I'll be more helpful and offer some general guidelines.

Sherry: Usually Fino or Amontillado. Fino (including Manzanilla, which is simply a Fino aged in the town of Sanlúcar de Barrameda) is the lightest, driest style of Sherry, and works in almost any recipe. Amontillado (a Fino that's aged longer in barrel) has a more assertive, nuttier flavor. I reserve it for recipes with mushrooms, game birds, and other hearty flavors.

Port: Usually Ruby, but a younger, simpler Tawny can work. Ruby is the most wine-like of Port styles - i.e., it's still sweet and rich, but it has more fresh, red-fruit flavors. Tawny Port is aged a long time in barrel, which gives it the tawny color and more nutty, caramel-y flavors. One practical issue: Tawny keeps for a long time after you open the bottle, so it's a good choice for occasional cooking and occasional drinking. Ruby Port usually loses its freshness within a week or two. If you have some Vintage or LBV (Late Bottled Vintage) in an open bottle, those will work, too, but don't buy these for cooking. Chowhound has a recent discussion about Ruby versus Tawny in cooking.

Madeira: Sercial or Verdelho if you can find and afford them; otherwise Rainwater. Sercial is the lightest and driest style. Verdelho is a little fruitier and rounder. Rainwater is similar to Verdelho in character, but a lot simpler and cheaper. Bual and Malmsey are too rich and sweet for most savory dishes; save them for drinking! This page includes a detailed guide to Madeira grape varieties and styles.

Marsala: Dry for savory dishes (especially fowl; for example, Chicken alla Marsala and some versions of Chicken alla Marengo; also veal scaloppini). Sweet for sweet dishes (zabaglione, tiramisù, etc.)

Chowhound has a useful discussion of using Port versus Madeira in cooking.

Two caveats:

(1) As usual, don't use any wine for cooking that you wouldn't drink. In particular, avoid "cooking Sherry" and other, similar travesties. They're usually of terrible quality and often are adulterated with salt and/or additives.

(2) Sherry, Port, Madeira, and Marsala are among the world's great wine styles, so don't limit them to cooking!

Of recipes and fortified wines

Today I'm making roasted guinea hen with bay leaves, Madeira, & dates. The recipe is from Judy Roger's exceptional book, The Zuni Cafe Cookbook. I really love this cookbook; it's detailed, well-written, and deeply insightful - not to mention, full of great recipes. Her roast chicken recipe trumps all others, in my view.

However, I have a quibble and a more general criticism:

(1) Gerald Asher's wine pairing recommendations are way too specific. For example, he recommends Qupé Central Coast Syrah 1999 for this guinea hen recipe. Asher justifies this specificity as an expression of real wines from real people and places. OK, but including the vintage?!

(2) The guinea hen recipe calls for 1/2 cup Madeira. What kind of Madeira? Rainwater? Sercial? Bual? Malmsey? These are vastly different types of wines, from the relatively light and dry (for Madeira) Rainwater style to the thick, rich, sweet, Port-like Malmsey. They would give vastly different results in the recipe.

The latter is, of course, a general gripe about recipe writers. I've lost count of the number of times customers have come into the wine shop asking for a fortified wine for a recipe (Sherry, Port, Madeira, or Marsala), without any guidance in the recipe about what style of the specified wine category to use. Each of these is a wine region that makes a variety of very different styles of fortified wines, from dry to sweet, lighter to richer, fresher to more aged.

We often can figure out a reasonable recommendation from the style and other ingredients of the recipe, but it isn't always obvious. These generic suggestions also reflect either sloppiness or ignorance on the part of the recipe writer. Would anyone get away with publishing a recipe that says "sauté 1 lb. of meat and add 1 tsp. of some herb that grows in Provence"?!

So here's my plea to recipe writers: When you specify a fortified wine as a recipe ingredient, indicate what kind (or kinds, if there's more than one option):

Sherry: Fino? Amontillado? Oloroso? Cream? PX?
Port: Ruby? Tawny? LBV? Vintage?
Madeira: Rainwater? Sercial? Bual? Malmsey?
Marsala: Dry? Sweet?

By the way, I'm using dry Marsala instead of Madeira with this recipe, simply because I have a bottle of Marsala open. If I were going to use Madeira, I'd probably choose Rainwater.