Perfect Festive Food Pairings with Prosecco DOC

No festive season is complete without a few bubbles. But just before you start stocking your fridge with the same bottle of fizz you reach for every year, understanding the different styles of Prosecco DOC is integral to pairing and enjoying the wine throughout a meal. Looking at the label to identify whether you’re drinking a Brut, Extra Dry or Dry, makes a lot of difference.

Categorised in order from the driest to the sweetest according to Italian law, the following categories of Brut, Extra Dry, Dry or Demi-sec, indicate the residual sugar within each bottle of sparkling Prosecco DOC. Therefore, a Brut Prosecco is much drier than a Dry Prosecco and has a lovely crisp acidity making it better suited to main courses and ingredients such as fresh fish.

Prosecco DOC has put together a helpful guide about how to choose the right bubbles to pair with your food. From Boxing Day breakfast to party canapés, Christmas lunch to panettone or mince pies, with each festive mouthful, there’s a different variety of Prosecco DOC to enhance your eating experience.

Breakfast

Start the day as you mean to go on with a traditional Christmas breakfast of scrambled eggs and smoked salmon. Pair with a glass of Prosecco DOC Ca’di Rajo Brut Treviso it goes fabulously well with fish especially those with a gentle texture and umami flavours.

Canapés

Prosecco and canapés are a match made in heaven: the bubbles can open your palate before a good dinner, but if you make the wrong choice, it can spoil the appetite. Choose a drier style of Prosecco like the Prosecco DOC Astoria Galíe Extra Dry Treviso. This classy Prosecco, with its green apple and pear fruit and soft, smooth style adds the perfect balance to cured meats, antipasti boards and most canapés with a umami flavour. The wine has a rich body, yet is very elegant as a pairing wine. Another lovely pairing is the Prosecco DOC La Delizia Brut, a classy brut style, with aromas of pear drops, flavours of lime and apple, complemented with lovely intensity that makes this wine very versatile.

Christmas lunch – first course

 If you decide to squeeze in a first course before the main event, it’s probably a good idea to keep it light with a fish dish such as a fish soup with the fragrant aromatics of the mastic herb. A glass of Prosecco DOC Piera Martellozzo Brut is an ideal match with as the lovely crisp profile of acidity cuts through the salty fish but is gentle enough to accentuate the aromatics of the soup.

Christmas lunch – main course

What we’ve all been waiting for, the main event! Each family has their own tradition when it comes to the main course, and popular choices steer toward a goose, turkey, glazed ham or for some, a whole salmon, as the key feature of a Christmas spread. The soft creamy fizz of Prosecco DOC Bottega Millesimato 2017 Brut Treviso and Prosecco DOC Cantine Borga Millesimato 2017 Brut Treviso make a marvellous match for any of these choices as their neither too rich or too sweet to overwhelm the flavours. Other options to consider are Prosecco DOC Torresella Extra Dry or Prosecco DOC Val D’Oca Argento.

Christmas lunch – dessert 

Even though you’re completely stuffed from all the turkey, there’s always room for something sweet and indulgent for dessert – after all it is Christmas! For sweeter dishes and dessert, the same rules apply as with any other wines: the sweeter the dish, the sweeter wine. Pairing Extra Dry Prosecco DOC’s such as Prosecco DOC Sgàjo Extra Dry Vegan Treviso that has a soft, creamy and citrus character that brings the perfect harmony to Christmas Day. Prosecco DOC Terra Serena Extra Dry Treviso with its lively, fruity notes of apricot, apple and lovely balance works well with sweeter dishes or in particular, fine biscuits.