There are a few rules to drinking wine that everyone knows. For instance, never drink a red with fish, never drink a white with a steak, and drink dessert wines with dessert. Fancy wine people (when not drinking their fancy wines with their fancy meals, of course) accompany their favorite bottles with thin-sliced meats and expensive cheeses, and would never stoop to anything as mundane as popcorn – even if the rest of us are more likely to follow Olivia Pope’s lead on pairings than any leading sommelier.
But when there are Thin Mints in the cabinet (or, better yet, in the freezer) and good television shows on the DVR, it’s time to break some rules. So I invited Bryan Garcia of Grand Cru Selections to undertake the seemingly impossible: find wines for under $20 that wouldn’t just not clash with the five most popular Girl Scout cookies – Thin Mints, Samoas, Trefoils, Tagalongs and Do-si-dos – but would actually compliment them.
My inspiration was a graphic designed by the folks at Vivino, which puzzlingly paired Thin Mints with a Brunello (a combination that made one of Gizmodo’s taste testers’ mouth “angry”). I knew there had to be something in the world that you could pair with the iconic and time-sensitive treats that would make them even easier to swallow and more grown-up then I remembered.
So, while on Garcia’s Instagram and Twitter accounts you’re more likely to find foods that make your mouth water and wines that would take your breath (and a lot of your money) away, he agreed to bite the bullet and a Samoa or two for the cause.
Spoiler alert: he’s really good at picking out wines. Here are the matches:
- The shortbread Trefoil: the French sparkling wine Domaine de la Louvetrie Atmosphéres NV ($16.99)
- The chocolate-caramel-coconut Samoa: a 2013 Fuori Strada Toscano Rosso Sangiovese ($13.99) from Italy – in a box!
- The peanut butter wafers and peanut butter creme Do-si-dos: a 2014 Clos de la Roilette Fleurie Cuvée Christal ($19.99) from France
- Chocolate-and-peanut-butter Tagalongs: a Shebang Red Ninth Cuvee California ($14.99)
- Thin Mints: a 2014 Envinate Albahra Garnacha from Spain ($19.99)
Lights, Camera, Girl Scout Cookies! pic.twitter.com/1bePIfcJmj
— Bryan Garcia (@corkhoarder) March 30, 2016
And while I (and our volunteer taste tester, Guardian reporter Sam Thielman) can attest to Bryan’s skills – the Garnacha he chose not only stood up to the challenge of tasting good with chocolate infused with peppermint oil, but made you notice the cocoa in the actual cookie underneath, and the Loire valley sparkling wine made the normally boring Trefoil taste special – it’s also a good reminder that the wine can do more than just get you drunk.
At its best, wine paired with the right foods can make both the wine and the food taste better. The reason you don’t pair a steak and a white wine, as I found out on my 21st birthday courtesy of my ex-boyfriend with terrible taste in wine, is that a citrus-y white is going to taste horrible after a bite of a peppercorn encrusted steak, and the steak is going to taste worse after the wine. Pairing a tilapia and a Bordeaux is going to make the wine taste off and the fish, depending on how it’s prepared, not taste at all.
You might not be a wine expert like Bryan, but sometimes when you want to get picking out a wine just right, go to a shop that specializes in wine and ask a clerk, or ask for the sommelier in a nice restaurant, and take their advice. Don’t assume that your best pairing is something fairly bland like popcorn, or that pairing has to be deadly serious and only in service of expensive wine and expensive foods. A little thought and help in choosing your next wine might make even your Wednesday night spaghetti and meatballs taste better than it did last week.
I mean, if it can work for a Thin Mint, it can work for anything.
