Welcome to brain Stuff, a production of iHeartRadio. Hey brain Stuff. I'm Lauren vogelbaumb and this is a classic episode of the podcast. It has to do with a relationship between cheese and wine, which I've been thinking about because the holiday season is upon us, a time when cheese plates are blissfully prevalent, and it turns out there are science reasons why wine and cheese can pair so well together.
Hey brain Stuff, Lauren vocal bomb here. A wine lover's on the whole probably don't need any particular excuse to pare a glass with a rich cheeseboard, but a recent study in the journal Food Science shows what people have long suspected cheese improves the taste of different types of wine.
Researchers at the Center for Taste and Feeding Behavior in France asked thirty one French wine drinkers to taste four different wines, first on their own, then with each of four different cheeses to see if and how the taste
of the wine changed by the cheese. The method used to evaluate the taste is called multi intake temporal dominance of sensations, which simply means that the drinkers were asked which taste sensations were dominant in length and intensity, or in layman's terms, which ones did you enjoy and why the wines were the same through all five tastings, a sweet white, a dry white, a full bodied red, and a fruity red. In the first session, the tasters took
three SIPs of each wine with no cheese. In the following sessions, they again took three SIPs, but in each session tasted a different cheese between SIPs. All four cheeses, ranging from creamy to semisoft and stinky to semihard too hard, were tasted with each wine. The study found that all of the wines tasted better after eating cheese, a less stringent and less sour, and in the case of the
fruity red, for example, that fruity flavor lasted longer. The lead researcher, Marigalmarini, told the Telegraph, we learned the duration of the perception of a stringency of a certain wine could be reduced after having cheese, and the four evaluated cheeses had the same effect. In short, when having a plate of assorted cheeses, the wine will probably taste better no matter which one they choose. Which is a relief to those of us who find creating pairings a clunky
prospect at best. The effect of the cheese is on the taste of the wines probably happened because the fat in cheese coats your mouth and reduces the dryness it might feel due to tannins from the wine. A bit of tannin in wines and other things like tea or mint is a fun sensation, but too much can be
puckery and unpleasant. Beyond making wine and cheese parties a potentially less expensive endeavor, the researchers have a practical application for this study to better understand how the taste of food can change when paired with other foods, leading to new and possibly better meals as different foods are served together. Today's episode is based on the article Cheese really does make Wine taste better on how stuffworks dot Com, written
by Aaron Kirkpatrick. Brings Up is production of iHeartRadio in partnership with stuffworks dot Com and is produced by Tyler Klang. Four more podcasts from my heart Radio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.