Which Wine Goes with Chinese Food?

Eating Chinese and drinking wine with it strikes many people as a contradiction — yet with the right bottle, Chinese food is one of the most rewarding pairings there is. Three wines cover almost any menu: an off-dry Riesling, a light Pinot Noir and a Gewürztraminer. Here you'll learn why residual sweetness decides between success and failure, which wine belongs with Peking duck, sweet and sour or Sichuan, and why the powerful red wine should stay at home.

Why These Wines Go with Chinese Food

Chinese cuisine is not one uniform flavour picture but a collection of very different regional kitchens: Cantonese mild and steamed, Sichuan hot and tingling, Beijing sweetish and savoury. What they share are three elements that challenge wine — soy sauce, meaning salt and umami, plenty of ginger and garlic, and often a sweetish component from hoisin, sugar or rice vinegar.

The most important mechanism is the sweetness rule: next to a sweetish dish, a wine always comes across as drier and more acidic than it is. Residual sweetness in the glass is therefore not a matter of taste with sweet and sour dishes, but the technical precondition for the pairing to work at all. That is exactly why Riesling is regarded internationally as the Chinese-food wine par excellence.

The second lever is the tannins. They react badly to salt and umami from soy sauce, come across as bitter and metallic as a result, and additionally amplify the heat. Red wine therefore has to be especially low in tannin here — and that practically always leads to Pinot Noir.

The third point is the aroma bridge: ginger, star anise, five-spice powder and sesame oil are intense and spicy. An aromatic white wine mirrors this profile, a neutral one disappears next to it.

The Recommendations in Detail

Riesling (off-dry) — the classic for almost everything

An off-dry Riesling is the most versatile wine for Chinese food and covers the three biggest challenges at once: sweetness in the dish, heat and soy sauce. With sweet and sour pork, fried noodles, dim sum or Sichuan dishes it is the most reliable choice. Price range: 9 to 16 euros. Buying tip: look for “feinherb” or “halbtrocken” from the Mosel or the Rheingau and for an alcohol level below 12 percent — the spicier the dish, the more that matters.

Pinot Noir (light) — for duck and hoisin

If it absolutely has to be red wine, there is hardly a way past Pinot Noir. Its bright cherry fruit, fine acidity and restrained tannin make it the ideal partner for Peking duck, stir-fried beef in oyster sauce or Char Siu. Price range: 12 to 22 euros. Buying tip: choose a light version not aged in new oak, from Baden, the Pfalz or Burgundy — barrique notes and soy sauce get along badly.

Gewürztraminer — for ginger and five-spice powder

Gewürztraminer with lychee, rose, ginger and exotic spice is the most aromatic option and suits dishes with plenty of ginger, star anise or five-spice powder especially well. With spicy Sichuan dishes it is a very good choice too, thanks to its body and gentle residual sweetness. Price range: 11 to 19 euros. Buying tip: from Alsace or South Tyrol; a noticeable but not sticky residual sweetness is an explicit advantage with spicy dishes.

Which Dish, Which Wine?

These Wines Don't Work

Powerful, tannic red wines like Cabernet Sauvignon, Barolo or a hefty Bordeaux are the most common wrong choice. Tannins and soy sauce add up to a bitter, metallic combination — and with spicy dishes it becomes downright unpleasant.

Dry white wines with sweet and sour dishes come across as sour and thin next to the sauce. Without residual sweetness in the glass the balance tips, no matter how good the wine is in its own right.

Powerful, oak-aged Chardonnays bury ginger, spring onion and sesame. Buttery toasty aromas find hardly any point of contact in Chinese cooking.

Serving Temperature & Practical Tips

• Off-dry Riesling: 8 to 10 degrees — well chilled, the cooling effect of the residual sweetness is stronger.
• Pinot Noir: 14 to 16 degrees — clearly cooler than room temperature, otherwise it comes across as alcoholic next to soy sauce.
• Gewürztraminer: 9 to 11 degrees — too cold and it loses its aromatics.
• When sharing a meal everything is on the table at once: choose the wine for the spiciest or sweetest dish, not for the mildest.
• Sparkling wine is the underrated option for whole menus — bubbles suit deep-fried, steamed and fatty dishes alike.

Chinese food is astonishingly wine-friendly as soon as you move away from the standard dry bottle. With an off-dry Riesling as the all-rounder, a light Pinot Noir for duck and hoisin dishes and a Gewürztraminer for anything spicy, you'll almost always be right. For duck in detail and for the related Thai cuisine you'll find dedicated guides.