Salmon fillet

Salmon fillet

Assuming a salmon fillet roasted or pan fried with a crisp skin, served with lemon or a light sauce.

Salmon is the oiliest and richest of the everyday fish, dense and mild, so it can take a wine with more weight than white fish can, even a light red. Its oils still react with oak to taste metallic, so whatever the colour, the wine should be unoaked or nearly so. Fresh acidity cuts the richness.

Pairs Perfectly. Pale rosé made from Pinot Noir, France. Dry, red fruited and sharp, with enough body for rich fish and no oak at all. It suits the colour and weight of salmon closely, and it is modestly priced.

Pairs Well. Frappato, Sicily, Italy. A pale, light red with strawberry and almost no tannin, served cool, one of the few reds that flatters oily fish.

Pairs Well. Dry Riesling, Mosel, Germany. Lime and slate on searing acidity, which cuts the oil of the fish cleanly.

Worth Seeking Out

Trollinger from Alto Adige, Italy. Pale, soft and almond scented with cherry fruit, drunk cool in the Alps with river fish and salmon.

Avoid

Oaked wines and firmly tannic reds. Oak and tannin both react with the oils in salmon to leave a metallic taste.

Failing That

A Beaujolais Villages, France.

If All Else Fails

Sauvignon Blanc, Marlborough.

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