As with any seafood, tasting that beautiful ‘sea’ flavour is essential. However, if you go and pair it with a glass of heavy, oaky wine you bought from an online wine retailer, or at a restaurant, you run the risk of merely feeling the food in your mouth. You will lose all connection with the subtle delicacies of the flesh and how the flavour dances on your palate.

Therefore, when it comes to pairing shrimp with wine, you want to treat it like a complex surgery. Every ingredient of your shrimp dish must work well with each undertone of the wine, which can often seem like a challenging and impossible task. Even though it is difficult, it’s certainly not impossible. We aim to offer some classic pairing combinations from your kitchen below.

Vinho Verde

Any Vinho Verde lover will tell you that you don’t need food to drink it because it’s fabulous on its own. While that’s undoubtedly true, this particular wine is a match made in heaven with most shrimp dishes. The best part is – because it’s available in red, white, or rose, you are bound to find one you like – from the first sip to the very last.

Vinho Verde hails from Portugal where seafood is the dominant cuisine. As a result, it’s commonplace in every restaurant, online wine providers, and most homes of wine lovers as well. It’s a high-acidity wine which helps it to cut through the creaminess of seafood dishes, all the while cleansing your palate and quenching your thirst.

Even if you’re treating yourself to deep-fried and battered shrimp, Vinho Verde will still win out as a perfect accompaniment to the dish. In essence, it’s like squeezing lemon onto your meal with each bite and sip.

Dry Riesling

Some of the best dishes involving prawns are spicy. While they are delicious in every sense of the word, they do make choosing wine to accompany it a bit of a challenge. However, that’s where Dry Riesling comes into its own. Riesling comes in a range of white grape varieties, including sweet and dry. What makes it so suitable for hot and spicy dishes is its high acidity level. Riesling can cut through the spice of a meal while refreshing your palate and preparing it for the next bite.

Dry Italian White Wine

If you decide to incorporate a thick, luscious tomato base to your shrimp with incredible depth of flavour, then pair it with a dry Italian white wine from your local bottle store or online wine provider. If you’re enjoying such a dish at a restaurant, you may also like to ask the waiter which white wine they would recommend.

Because tomato bases typically have quite a hearty and “winter” feel to them, you often need to break through the richness to cleanse your palate. You can’t do this with any typical bottle of red, including those with high alcohol levels or hints of oak. Dry Italian white wine, on the other hand, is crisp, refreshing, light, and lean. It has a hint of sweetness without being overpowering, all the while cleaning your palate with each sip.

Shrimp is a popular ingredient in many dishes, but it can be challenging to pair it. Rather than risk spending money on wine that doesn’t work, consider any of these options above. You may find your restaurant or dining experience is far more pleasant as a result.