"I'll Just have half a bottle of Blue Nun"

As said Alan Partridge when asked to choose a bottle of wine for his disastrous meal with the Head of BBC programming. I have to admit that my choice of beverage is a little more refined than Blue Nun!

It's a funny thing though, how we decide what to drink when matching it with a meal. For example, I would never have wine with curry. That is strictly a beer domain. On the other hand, I would never have beer with Italian food, always red wine.

When I was in America I took to having cocktails with my food, e.g. a Whisky Sour with my steak or a Mint Julep with my southern fried chicken. Perhaps it was because they were cheaper there and they make them so much better than they do here.

But I think what it really comes down to is that we like to re-enact scenarios when we partake of food and drink together. So if I was eating a thin crust pizza topped with pepperoni, I instinctively want to match it with a nice Chianti and imagine myself in some traditional trattoria in Naples with checked table cloths and opera music playing.

On a final note, something I never understand is men who have pints of beer or bitter with a three course meal, be it French, Modern European or British when everyone else is drinking wine. A pint has its place with food and preferably that is in a country pub with a ploughman's. Is it because they see drinking a glass of wine as effeminate? Get over it. And don't give me this "I don't like wine" nonsense. All wines taste different.

No, it all comes back to Alan Partridge...the sort of man who would prefer a nice big pint of Directors with his farfalle pasta, or action man bow-ties as he calls them. Remember this the next time you match a pint of Fosters with your slowly poached wild sea bass in a sea urchin and vermouth sauce!