My Go-To Wines with Chilean Seafood

As pandemic restrictions are easing up, we were finally able to get out of Santiago and head to the coast. I visited a couple wineries (write-ups coming soon), but we also enjoyed a lot of seafood. Therefore, I wanted to talk about my go-to whites with seafood and give an overview of Chilean seafood. 

Obviously there are a lot of types of seafood dishes in Chile with 4,000 miles of coastline and a lot of great wines that can work with those dishes. We have some general wine pairing resources here. However, I want to limit myself to typical Chilean seafood options around the Viña del Mar coastal region (the closest coastal region to Santiago) and two of my favorite whites with seafood. 

What’s wonderful about Chile is you’re never more than a couple hours from the Andes mountains or from the coast, where you can experience beautiful beaches and fresh seafood. In fact, you can experience both. Where we stayed in Concon, just north of Vina del Mar, we could see Mount Aconcagua, South America’s highest mountain, from our balcony. That’s how thin Chile is as a country and high the Andes are. That’s also what gives Chile such a wonderful wine-growing climate throughout the country as far north as the Atacama desert and as far south as Patagonia. On the other hand, it’s difficult to remain thin in Chile with so many fresh, simple and yummy seafood options. If you come to Chile, here’s what you can find: 

Raw Seafood Options

Many of the coastal towns have a caleta, or fisherman’s cove, where you see colorful fishing boats and you can find a seafood market. There are many seafood restaurants to choose from too. The most common local raw seafood dish you can get is ceviche, which is essentially raw fish with lemon or lime juice and other seasonings. There are several recipes (ie Chilean and Peruvian styles) and options of which type of raw fish or mussels they’ll put in there. If you’re adventurous, one thing in your ceviche you can only try in Chile and Peru is piure, which tastes sort of like a chewy sea urchin and looks like an organ of an alien lifeform. There are also various raw scallop (ostiones) dishes you can find. 

Speaking of sea urchin, I already did a post about it, but it should be mentioned that sea urchin (erizos in Spanish) and oysters (ostras) are incredibly cheap in Chile compared to many other parts of the world. For example, I bought large oysters for about 50 cents each at the grocery store. In the US, it’d cost 6-10 times as much. Your average seafood restaurant on the coast is also well-priced compared to Santiago or other countries. 

In addition to South American dishes, there are sushi restaurants all over Chile, especially Santiago. It’s practically as common as empanadas or burgers as an everyday lunch option. Most are cheap, Chilean/Peruvian versions of sushi featuring a lot of avocado, raw salmon, chives and cheese. This type of sushi is served in rolls or gohan (in bowls of rice). It’s cheap and tasty, but not necessarily what you’d find in a Japanese or American sushi restaurant.  Generally the raw salmon is fresh because Chile has some of the biggest salmon farms in the world in the south of Chile and exports a lot of salmon. On the other hand, the raw tuna they serve is usually not as fresh. More authentic Japanese restaurants do exist in Santiago, but you’ll have to pay more. That’s why you’re better off sticking to Santiago for the best sushi rather than the coast.  

You can also find Peruvian ceviche-sushi fusion options and various other Peruvian raw food dishes such as tiraditos, basically sashimi strips with a sauce, and causas, a cold mashed potato salad which can have cooked or raw seafood on them.  

Cooked Seafood Options 

Besides raw fish in ceviche, essentially all fish can be a la plancha (grilled) or frito (deep fried). The most common fish you’ll find are salmon, tuna, merluza (hake), reineta (a flat-fish), corvina (croaker) and congrio (a type of cusk eel although it’s usually wrongly translated as conger eel). What you won’t often find is Chilean Sea Bass, which is the North American name for the Patagonian Toothfish that’s called deepsea bacalao (bacalao de profundidad) in Chile. I have found regular seabass (robalo) though. Grilled octopus (pulpo) is also quite common and so delicious. 

Another common dish is baked machas (a type of clam) or in-shell scallops covered with cheese, usually parmesan. In addition, you can have all sorts of seafood made in pil-pil sauce (a garlic oil sauce), such as shrimp and scallops.  There are also baked casserole dishes called pastel/chupe de jaiba (a type of crab) which is creamy and buttery. You can replace the jaiba with mixed mussels (choritos), scallops or loco (a local small type of abalone) too. Finally there are various seafood soups/stews such as paila marina or some type of caldo/sopa de mariscos (seafood soup).      

Lastly, probably the best and cheapest dish you can find on the coast is seafood empanadas. These empanadas are typically deep-fried and filled with cheese and some type of seafood such as crab, shrimp, etc. Concon has the best seafood empanadas we’ve ever had.  However, I should give honorable mention to the baked tuna empanadas you can find on Easter Island. 

There are other seafood dishes in other parts of Chile, especially Patagonia with their centolla (king crab) dishes, but these are the most common ones you’ll find in a restaurant in and near Valparaiso/Vina del Mar. Restaurants may also serve non-South American based dishes such as seafood pastas, risottos and Chinese-Peruvian styled chaufa de mariscos, or seafood fried rice. 

Wine Pairing #1

After 3+ years in Chile, my go-to white with any of these dishes has been basically any Chilean Sauvignon Blanc. 

The first reason is the price. I’ve spent as little as $5 at the store or $10 a bottle at a restaurant for a high quality Sauvignon Blanc to go perfectly with seafood. Typically $7-13 is all it will cost you at the supermarket. 

Secondly, it’s the varietal that’s easiest to find. Only Cabernet Sauvignon and Chardonnay are as common in stores. It’s also widely produced in many different regions of Chile. However, I prefer the ones made along the coast such as the Leyda Valley and coastal parts of Casablanca for most seafoods since the ocean air imparts a nice salinity to it and keeps it fresh. 

Thirdly, the quality is consistent at all price levels. Some may have more complexity and fullness, but even the cheapest Sauvignon Blanc more than gets the job done. In fact, the cheaper Sauvignon Blancs are actually the most preferable for lighter seafood dishes. Cheaper Sauvignon Blancs all have the requisite mix of acidity, minerality, salinity, dryness, and light palate cleansing feel that will compliment and won’t overpower any of the lighter seafood dishes. Even the more expensive and oaked Sauvignon Blanc keep that crisp feel.  Furthermore, the acidity will help cut through the creamier seafood dishes and the herbal notes compliment the seasoning of these dishes. They can even work with Asian seafood dishes. They’re also lovely on their own as aperitif. 

As far as Chilean Chardonnay, it varies too much in terms of style. Some have more oak and malolactic fermentation. It may not have the same acidity depending on where it’s from and the producer. The only dish I may consider getting a Chilean Chardonnay instead is the richer and creamy pastel de jaiba if it’s a more buttery Chardonnay. 

Wine Pairing #2

Long before moving to Chile, I first learned about wine and food pairings from my in-laws in Brittany, France, where you can find some of the best fruit de mer (seafood) in the world. One of my favorite meals during my first stay there was getting my hands dirty de-shelling and eating fresh oysters, langoustines, shrimp, sea snails, periwinkles and crab with a bottle of Muscadet on the coast.  Hence, prior to moving to Chile, my favorite seafood wine pairing, especially with raw and cold seafood dishes, was Muscadet. 

Although Brittany is known as a cider region, Muscadet is sort of Brittany’s honorary regional white wine because it comes from a part of the Loire Valley near Nantes that used to be part of Brittany. It’s made with the Melon de Bourgogne grape and is typically an unoaked light-bodied, dry, zesty and briny white wine that goes perfect with seafood. They are crisp, clean and simple although on the bottle, they often say sur lie. This means it was aged on their lees, or dead yeast particles, which can give it more complexity, such as bready notes. The more expensive and complex ones are aged longer sur lie. 

Similar to Chilean Sauvignon Blanc, it’s a wine you can find in most French supermarkets and it’s one of the cheaper wines you can find. 10-12 Euros is what you’d typically pay. It’s also just as consistent in quality and rarely disappoints. Both often have the influence of the ocean in their wines with a lot of citrusy notes.

Although I have other favorite seafood wine pairings, such as dry Riesling, Chablis, dry Champagne, Albariño or Sauvignon Blanc from other regions, it’s hard to beat the price, consistency and quality of Chilean Sauvignon Blanc and Muscadet. Plus, both are connected to places I’ve spent a lot of time. 

I had never had Muscadet in Chile though, so when I was able to find a Muscadet, I thought it was a perfect opportunity to see how it compares with Chilean Sauvignon in matching Chilean seafood. I drank them over a few days with several seafood dishes such as raw oysters, seafood empanadas, fried congrio, ceviche, seafood fried rice, machas a la parmesana, smoked salmon and grilled salmon. 

Tasting Notes

2018 Vina Casablanca Cefiro Cool Reserve Sauvignon Blanc Casablanca

Screw cap. What you expect from Chilean Sauvignon Blanc with herbal and salinic minerality. Palate of melon, a touch of citrus, minerality and something sort of spicy, mild jalapeno like. I’d like a little more acidity though. Otherwise a solid typical Sauvignon Blanc from Casablanca to go with seafood. 88 pts AC. 

This was only 5,000 CLP (~$6-7) at Supermercado Diez. This particular wine may not be widely distributed outside of Chile, but literally any other Chilean Sauvignon Blanc you can find will do well with seafood. 

2017 Domaine de la Pepiere Clos de Briord Muscadet

A biodynamic producer. They use natural yeast, and the wine spends 7 months sur lie without racking. Lighter and crisper than the Casablanca Sauvignon Blanc. The Sauvignon Blanc is sweeter and more viscous although it’s also certainly not a big wine. The Muscadet is definitely drier and in some ways is simpler and cleaner, with more citrus and salinic minerality. However, it doesn’t have the same herbal side the Sauvignon Blanc has. On the second day there’s a bit of bready notes from the yeast, similar to what you’d get in Champagne.  89-90 pts  AC.

I found this Muscadet at Edwards for around 13,500 CLP (~$18). It will cost around $13 in France and $15-25 outside of France. 

Conclusion

Both Chilean Sauvignon Blanc and Muscadet go well with just about any seafood, but this particular Chilean Sauvignon Blanc seemed better with heftier seafood dishes like the fried congrio and salmon since it’s fuller and has the herbal notes. It also went great with the ceviche because of that jalapeno taste which matches well with the yellow aji (chili pepper) they put in the ceviche.  On the other hand,  I preferred the Muscadet with the raw oysters over this particular Sauvignon Blanc because it had more acidity. However, there are other Sauvignon Blanc at this price range that are fresher and lighter and would work just as well as the Muscadet. 

Overall I feel Chilean Sauvignon Blancs are the more versatile seafood pairing. Maybe it’s just about local food with local wine, but it worked better with the seafood empanadas and ceviche while Muscadet is still my favorite raw oyster wine and in this case it was the better wine even if it wasn’t the better pairing for all the dishes.

What are your go-to wines with seafood?