What is the best wine to pair with Mexican food?

Anthony Gopal responds: ‘When you’re pairing wine with Mexican food, more than anything, you should look for something with freshness and lower alcohol. You never want to have high alcohol when you’re thinking about spice, because they amplify each other. Mexican food is about salsa, garnishes and lime. There’s always going to be some sort of bright sourness, so you want something with some zip to balance that. Any wine that’s what you would call ‘rounded’ will end up feeling flat compared to the food. Unless you’re a bit of a masochist and you want to set your throat on fire, you don’t want to be drinking 15% ABV with habanero chillies. When pairing wine with Mexican food, freshness is the first thing that springs to mind, but don’t be afraid of intensity. That’s not to say tannins or high alcohol, but things which are aromatic are great and things which have concentration are always good. People think you have to have a really light, dry white wine with anything spicy like Mexican food. But these things just get washed away. If you end up with a Picpoul or whatever, it just turns into water by comparison. So don’t be afraid to drink red wine with spicy, smoky food. Something like a Pinot Noir is great – you’ve got the fruit but you’ve got earthiness and mushroomy flavours. There needs to be some underlying smoke. Pinot Noir is great because you can have the intensity without having high alcohol and high tannins.