What beers and wines go best with everyday foods? An article in the Minneapolis Star Tribune from a year and a half back got me thinking about regional foods and the ap­posite pairings.

The Strib doesn’t emphasize gourmet, foodie foods; rather Bill Ward (wine guy) and Michael Agnew (beer guy) address pairings with more ordinary fare:

Of particular interest to me, more than the details of the suggested pairings, was the regional slant exhibited by the list of foods the newspaper chose. Here they are:

The items in red would assuredly not appear on any New England list of everyday foods, though most of the others might. In fact I would wager that some of my right-coast readers couldn’t even identify all of those red items with assurance. (For example I had never heard the term “brats” — for bratwurst sausages — nor eaten cheese curds until I moved to flyover country.)

And s’mores? I doubt that Easterners would necessarily consider s’mores a common everyday food. Here are some purported s’mores facts (although how authoritative a source is “BrandPoint, Free Premium Content?”):

• National S’mores Day is August 10
• An average of 2.1 million s’mores are consumed nationwide each summer
• Grand Rapids, Michigan is the epicenter of the s’mores phenomenon

So perhaps we can assert that the Upper Midwest is more s’mores-obsessed than the East.

Here are a few foods that New Eng­landers might well add to such a list.

• grinders
• Boston clam chowder
• franks & beans

Contrapositively, Midwest readers might not have a clue about “grinders,” a.k.a. hoagies or subs.

I looked for a similar list of beer / wine pairings for everyday foods with a New England slant, but came up mostly with lists (such as this one) of seafood dishes and their rec­om­mended accom­paniments. A year ago there was a restaurant in Winterport, Maine, asso­ciated with both a winery and a brewery there; it was called Pairings. Here’s a review. I don’t see current evidence that it is still in operation.