<i> the strategy of</i> WINE <i> & </i> FOOD

Matching food and wine is a game much like any other. A lot of the enjoyment comes from how much you are willing to put into it.

Many Americans don’t understand soccer. They say there is no score; there is no excitement. But there is so much that goes into a soccer game that someone like me, who has been living soccer all his life, will appreciate. You understand the position of the players, the harmonies and the strategy of the game.

Personally, I think people who watch baseball are crazy. But I know people who tell me what it means when they see the infield drawn in or whatever. You know there is a logic to it. And to a purist, there is nothing more fascinating than a game of strategy.

There is an enormous strategy for matching food and wine. We must look carefully at what we are serving and how the food is prepared, but we must also think about the role of the wine in this marriage. It’s a whole art, because behind each wine there is the philosophy of a winemaker, the history of a land ... a distinctive approach. Those are the intricacies that are the pleasure of learning more about wine.

Everything worthwhile requires education. Everything requires a novitiate, a time of initiation. You have to study, you have to taste, you have to think. You have to understand the difference between this wine and that wine, and then how they are with different dishes. Then your appreciation will be opened up and enlarged.

All of these things become intensely important in the dialogue between wine and food. We read a lot, we taste a lot, we think a lot, we search a lot and we have the ability then to put all of this into the pleasure of a meal.

Above all, there has to be the natural pleasure of experimenting, of being aggressive with your choices. Sure, you can have your steak and your glass of Cabernet and that can be the end of it. But if you want to really tease your palate, to satisfy your palate the right way, you have to think about it.

This doesn’t mean that every meal should be an ordeal. This experimentation is not something you can do every day in life. You might be able to drink a great bottle of wine every day, but not with the same energy you have when you’ve spent some time looking forward to a great dinner. That’s when you expect more than the normal, when you want everything to converge, so that at the end of the experience you are fulfilled and satisfied.

On the other hand, there are times you just don’t want to have to think about all of that. There are times when you just want to eat and drink for comfort, when you want things to be familiar. You know exactly what to expect from a piece of meat, what to expect from a dish of pasta, what to expect from a straightforward Chianti, and you just leave it at that.

Paying attention to food and wine doesn’t necessarily mean spending a lot, either. Sometimes it’s so frustrating to see people name-dropping a bottle of wine just because it costs so much money or because Robert Parker gave it a very high score. But they don’t understand what they are drinking. What’s important is to take your time and to try to understand, to make sense of the wine.

Eating good food is wonderful and so is drinking good wine. Put the two things together and they are extrapleasurable. Once you can appreciate the intricacies of good food, you already know that this is one of the big joys in life. If you add wine to it, it will be an even more complete sense of appreciation.

You will have the highest understanding the ballgame. It will be like looking at the quarterback or the pitcher or the center half and understanding their position and the strategy. A great meal is among our most pleasurable memories. There are a lot of days to our lives, but here and there, sometimes there is a meal that really excites you.

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Selvaggio is owner of Valentino restaurant in Santa Monica, which is world-renowned for its wine list. He is also co-author of “The Valentino Cookbook” (Villard Books, $34.95)