It’s that time of the year when the rule against chocolate dissolves like a Flake on Joss Stone’s tongue. A wine to go with it, sir / madam, or is wine and chocolate too much of a good thing? A friend who attended a chocolate and wine tasting recently found each match, to her dismay, worse than the preceding one as the presenter struggled to convince a sweet-toothed and willing audience that matching the two was as easy as falling off a chocolate log. The problem is that chocolate, especially milk chocolate which is both sweet and fatty, tends to strip wine of its natural fruit flavours, making it taste thin, lean and sour. Even a classic sweet wine like sauternes can suffer under the assault of chocolate’s lingering, mouthcoating sweetness. Can two such polar opposites ever attract? The answer is that they can, but only the most dedicated of chocaholics would put red wines and chocolate together.

The darker the chocolate, the more its fighting chance, especially with a wine that’s sufficiently rich and viscous not to curdle the wine. Dark chocolate contains an undertone of bitterness and dryness and the bitterer the betterer may be pidgin English but it’s no bad rule. Not a hard and fast one, mind, because the flavour profile of the wine and the chocolate also count. Take a sweet, rich Australian liqueur muscat like Buller’s Rutherglen Muscat, £8.99, Majestic; on its own, its unctuous rose petal richness borders on the cloying. Try it with a dark chocolate like Lindt Excellence Chilli Dark and it turns into a match made in heaven as the wine tastes of muscat and the chilli sings. Can a golden sweet wine ever work then? Just about, but to retain the marmaladey sweetness of a Brown Brothers 2007 Orange Muscat and Flora, £4.99, down from £6.49, 37.5 cl, Somerfield, or the luscious pineapple and mango richness of a 2006 Feilinger Artinger Beerenauslese, Burgenland, 37.5 cl, £9.99, Waitrose, you need the acid foil of raspberries, albeit sprinkled with chocolate flakes.

Why not take the vinous high ground and your liquid sweetness with a more time-honoured match. Port and stilton, roquefort and sauternes, are statements of the obvious point that a rich sweet wine loves the savoury, salty and creamy. A sweet botrytis wine or nobly rotten, wine such as the 2005 Bimbadgen Estate Botrytis Semillon, £6.99, Majestic, 37.5 cl, or Patricia Atkinson’s extraordinarily richly honeyed 2003 Clos d’Yvigne, Saussignac, 50 cl, £21, Justerini & Brooks (020 7484 6400), work a treat with a creamy blue like the cow’s milk St.Agur and firmer Fourme d’Ambert or our own goaty Harbourne Blue. Classic tawny ports such as the sweetly cinnamon-spiced, Christmas puddingy Taylor’s 20 Year Old Tawny, £26.99, Sainsburys, Selfridges, Threshers, Waitrose, have a similarly devastating effect. Washed rind cheeses can be harder to match but a fresh, creamy goat’s cheese is a perfect foil for a delicate floral riesling such as Dr. Loosen’s 2006 Riesling Beerenauslese £9.99, 18.75 cl, Waitrose, whose richness is but cut by a trenchantly zesty tang.

Madeira can range in style from the sophistication of Henriques & Henriques 15 Year Old Verdelho, 50 cl, around £17.00, Waitrose, The Sampler (0207226 9500), Noel Young (01223 844744), whose burnt caramel undertones carry Portugal’s sub-tropical island’s trademark tangy refreshing blade of acidity, to the nutty crème brûlée richness and tang of a 10 Year Old Malmsey, Madeira, Broadbent Selections, £25.95, Berry Bros & Rudd (0870 900 4300). From southern France’s Pyrenean corner, a traditional alternative to port such as Maury can act as a great partner for Fourme d’Ambert or Stilton; like the 1928 Maury Solera, £12.95, 50 cl., Tanners, Shrewsbury (01743 234500), begun in the earliest days of the Maury co-operative, which combines rich caramel and raisin flavours with the nutty, aged rancio effect of an oloroso sherry. Or, since it’s Easter, what better way to mark the occasion than with vin santo, Italy’s holy wine, and Trentino’s lusciously sticky and concentrated, yet elegantly citrusy, Arele Vin Santo, £18.99, 50 cl, D. Byrne & Co., Clitheroe (01200 423152). Let us prey.

Wine: Something for the Weekend

Under a Fiver
2007 Misterio Oak Aged Malbec, Finca Flichman
Made from pure malbec and aged in oak, this is a ripe, but not overpowering, juicy red made from Argentina's signature grape, with generous plum supported by damsony acidity.
£4.99, Morrisons

Under a Tenner
Veuve Edouard Champagne
Treat yourself to a cut-price champagne this Easter: this attractive example doesn't pretend to be Cristal, but has light, crisp, youthful and lemony flavours.
£9.99, normally £19.99, Somerfield, until Tuesday

Splash Out
2001 Clos du Mont Olivet Châteauneuf du Pape
This classic southern Rhône blend has a leathery aromatic complexity and mellow tannins, with spice-infused richness and a succulence that avoids blandness.
£14.99, Majestic