Barbecue!

In line with my earlier post about what to have for wine in the summer... I got to thinking this morning, "how do I like to eat in the summer?"

The answer, of course, is barbecue.  What could be more summery -- no matter where you live -- than meat cooked low-n-slow over a fire, with sauce?

So, what kind of wine should go with barbecue?  Of course, it depends on the style.

North Carolina style barbecue, with it's vinegar-based sauce and hefty use of pork, screams out for a heavier white.  Interestingly, I'd be curious to try Chateau Carbonnieux -- a fairly hefty and rich Bordeaux blanc -- with it.  White Rhone would go well, as would an uber-buttery Chardonnay.

A pulled pork sandwich, with it's heavier tomato-based sauce and distinct smoky/spicy notes would go well with Tempranillo, or an Australian Shiraz.  The sweet and spicy notes in the wine would pair off with the food.

Kansas City, with it's dry rub and side serving of molasses-based sauce screams out for a high-test Aussie Shiraz.  Depending on how spicy the rub is, Zinfandel might go well here -- I'm particularly thinking of Macchia, which makes a very high-test (15.5%-16.5% ABV!) zin.

So, there you have it -- for barbecue, it's pretty hard to go wrong with Shiraz, Tempranillo, or Zin.  Big fruit, spice, lots of weight, often a touch sweet.

Barbecue -- it's not just for beer anymore.

Image from gbleem at en.wikipedia.org.  Used under GNU Free Documentation License.

Taking the bull by the horns

Full disclosure: This wine was tasted at a free tasting with the importer, and I chose to purchase the bottle shown in the picture for later consumption at home.

Toro is a relatively new region in Spanish wine; the DO (Denominacion de Origin) was created in 1987 with only a handful of wineries.  In the last 20 years, though, a number of producers have moved into the area, increasing the number to about 40.  The primary grape here is Tinto de Toro, which is the local name for Tempranillo.  Stylistically, the wines tend to be more New World in style than their brethren from other Spanish DO's, such as Rioja.

An example would be T Toro, of which I've just recently tried the 2006.  According to the importer, the wine comes from 50+ year old Tempranillo vines grown in a sandy soil.  Interestingly enough, the vines are all ungrafted vinefera, as the sandy soil helps to prevent phylloxera.  The wine is bottled under Stelvin, rather than cork, another indication of the progressiveness of the Toro winemakers.

The wine is an opaque purple, with a thin ruby rim.  A swirl and sniff shows the New World character of the wine immediately; there's a ton of fruit to smell, mainly blackberry and cherry.  Some spice notes, kind of like baking cinnamon.  Sipping shows lots of explosive, jammy fruit.  Lots of flavor here, with the spice moderated -- indeed, almost completely covered -- by the berries.  The wine feels a bit top heavy, with too much going on in the forepalate and not much at the end.  That being said, the finish is rather long, about 45 seconds of blackberry jam.  89 points.

Good example of an everyday wine -- it cost me $9 to buy a bottle -- that would pair off quite well with a number of meals.  Off the top of my head, I can think of gourmet burgers (especially with sauteed sweet onions), pork chops with apple sauce, and my father's pork tenderloin in honey Jack Daniels marinade all as being good pairings.