Big BBQ Wines
With last Saturday’s nice weather, we finally fired up the BBQ for a proper backyard cookout following a satisfying afternoon of yard work. And with more nice weather on the way in the coming weeks, I thought big BBQ wines should be the focus of this week’s Capital Wine features. I picked a range of styles and price points to hopefully find something for everyone’s BBQ needs. Feel free to reach out if you’d like more suggestions…we have lots of options!
Leaping Horse Cabernet Sauvignon
If we were to play a word association game, saying the first thing that comes to mind from another word, “Cabernet” would be my association to “BBQ”. What is more classic with grilled red meat on the BBQ than a big red wine like Cabernet Sauvignon?? There is no shortage of epic high-end Cabernets out there, but what’s a little more rare is finding an outstanding go-to Cabernet under $20 that you can rely on day-in and day-out to help you with the grilling and to pair perfectly with your steak. Well, look no further than Leaping Horse.
Leaping Horse is the second label of the famous Ironstone Vineyards, owned by the Kautz family in the Lodi region of California. While the Kautz family now has a couple great wineries, their main family business for decades has been grape farming: growing excellent quality, sustainably certified grapes and selling them to other wineries. This has two benefits: 1) they get to keep all the best grapes for themselves at Ironstone and Leaping Horse, but 2) they also have less overhead with expensive grape costs and they can pass that value onto the customers. This is one of the reasons Leaping Horse and Ironstone have always over-delivered on value to price. This is everything you want in a modern Cali Cab: big dark blackberry jam with eucalyptus, coffee, and vanilla notes. Easy drinking and smooth, perfect for a glass while cooking, then a couple glasses with dinner. And one of the best parts is that this wine is completely bone dry. There is just 1.1 grams of residual sugar per litre. Wines of this style are usually in the range of 10-20 grams. It’s just the perfect climate and their excellent winemaking that makes it difficult to find a better California Cab for $16.
Finca Decero, Malbec 2017 | $25.99 x12
Not everyone is into the fruit-forward, big jammy styles of wine, instead looking for more structured and tannic reds built for melding into fat and protein. And my answer to that is Malbec from Argentina. These wines are famously inexpensive, and there are definitely some great examples of Malbec under $20 (including in our portfolio!) but this is truly one of the greatest Malbecs I’ve ever had. Finca Decero is the Cadillac of Mendoza wineries. It is set in the picturesque foothiills of the Andes Mountains at 1050 meters elevation, everything is grown organically, carefully harvested by hand, then sorted and re-sorted so that only the best grapes make it into the wine.
Finca Decero Remolinos Vineyard in Mendoza, Argentina.
This wine perfectly marries the earthy, gritty tannic-structure that is characteristic of the Malbec grape with a more nuanced elegant floral complexity not often seen in Mendoza. But how? “Elegant” and “floral” aren’t words usually used to describe Malbec? The Remolinos Vineyard where the winery is located is predominantly a gravelly terroir, which gives that classic rustic earthiness that Malbec is famous for. But there are also a few veins of sandy soil that runs through this vineyard on which Malbec is also planted. Years ago, they noticed a big difference in the wines from Malbec grown on those two different soils and began vinifying them separately and blending them together before bottling. The Malbec grown on the sandy soil was still a big wine, but much more delicate, pretty, and floral. So every year they blend a little bit of the Malbec grown on sandy soil into the majority gravel grown Malbec for the perfect package of dark fruit, earth, and muscular tannins, topped off with a refining floral complexity that jumps out of the glass. I visited the winery in 2012 and did some of this blending myself. It was absolutely amazing what the gravel and sand Malbecs tasted like separately, and how good they tasted when combined. Try this out with big fatty burgers and aged cheddar on the grill, or a big rib steak. You won’t regret it.
Bodegas Lanzaga, Telmo’s winery, hidden in the Rioja landscape.
Anyone who knows me, or follows this newsletter knows I LOVE Telmo Rodriguez. Instead of taking more time to wax poetic and rant about how great his wines are, I did a blog post all about Telmo and why I love his wines so much. If you want some more context, go read that here, then come back and check out this wine.
In keeping with Telmo’s philosophy of bringing back what he calls “pre-war” winemaking, he tries to remain true to Spain’s own rich history of winemaking. He seeks out “wild” abandoned vineyards of old bush vines and makes most of his wine in cement fermenters without any oak barrel aging. By fermenting and aging his wines in cement with wild indigenous yeast, he believes you get a purer expression of the terroir and a more authentically Spanish wine. Because there is so much complexity from the terroir and the earthy nuances that the wild yeast brings to the fermentation, people often think there is some oak influence in the LZ. But while there isn’t any oak in this wine, it is by no means a fruit bomb. It’s a field blend of mostly Tempranillo, Garnacha, and Graciano. They combine to make a wine with big dark fruit, spice, earth, even a bit of smokiness sometimes. The LZ is meant to be the village level wine to their top Rioja wine, Lanzaga. Both are named for their village of Lanciego. LZ is a very drinkable wine that’s quite complex, a little lighter bodied than the Malbec or Cabernet suggestions, but still very much suited for the BBQ. Think burgers or crispy shish kabob with zucchini, onions, roasted red peppers, etc. 10/10 pairing.
Castiglion Del Bosco, ‘Dainero’ 2018 | $23.99 x12
Castiglion Del Bosco is one of the most beautiful estates in all of Montalcino…or maybe all of Tuscany? Or even all of Italy? Click through from the email and watch the video on the website. It’s a historic 800 year old property that had fallen into some disrepair over the centuries until the Ferragamo family purchased it in 2003 and breathed new life into it. Salvatore Ferragamo was famous for pioneering haute-coture shoes, making high-end footware for the stars back in the golden era of Hollywood (Dorothy’s ruby slippers, John Wayne’s cowboy boots, etc). Their fame and fortune in fashion skyrocketed over the decades and in the 1990’s and 2000’s Salvatore’s sons and grandson diversified the family business into wine. Salvatore’s son Ferriccio and his grandson Salvatore Jr. oversee their Il Borro winery and his son Massimo oversees Castiglion Del Bosco. The estate is also a luxury resort with some villas, dining, spa, golf course, and horseback riding over it’s vast 5’000 acres. But wine is the primary focus of Del Bosco with it’s vineyards and winery, making some of the finest Brunello in Montalcino.
We’ve been importing their amazing Brunello for over a decade and it is definitely one of the greats. Click here for more info on their Brunello. But today’s focus is on their new ‘Dainero’ which is a Super Tuscan blend of 90% Merlot and 10% Sangiovese. Thanks to the movie Sideways where Paul Giamatti’s character hated Merlot and loved Pinot Noir, Merlot fell out of fashion for a long time in popular culture and Pinot’s popularity exploded. But not for any good reason! Merlot is awesome, especially when blended with the right grapes. And this Sangiovese blend is really delicious. I popped my first-ever bottle this weekend while BBQ’ing and it did not disappoint at all. Lots of plum and dark fruit notes on the nose and a bit of dried spice, earth, and a hint of vanilla. It was rich and round on the palate and got more complex as it opened. Smooth enough to drink on it’s own while BBQ’ing with your dog, but also big enough to go with the rib steak and baked potatoes. Super refined, as expected from anything Ferragamo. I’ll definitely be having this again.
The original cattle barn, turned winery in Geyserville, California.
‘Old Vine Red’ is one of our most popular wines at Lifford. It’s been a staple of so many people for years, including myself. Marietta Cellars is a bit of a unique operation, it’s not your conventional commercial California winery. It was started by Chris Bilbro in the late 1970’s when he turned an old cattle barn he rented into a winery and began making wine in Sonoma. Here’s a good article from a few years back about the Bilbro men. Chris named the winery after his aunt Marietta who’s family made wine in Italy for generations. He was able to buy grapes and get advice from his landlord and neighbour Viola Angeli—whom their Zinfandel is named after. Chris never went to winemaking school, he was self-taught and learned as he went. I love this statement that perfectly sums up their philosophy:
“Marietta Cellars doesn’t have a tasting room or a wine club. We don’t buy advertisements in wine magazines or enter wine competitions. We don’t make “trophy wines” nor do we charge “trophy wine” prices…Our wines don’t sell because of ratings, because of the view from our tasting room, or because of a fancy label. Our wines sell because we make consistently great wine and we ask a very fair price.
Chris’ days sounded like an absolutely dream, living his best life every day hunting, fishing, making sausage, and making wine, His 3 boys grew up living that dream life, learning winemaking, and learning his philosophy. Unfortunately Chis passed away last year, but his son Scot has taken over as winemaker and carries on his tradition. The other two sons have also started their own wineries that we represent as well. Jake owns Limerick Lane Winery and his youngest son Sam started Idlewild Winery, which I featured last week in the Natural Wine Offer, check that out here. All of the Marietta wines are outstanding, but here’s a few of my favourites that are all perfect for hanging out in the back yard and grilling on the BBQ. Check out the rest of their wines at https://mariettacellars.com/wine
‘Old Vine Red’ Lot 69 | $22.99 x12
Their most popular, wine and the biggest value. It’s a Zinfandel-based non-vintage wine. Much of this wine is a field blend (like Telmo Rodriguez!) and mixed in with at least 65% Zinfandel are various barrel-aged varieties from previous years. Any typical vintage can see 60-70% Zinfandel, with field blends of Barbera, Petit Sirah, Cabernet Sauvignon, etc. And most importantly this wine is bone dry and only 13% alcohol. A true old-school representation of Zin: not at all sweet or jammy, more savoury, earthy, and foresty notes along with the dark blackberry and licorice notes.
‘Armé’ 2016 | $42.99 x12
Armé is a Bordeaux blend named for Marietta’s husband who grew up working and fishing throughout Sonoma’s Alexander Valley. He taught all the boys to fly fish when they were younger and this wine is a tribute to him with a fly hook on the label. This is a big Bordeaux Blend that has a long 20 month aging in neutral oak barrels, which gives it a refined sophistication, without getting big too oaky. Think dark stone fruit, black olive, herbs, tobacco, and licorice. It’s 86% Cab Sauv, 5% Malbec, 5% Merlot, 4% Petit Verdot. It’s not cheap, but it’s much cheaper than it could be. The Armé is $43 but could easily be $90 compared to the field. They could charge a lot more if they wanted to, but they love over-delivering on quality for price.
‘Gibson Block’ Syrah 2016 | $64.99 x6
The McDowell Valley AVA is a small viticultural area in south eastern Mendocino County, just north of Sonoma. Here they have what is probably the oldest planting of Syrah in California. I think I remember Jake telling me it was first planted in the late 1800’s. Either way, if you love Syrah, this low yielding single vineyard of truly old vine Syrah is a must-try. Only 650 cases made per year. Click here for more details.
The order deadline for this week’s delivery to Ottawa is 9am Wednesday morning. Send me an email or drop me a note in the Contact section if you’re interested!
-Andrew Rastapkevicius