If it is good enough to drink...

I first need to apologize for my lack of activity with my Blog. It has been nearly a month and I have not had any new entries for people to read and comment on. I have been so busy with work and other activities that I have not had an opportunity to really sit down and give you my amateur opinions and rants. Fear not though, the last couple of weeks have been good for me and I have many great ideas to work with, so stay tuned.

With that said, lets cook. Seriously. Barry asked me a while back what I thought would be a good wine to use while cooking Bracioles and I grappled with this for a couple of days before I got side tracked, so I figured it would be a good place to pick back up. Now, for those of you who may not know Bracioles are an Italian classic dish where beef or sirloin cuts are wrapped around stuffing and cooked by browning and turning and eventually simmering in a red sauce. The actual process itself is quite fun a little time consuming, but the finished product is very good and well worth the wait.

There are several different types of "Cooking Wine" out there; Sherry, Burgundy, Marsala and even a lesser known Medeira cooking wine. These are staples for many who have cooked with wine and I wouldn't be surprised if you have used one to make Beef Stew. The problem with these, though, is that they tend to be fortified and have additional salt and flavors added to them. They may taste good to some extent, but you are missing out on the real experience of cooking with wine. Not to say that cooking with these wines isn't good, but if we really think about the food we are cooking and then pair the wine with it correctly.... OH MY GOD!!!! Think of how splendid that would be in your mouth!

My first recommendation is to use a wine that you want to drink, and don't be afraid of using a lot of it. REMEMBER this phrase: "If it is good enough to drink, it is good enough to cook." I have made white wine pasta sauce, and I have made steak sauce using wines that I had in the house and that I was drinking with the food I was preparing. Pair the wine well and trust me you will be able to have a lot more fun and you can easily change up the recipe by changing up the wine.

Lets talk about the flavors of wine for a second and where they come from real quickly. Obviously, flavors come from the grapes and skins themselves. Flavors are also produced by climate in which the grapes are grown. For example a California Cabernet will taste different than a Cabernet Franc from Bordeaux France even though they are they same grape. Lastly, flavors come from the process in which the wine itself is made. Take two batches of Chardonnay grape and go through the exact same procedure with them but age them in two different barrels, one steel and one oak, and you will have two very different wines. (I personally prefer less oak.)

I could get into the more specific (and therefore, complicated) ways that wine gets it flavors and bouquet, but that is for a different entry at a different time and I am focusing on this one topic today.

So, back to Barrys question. What wine to use while cooking Bracioles? My first thought would be to examine what the filling would be. I have seen sweet fillings, savory ones, and Cheesy fillings or salty ones. Even the combination of all of them. With that said there is wide range of different wines that would work and the old mindset that you can only have red wine with red meats and whites with fish just does not hold water anymore. In fact even David at Ceres St Wine Merchants has recommended that I drink a strong white wine to hold up and compliment a spicy meat dish.

With all of the different wines and techniques available to us today it is OK, and recommended, to think outside the box when it comes to the meals we eat and the wines we pair. For instance, since this is an Italian dish, served with a red sauce, lets try a solid Chianti or red wine from the Chianti region of Italy. One of my personal favorites is a 2006 Tutto Bene by Tenimenti Angelini. If you want to try something different maybe a dry white wine? I am not a big dry white wine drinker, so it is hard for me to recommend any particular wine, but one thing I can say is that Pinot Gris is quickly becoming one of the most popular dry white wines produced in the U.S. These wines tend to be slightly spicy and earthy and should make for a very good sauce with the Bracioles. (If you want to stay with the Italian theme, it's ok... Pinot Gris is also known as Pinot Grigio.)