Wine
Former Wine magazine editor Chris Losh looks at Cabernet Sauvignon and what goes with Italian food.
This month's recommended wines
Summer is still here, so I've had a poke around for more of those "summer food" or "by the glass in the beer garden" wines. The below are all, simply, great gluggers, whether with or without food.
MONTAGNY PREMIER CRU LA VIEUX CHATEAU 2002, DOMAINE LUCIEN DENIZOT, BURGUNDY A cool year with slow ripening has left us with some good whites from growers who know their stuff. This wine from Montagny, south of the pricier Côte de Beaune, is a good example of what Burgundy can do when it gets it right. Attractive apple and pear fruit, overlaid with a gentle baked pastry, this is delicate, but well balanced. £94.44/case +VAT @ J&B 020 7493 6174
MUSCADET SUR LIE 2002, DOMAINE DE LA QUILLA, FRANCE In the wrong hands Muscadet can be one of the more forgettable wine experiences. But with the right bottle on a hot day or faced with a plate of seafood, it comes into its own. This is lemony, clean as a whistle and super-fresh, with just a hint of flintiness.£56.64/case+VAT @ Vine Trail (0117 921 1770)
SAUVIGNON BLANC/SEMILLON 2003, YARRA BURN, VICTORIA, AUSTRALIA The classic white Bordeaux blend transplanted to Australia - and it seems to have thrived in the cool climate of Victoria's Yarra Valley. While there are evident fresh aromatic characters from the Sauvignon, the Semillon adds weight and roundness on the palate. A wine of purity. £80/case @ Constellation Wines (01372 473080) (Constellation do not give out exact retail prices - the figure quoted is a guide)
PINOT NOIR 2002, ISABEL ESTATE, MARLBOROUGH Marlborough has seen a lot of plantings of Pinot Noir over the last few years, and Burgundy had better keep an eye out if this is anything to go by. Spicy strawberry fruit with a cheerful softness on the palate - it's not so much silky as round and juicy, but still a crowd-pleasing example of Pinot for the price. £105.36/case@ Berry Bros and Rudd (0870 900 4300)
COONAWARRA ESTATE CABERNET SAUVIGNON 2000, WYNNS, AUSTRALIA Still, for my money, the best place to go looking for Aussie Cabernet, Coonawarra seems to produce at just about every price level. This isn't expensive wine, but it's very recognisable - a joyous mixture of cassis, mint and minerals with a lengthy finish. £40.17/six-bottle case +VAT @ Southcorp Wines (020 8917 4600)
Cabernet Sauvignon - a star the world ove
Where do you start with Cabernet Sauvignon? The world's most popular red variety, it's more widely planted than probably any other quality red grape. Capable of making both the world's most expensive wines and decent by-the-glass house reds, no wonder it's a bit of a star of wine lists the world over. Hard to believe, then, that for years no-one knew where it actually came from. Now, though, genetic research has discovered that this most noble of grape varieties actually has a rather seedy past. Cabernet Sauvignon is the result of a spontaneous cross-pollination of Cabernet Franc and Sauvignon Blanc. So next time someone talks to you about its aristocratic lineage, remind them that it's actually the bastard lovechild of an also-ran red and an aromatic white!
In fact, the relationship with Sauvignon Blanc isn't so surprising. Pick Cabernet Sauvignon under-ripe and it's a lessthan- winning glass full of green peppers. Close your eyes and you could almost be drinking Sauvignon Blanc - only with tannins as well. Nice. While Cabernet (unlike, say, Pinot Noir) is capable of producing decent wines in a wide variety of places it does require one thing: full ripeness, ideally with a slow-growing season. Pick it young and adolescent and Cabernet is an angular, spiky creature. But equally, get it too ripe too quickly and while there might be plenty of sugar in the fruit, the tannins will still be tough. It's one of the reasons that, in a good year, Bordeaux is able to make such perfect wines.
The grapes ripen slowly, hitting both full sugar and tannic ripeness just before the autumn rains come along. But in rainy years or vintages where the summer ends quickly, vignerons in the grape's heartland can be left with the worst of all worlds: high acidity, high tannin and low fruit. In this, at least, the New World has an advantage, and places like California, Chile and South Africa have already shown that they can make very good Cabernets, usually with a softer structure than their Bordelais counterparts. Whether they will age so beautifully is another matter. It is this longevity that helps to set Bordeaux apart from her challengers when it comes to Cabernet: the fact that the wines will develop so well in bottle for decades if you let them. Chilean Cabs, for instance, might be more accessible when they are younger, but they are less inclined to hold their structure with time.
But as wineries the world over get ever-more interested in making not just good, drinkable wines, but truly great wines, so their experiments with Cabernet are taking them to cooler, more difficult sites, where the grape has to struggle to get ripe. Places where the ripeness is not guaranteed and maybe one year in 10 is horrible. But that's where the next level of excitement is going to come from.
Food and wine matching - Italian food
In a country with the regional variations of Italy, it's no great surprise to find such a diversity of cuisine, which means that there aren't really any cast-iron matches for generic Italian food any more than there are for, say, French. Having said that, there are a few tried and tested Italian dishes that seem to crop up time and time again for which it's handy to get the right wine.
BologneseAnything too tannic or too in-your-face will stamp all over a tomato and garlic sauce, so you need something mid-weight and gentle.
VIÑA ALBINA RESERVA 1998, BODEGAS RIOJANAS, RIOJA For me, this sums up what Rioja can do with Reserva wines when it wants to. It's not big or intensely fruited, but it's as soft as you like, generous and ridiculously easy to drink. Its spicy, warm-leather tones with a supporting residue of old fruit aromas are hugely appealing. Would probably also match well with meatier fish dishes. £40.14/six bottle case +VAT @ Boutinot (0161 908 1340)
Veal It's tempting to get too big with veal, but I'd tend to err on the side of caution and go with less heavily flavoured or structured whites -something that Italians do probably better than anybody else.
COLBARACA SOAVE CLASSICO SUPERIORE 2002, MASI, ITALYA lot of Soaves achieve the impressive feat of tasting of nothing at all. And while this single vineyard offering isn't a big wine, its delicate floral and citrus flavours with a leavening zip of fresh grapefruit, make it a self-effacing partner for lighter meats. Would also work with salads. £66.84/case+VAT @ Berkmann Wine Cellars (020 7609 4711)
Lasagne Any wine match with lasagne depends on exactly what the chef has seen fit to put in it, but as a general rule I'd go with a red that has enough weight to get through the various layers of herbs, sauces, pasta, veg, meat etc - but again, isn't overly tannic.
1865 CARMENÈRE 2001, SAN PEDRO, CHILEThere are ever-more good examples of Carmenère coming out of Chile now, and this is one. Vines are really made to work in superrocky, poor soil, giving a wine of good concentration and ripeness, with lovely round coffee-bean and spice flavours. £126.96/case+VAT @ Roberson Wine Merchants (020 7371 2121)
Pizza There are nearly as many pizza styles in existence as there are bottles of wine, but to my mind this is one of those occasions when the Italian wines (which tend to be slightly higher in acidity) can really come into their own. The freshness of the less tannic Italian reds cuts through cheese and to
