LCBO Food & Drink Summer 2023

RED ALERT

WINES MADE FOR CHILLING A trend is starting—red wines that are deliberately designed to be enjoyed chilled.

The Quick Chill There are several ways to bring a red wine that’s too warm down to optimum serving temperature. Put it in a bucket of water and ice for 15 minutes (it will cool more quickly than if you just use ice as more of the bottle’s surface is exposed to the cold). Put it in the fridge for 30 minutes. The freezer is another option, but don’t leave it in there too long. (Wine expands as it starts to freeze and will force out the cork or break the bottle. Messy.) Cool, Not Cold Tannin is the problem if you serve red wine too cold. After two or three hours in the fridge, aromas are faint, fruit flavours have dwindled but tannin is exaggerated and the wine tastes astringent, bitter and generally out-of-whack. Some grape varieties naturally have more tannins; others spend extra time on their skins during fermentation to boost tannin extraction. So look for wines made from grapes with lower tannin such as Pinot Noir, Gamay, Corvina and Grenache. With other varieties, younger, simpler, lighter-coloured reds are your best bet.

Black Tower Dornfelder Pinot Noir LCBO 580118, $15 From Germany’s Pfalz region comes an off-dry, light bodied blend of Pinot Noir and Dornfelder, a hybrid variety prized for giving darker colour than most German reds. Lively acidity lifts restrained red berry fruit; close your eyes and you could be drinking rosé.

Fresco di Masi Rosso LCBO 22196, $18.95 The revered Italian

producer Masi has created a thoroughly modern red that is

destined for summertime stardom. Innocent of any oak, it looks like a dark rosé, with Merlot and Corvina grapes from the Veneto offering the fresh but subtle taste of tangy cherry and pomegranate. Organic, naturally fermented and vegan-friendly, it takes kindly to rosé treatment—give it an hour in the fridge.

Keep Your Cool You’ve chilled the red nicely; now you bring it out into the backyard. Keeping it at the right temperature becomes the new priority. Sitting the bottle in a bucket of ice and water is the simplest idea. Regulate the tem perature by taking it out from time to time. There are many bottle chillers on the market that act like an insulated vase, slowing down the rate at which the bottle warms up.

A cooler sleeve is another answer—a gel-lined sleeve you can chill in the fridge or freezer. It will chill the bottle and keep it cool for a cou ple of hours (by which time the wine will be gone). Le Creuset’s nylon ver sion is the gold standard (available at amazon.ca for around $55); Swissmar

also makes an effective sleeve ($18 at cocktailemporium.com).

48 FOOD & DRINK SUMMER 2023