Wine with Leslie: Perfect wine and barbeque pairings for the bank holiday
Leslie's selections this week are all European and can be served a little cool if that is your preference
So you have the lumpwood charcoal and the steaks and butterflied lamb all ready for the barbecue and are stressing about the wine — please don’t. Barbecues are meant to be relaxing: and a bit like my annual advice for Christmas dinner the most important advice is to make sure you choose wines you really like yourself.
It was just over five years ago in 2016 when the world’s most famous meat and fire chef, Francis Mallman, was in Ballymaloe for LitFest. The Argentinian chef was up before dawn getting the fire ready and spent whole days slow-cooking lamb and beef. I had southern Italian wine open that weekend for a tasting and it worked just as well with his bbq as a Malbec would have done. I visited Mallman’s Mendoza restaurant once and made the mistake of ordering rare steak when I should have ordered the slow-cooked ribs like my Argentinian hosts. The richly textured meat I stole from them and tasted in Ballymaloe did work well with Malbec as you would hope but also with Argentinian Bonarda which has more red berry fruit flavours as found in many Italian wines. I should mention that Bonarda is actually the same grape as Douce Noir from the Savoie but it often tastes Italian to me.
