{"id":278,"date":"2008-04-13T04:55:25","date_gmt":"2008-04-13T11:55:25","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/danthewineguy.com\/?p=278"},"modified":"2009-02-22T12:06:51","modified_gmt":"2009-02-22T19:06:51","slug":"sangiovese-makes-for-a-great-food-wine","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.danthewineguy.com\/?p=278","title":{"rendered":"Sangiovese Makes For a Great &#8220;Food Wine&#8221;"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>This week we continue our look at sangiovese, the primary grape used in wines from the Chianti region of Italy.<\/p>\n<p>Sangiovese tends to be a bit on the acidic side, which is not necessarily a bad thing, because this allows the wine to hold its own against a wide variety of foods.<\/p>\n<p>A prime example would be tomato-based pasta dishes, which are frequently paired with sangiovese in Italy. While the high acid content in tomatoes can cause most wines to fall flat on their face, sangiovese actually compliments this food by softening the astringency factor. This allows the wine\u2019s other flavors \u2013 usually smoke, spice and nuances of dark fruit \u2013 to really shine through. <\/p>\n<p>Sangiovese also matches up nicely with lighter beef dishes (think veal scaloppini) and even pairs well with pastas prepared in a heavy cream sauce such as fettuccini alfredo.<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/www.bevmo.com\/115images\/74385.jpg\" alt=\"null\" \/>A couple of recommendations: The <strong>Banfi 2004 Chianti Classico<\/strong> (pictured at left, about $15) is a perfect example of the type of sangiovese enjoyed in Italy. I\u2019d call this an elegant Chianti \u2013 relatively low in alcohol (12.5 percent), reserved sultry flavors of anise, leather and smoke, and a trace of dark cherry and pepper on the finish. I\u2019d like to think of this wine as the quiet, sagely Italian patriarch seated at the dinner table. It doesn\u2019t interfere with the meal by offering up unsolicited advice, and yet without it, the dining experience would be incomplete. Nice stuff.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cAmericanized\u201d versions of Chianti, as I like to call them, tend to place slightly more emphasis on sangiovese\u2019s fruit flavors. Walla Walla\u2019s <strong>Yellow Hawk Cellars 2004 Sangiovese <\/strong>(about $18) is an excellent example, with a good dash of bright, red cherry flavors prevailing over the wine\u2019s spicy and smoky notes.<\/p>\n<p>Also worth noting is the <strong>Cavatappi Winery 2006 Sangiovese <\/strong>(about $13) from Eastern Washington\u2019s Wahluke Slope region. Although it\u2019s still drinking a bit young, this is a sturdy, well-priced sangiovese that will pair well with heavier foods such as baked salmon or aged cheeses. Both the Yellow Hawk and Cavatappi wines are currently available at the The Vines wine shop, located at 1319 Cornwall Avenue in Bellingham.<!--3cf43e8131392289ee6b10c33e9355b2--><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>This week we continue our look at sangiovese, the primary grape used in wines from the Chianti region of Italy. Sangiovese tends to be a bit on the acidic side, which is not necessarily a bad thing, because this allows the wine to hold its own against a wide variety of foods. A prime example [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-278","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-from-the-bellingham-herald"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.danthewineguy.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/278","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.danthewineguy.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.danthewineguy.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.danthewineguy.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.danthewineguy.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=278"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.danthewineguy.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/278\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.danthewineguy.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=278"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.danthewineguy.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=278"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.danthewineguy.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=278"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}