The Only Red Wine I'm Drinking This Fall
It’s my favorite time of year. The leaves are turning, the sweaters are coming out, and 12-foot skeletons are peering down at me. It’s fall, and that means I’m turning towards fall flavors in both my cooking (hello squash, I’ve missed you) and my drinks. I love bright, citrusy white wine drinks in summertime, but the chilly fall calls for a deeper flavor.
I’m pretty fussy when it comes to red wine — it tends to give me headaches — and almost always shy away from it. The one exception is a sparkling Italian red wine called Lambrusco.
What is Lambrusco?
Lambrusco is a sparkling red wine from the Emilia-Romagna region of Italy (also the home of traditional lasagna Bolognese, yum). It ranges in flavor from sweet to dry and has a relatively low percentage of alcohol when compared to other wines. It is known for its light, fruity, floral flavor. If you’re looking for a good first bottle to buy, I recommend Lini Lambrusco Rosso and Denny Bini Lambrusco dell’Emilia.
What Makes Lambrusco So Great?
It’s lightly sparkling. Lambrusco is a frizzante wine, which means it’s lightly bubbly. Pleasantly fizzy, but not quite as carbonated as Champagne or prosecco, which makes it a very drinkable wine.
It goes well with everything. There are a lot of “rules” around which wines go with which foods — white wine with fish, red wine with beef, for example — but Lambrusco exists outside all of these boundaries, going just as well with a seafood stew as a pot roast. I bring a bottle of Lambrusco to every dinner party and gathering, and it’s one of my favorites to serve at Thanksgiving. You cannot go wrong.
It’s the perfect fall wine. Autumn is a transitional season. It’s chilly, but sometimes it’s warm. It’s got one foot in winter and one in summer. Lambrusco has a deeper, warmer flavor than white wine, but is also sparkling and fruity. It’s the perfect thing to drink in the fall and deserves a place right alongside the pumpkin spice latte and mulled cider as a top seasonal beverage.
This post originally appeared on The Kitchn. See it there: The Only Red Wine I’m Drinking This Fall (It Breaks All the Rules!)
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