Steak. Grill. Fire. The next word in this sequence is “Man,” isn’t it? In some ancient Cro-Magnon family, I’m sure there was someone poking a mastodon filet with a stick as the meat carbonized over a roaring (albeit newly invented) fire. That someone was a guy, of course. Hey, the tradition had to start somewhere …
But what was he drinking, you ask? It’s probably best that we not speculate. Instead, let’s talk modern times, in which any given evening will find men hunched over their $1500 eight-heating-zone grills, tweaking their roaring fire with a twist of a dial, then poking their free-range organic wagyu beef with a heat-resistant doohickey they picked up at Williams-Sonoma. Hey, it’s just like the cavemen, right? Man. Fire. Grunt.
Anyway, here’s what our modern pyromaniacal carnivore is drinking: zinfandel. No, not the sweet pink stuff. The real zinfandel. Boisterous, powerful, laden with alcohol, it’s the self-proclaimed life of the party … a guy’s wine for a guy’s slab-o’-cow. And here’s a great one from its best practitioner: the Ridge Zinfandel East Bench from the Dry Creek Valley. It goes well with mastodon, too. Pick up a bottle ($28.80-$37.99) at Kappy’s Fine Wine & Spirits (10 Revere Beach Parkway, Medford, 781.395.8888) or BLM Wine + Spirits (1354 Commonwealth Avenue, Allston, 617.734.7700).
Not to denigrate anyone who likes “white” zinfandel … though you’d think someone would have pointed out that lurid pink isn’t quite the same thing as white … but zin has always done better in its ruddiest form. It was what European immigrants grew as they sought their fortunes in California’s hills, valleys, and mountains a century or so ago because it was incredibly versatile. It could be their crisp Chianti, their Sicilian fruit bomb, albeit a fun and fruity one.
Then there was Prohibition, and wine nearly faced extinction. But zinfandel, at least in grape form, didn’t, because it was planted on random slopes and in hidden pockets that tax inspectors couldn’t quite reach. As a result, there are more than a few zinfandel vineyards in California that passed their hundredth birthday a good while ago, and the region thus possesses some of the oldest continuously producing vines in the world. Yes, here, not in Greece or Italy. Take that, Old World!
So there’s one for the home team. Here’s another. Almost all our wine styles were, originally, borrowed from someone else — our cabernet sauvignon/merlot blends from Bordeaux, our pinot noir and chardonnay from Burgundy, and so forth. Styles have morphed and matured a lot since those days, but one grape has always been our own. (Yes, of course I mean zinfandel. Haven’t you been paying attention?) Sure, it originally came from somewhere around Croatia, and true, it’s planted in Italy (where it’s called primitivo), but we’re the ones who’ve made world-class stuff out of it. Zinfandel is the one truly original American wine, and it deserves its place in a pantheon of Uncle Sammishness alongside Southern barbecue, baseball, and reality shows involving Bret Michaels.
Incidentally, the grape’s still a chameleon. There’s “white” zin, yes, but dry pink versions exist as well. It can be done in a structured, ageable way, but also as a massive explosion of fruit … one to guzzle by the gallon the same night it’s carried home from the shop. There are boring mass-market bottlings and crazy experiments. (The latest of the latter is the Dashe “l’Enfant Terrible,” made in contravention of just about every American winemaking norm and yet unmistakably zin; you might have to head to the other coast to find this one.)
Barring a plane ride, what’s worth buying? The old rules — stick to producers whose names begin with “R” — are useless. There is one exception: Ridge still makes two beautifully ageable zins (Geyserville and Lytton Springs) that, in good years, are capable of developing for over a decade, though unfortunately their other bottlings are a lot more hit-and-miss than they used to be. Another star is Dashe, whose winemaker used to work at Ridge and whose non-iconoclast zins (especially the Todd Brothers Ranch) are as classic and muscular as one could ever want. Then there’s the for-the-cellar Storybook Mountain, the brambly and wild Sierra Vista, the polished but appealing Easton, the supremely elegant and surprisingly long-lasting Nalle, the bargain-priced Graziano, the crisp and Italianate Montevina, the powerful and peppery throwback Tulocay … the list could go on and on.
So what’s the deal with zin, meat, and fire? Unlike most fruit-explosion wines, zin retains a good bit of structure, so while it has the power to stand up to smoke and char, there’s also enough acid to slash through the luscious fat within. The only drawback? High alcohol. Zin gets very sweet on the vine, which can mean alcohol levels that can look more like those of port than wine. One solution is to give the wine a very slight chill, which tames the burn.
As for the overcooked mastodon on the Weber? Zin won’t help with that. You should have been paying attention to the grill, not this article.
