8 hours ago
Having a barbecue? Here are the best bottles to serve
M uch as I think that prescriptive food and wine rules are made to be broken, it's madness to serve any old wine with your barbecue and expect it to work. Forget wishy-washy whites, feeble pinks and skinny, unoaked, lower-alcohol reds and go for turbo-charged bottles with plenty of alcohol and attitude.
With so many flavours piled high on your plate, it's a waste of money spending more than a tenner on your barbecue bottle, and braai-mad South Africa is the perfect source of these good-value tub-thumpers to go with meaty dishes. Check out Stellenrust, founded in 1928 and one of the largest family-owned estates in the country. It has made a cracking range of own-label pinotage for Tesco, including the vegan-approved, just-landed 2024 Finest Stellenbosch Pinotage, see star buys. Over at Waitrose until Tuesday you can nab one of South Africa's greats, none other than Kanonkop's dark, dusky, bramble-stashed 2023 Kanonkop Kadette Pinotage at £10, down from £14, with the sort of dreamy, velvety fruit that your guests will want endless top-ups of.
