BBQ with neighbors

The other day, our neighbors served a wonderful BBQ on their sunny deck. It was Atkin's paradise - Lamb, Pork Spare Ribs, Beef and Scallops. Who could ask for anything more? Some wine? Yes, indeed! Columbia Crest Reserve Syrah was just the perfect choice. By the way, it won a Gold Medal at the Seattle Wine Society Wine Judging -see August 10th posting. It has lots of good, soft, velvety fruit with enough rounded tannic umph to match the barbeque marinades and smokey flavors. Even though Columbia Crest produces a huge amount of wine they seem to take enough care in making the Reserve wines that they don't at all seem like factory wines and, in fact, taste like they were handcrafted in a small winery.

By the way, check out the Columbia Crest Reserve Merlot! I have a friend who drinks it as her everyday wine, but at $30 a throw, most of us will have to settle for an occasional splurge. One of these days I will write about "pricepoints", but, for right now, I just want to point out that even though most of us can't afford $30 a bottle very often, this is the point where you get the most bang for your buck. There are probably more really great wines at this pricepoint than at any other. Many thirty dollar wines really are at least twice as good as $15 wines, but very few sixty dollar bottles are twice as good as thirty. Anyway, it's all relative and very good wine can be had for as little as $2 these days thanks to the likes of "Charles Shaw." Go ahead, splurge!