Another sunny day in England during what feels like a never ending heatwave meant yet another BBQ.

I picked up a bottle of Tesco Finest Chianti Classico Riserva 2022 to go with it.

I wasn’t looking for anything overly serious. I just wanted something Italian, savoury and with enough acidity to stand up to everything I was planning to throw on the BBQ.

In the glass

Straight away on the nose I was getting cherries with just a tad of green in the background. Nothing overpowering, but enough to notice.

On the palate it was really nice. Plum and cherries were at the forefront, but that green note from the nose became much easier to place. It was tomato leaf.

It sat quietly in the background rather than dominating the wine, then appeared again right at the finish. There was good length too, with that cherry fruit hanging around before the tomato leaf came back through.

On its own I liked it. With the food, though, it became something else entirely.

The BBQ

Holy smokes, this BBQ was incredible.

I had a wagyu ribeye, simply seasoned with Maldon Salt and black pepper, then seared over the fire for two and a half minutes on each side. Alongside that were minted lamb chops, charred corn, a goat’s cheese and tomato salad with little gem lettuce, macaroni with salt, pepper and butter, and a whole head of garlic wrapped in foil and cooked directly on the coals.

It was one of those meals where everything just came together, more importantly for this review, the wine worked so well.

The acidity was brilliant with the richness of the ribeye and lamb, while the cherry and plum fruit never got in the way of the meat. That tomato leaf note suddenly made complete sense alongside the tomato and goat’s cheese salad too.

The char from the BBQ, the sweetness of the roasted garlic, the richness of the meat and that savoury edge in the Chianti all seemed to belong together.

This was a completely different experience to some of the bigger, darker and more fruit driven reds I’ve had with steak recently. Rather than trying to overpower the food, this seemed to slot itself into the meal.

Eden’s tasting note

Even little Eden joined in with a tiny taste and gave me perhaps the most confusing tasting note I’ve heard so far.

Tabasco.

I still can’t get my head around it.

Maybe she was picking up the tomato leaf and acidity and associating the combination with Tabasco. Maybe her six year old palate knows something mine doesn’t. Either way, I’m recording it because if I’m allowed to describe wine as Blackcurrant Lemsip and cherry Soothers, I can’t exactly start policing tasting notes now.

The verdict

This was an experience.

The wine itself gave me plum, cherry, good length and that distinctive tomato leaf character which appeared on the palate and then returned on the finish. But this was one of those occasions where judging the wine on its own would miss half the point.

Put it on the table with food cooked over fire and everything clicked.

A sunny English evening, wagyu ribeye and lamb over the coals, roasted garlic, goat’s cheese and tomatoes, family around the table and a glass of Chianti Classico.

Sometimes that’s exactly what wine is supposed to be about.