Zinfandel

[Zinner]

Well they used to say that there are three R's in Zinfandel...Ridge, Ravenswood and Rosenblum. It's hard to go wrong with top producers such as these. And a favorite for me would be Hendry, a small Napa winery, that, among other things, makes a luscious Zin called Block 7.

But the good thing about Zinfandel is that there is such a variety--even if you taste a lot, there are more to discover. Recently visiting the Dry Creek Valley, I found a winery called Bella that is making outstanding Zin.

I think foodwise, Zin goes really well with roasted meats and the autumn vegetables that you might be eating at this time of year. And grilled meats and veggies are great with it too.

The lighter Zins such as the Rancho Zabaco Dancing Bull are slurp-it-up-now stuff. But I recently had a '90 Ridge Lytton Springs that was fabulous, so some of them do age.

If you really go crazy over Zin after you've continued to taste for a while, there's a huge Zin event in San Francisco ever year called ZAP...Zinfandel Advocates and Producers(they have a website). I believe it's in the latter part of January and it's where the devotees go to pay homage to one of their favorite grapes.