It's Rosé Season!

If you have never tried rosé, add it to your list of wines to try. It is a wonderful alternative to light or medium bodied whites wines.

And the best part, rosé is fantastic with food.

Rosé wine comes in varied types; the best examples made from red grapes. When grapes are pressed to make wine, all the juice is clear. It is during fermentation that color is bled from the skins to give wine color. For rosé, the skins are removed once the color of the juice has reached that rosé color, resulting in a wine that shares characteristics of both red and white wines. Loosely defined, rosé is a mild light red wine that can be chilled to replace a white wine. Rosé should be served slightly warmer than a white wine, although I do like it well chilled. The ideal temperature is around 55 degrees.

Rosé wine is typically either dry or off-dry, which just means the wine has a slight sweetness to it. Rosé is commonly made from one of the following red grapes: Pinot Noir, Grenache, Carignan, Mourvedre, Cabernet Sauvignon and Cabernet Franc. In general, rosé wine pairs nicely with salmon, duck, pork and tuna. Depending on if you would like to try a drier or sweeter style, of rosé the following will help guide you with pairing choices.

Dry Rosé wine pairs nicely with the following foods:

~ Cheese Courses

~ Fish

~ White Meats

~ Pasta

~ Summer Vegetables

Off-Dry Rosé wine pairs nicely with the following foods:

~ Burgers

~Curry Dishes

~Spicy Asian