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Raleigh News and Observer
By BARBARA BARRETT, Staff Writer
It's heavy, with hints of plum and cherry, the aroma of cedar and the toastiness of oak -- a porcine little wine.
Thus did winemaker Mark Friszolowski, pausing from his serious viticulture work in Davidson County, describe his Fine Swine Wine. He crafted it as the perfect plonk to accompany pulled pig.
"It's wine to go with the local cuisine," Friszolowski said. "This wine is a wine you could do in a paper cup."
Fine Swine, a 2005 vintage produced by Lexington's Childress Vineyards, will be on sale at the Lexington Barbecue Festival on Oct. 22. It sells for $10 a bottle -- this ain't Boone's Farm -- and quantities are limited.
The winery was still under construction last year when locals clamored for a special bottle to go with the festival, an annual event of music and gastronomic excess that is expected to draw 100,000 people this year.
A barbecue wine was a new challenge in the field of oenology. Friszolowski had to develop a wine that could defy the heavy taste of ketchup-and-vinegar-sloshed pork, a meal usually washed down with sweet tea.
He devised a strong-tasting blend of cabernet sauvignon, cabernet franc and merlot. The grapes were grown at the vineyard and harvested last fall.
The wine is sweet, Friszolowski said, and has a kick at the end.
And in case you're wondering, barbecue partisans, Fine Swine is not only swillable, it's also adaptable: It goes with Down East barbecue as well.
"We tested it," Friszolowski said.
Staff writer Barbara Barrett can be reached at 829-4870 or bbarrett@newsobserver.com.
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