Dry Red Wine For Cooking: Red Wine Reduction Sauce Recipe (+All The Best Varietals!)
Dry red wine for cooking: everything you need to know about which dry red wines to use in recipes and the best tips for cooking with it! In this post, I will be breaking down 16 dry red wine varietals that you can incorporate into your meat dishes, stews, and sauce recipes. From Cabernet Sauvignon and Merlot to a red blend, I have it all covered here for you!
Help Us Out!If you love a recipe, be sure to come back and share your ratings. This helps future users, and allows me to continue sharing free recipes! Angela
Instructions
In a skillet or sauce pan, heat 1 tablespoon of beef drippings (or tallow, or butter) or medium. Add the diced shallots and minced garlic and saute briefly, about 1 minute.
Pour in the red wine (use a wooden spoon or spatula to deglaze the pan if needed, scraping any browned bits on the bottom of the pan from cooking the steak). Then add the beef broth and balsamic vinegar as well as the fresh herbs (thyme, oregano, or rosemary).
Stir, increase to medium-high heat if needed, and bring your sauce to a simmer. Allow the sauce to reduce at a low, steady simmer until reduced by half and thickened. This should take anywhere between 15-30 minutes.
Once the sauce has reduced by half and is slightly thickened, add the optional butter, remove the skillet or pan from heat, and whisk the butter into your sauce.
I like to strain the sauce before serving, however, you can serve the red wine reduction sauce immediately after removing the herbs from the pan.
Notes
Your red wine reduction sauce should yield 1 ½ cups when reduced, with each serving being ¼ cup for nutrition calculation.
Serve with your favorite cut of steak or pork, or use to make delicious braised short ribs.
Using a better quality red wine is recommended to yield the best flavor in your sauce (as well as to serve with dinner).
Adding the optional butter after the sauce has reduced adds richness to the already amazingly flavorful sauce.
Optionally, you can whisk 1 tablespoon of flour with your pan drippings or butter at the beginning of making this sauce to add a creamy texture.
This sauce will be wonderfully tasty if you make it as instructed above with a 1:1 ratio of broth and wine, but is equally wonderful with a slightly more mellow wine flavor with a 2:1 ratio of broth to wine. Starting with 2 cups broth will require a few more minutes of cook time to reduce the sauce.
Be patient when simmering and keep the heat just high enough to hold the sauce at a low, steady simmer. Rapidly simmered or boiled sauce can turn out tasting bitter or reduced too much.
To store: Transfer the cooled red wine reduction sauce into an airtight storage container. Store in the fridge for up to 3-4 days.
To freeze: Store the cooled sauce in an airtight freezer storage bag or shallow container for up to 4-6 months. I feel that this sauce is best used within the first 3 months after cooking.