Drink of the Week: Southold Farm + Cellar “Therapy for Liars” Field Blend

Wine pairing in my household is a very casual affair, often consisting of grabbing some takeout and then surveying the wine shelves. But when I picked up a thick, Sicilian pie from Paulie Gee’s Slice Shop the other night, I knew exactly which bottle I wanted to open. The Southold Farm + Cellar’s “Therapy for Liars” had been intriguing me both with its cheeky name and its field blend style. Unlike a typical wine blend, in which grapes are fermented individually and then blended before aging or bottling, a field blend ferments all the chosen grapes together. While it’s a practice more traditionally common in Europe, American producers like Southold Farm + Cellar have been experimenting with the category as an expression of terroir.

At Southold Farm + Cellar, the terroir expressed belongs to that of the Texas Hill Country, west of Austin. At Southold, the husband-and-wife operation run by Reagan and Carey Meador, they approach winemaking from a farming-first perspective, letting each season dictate what happens in the winery. The result is fresh, expressive wines that vary from year to year. The Therapy for Liars is a red field blend of nearly equal parts Garnacha, Mataro, and Merlot. It’s bright, juicy flavors of cherry, with a nice acidic kick and earthy undertones of slate, perfectly cut our dense, cheesy pizza. Pairing successful. $50, southoldfarmandcellar.com