I made dinner for the family this past Saturday. Nothing grand, but I do like to avoid the routine even in the everyday. The menu consisted of a salad, brats, and mixed vegetables. The package of Johnsonville brats was in the refrigerator, but they were still partially frozen. So as I was going through the list of everything needed for dinner, I opted to put the brats into the microwave to hasten the thaw.

To my horror, I discovered that my beverage options were highly constrained. Ginger Ale simply wasn’t going to cut it. Conventional wisdom suggests that the drink of choice with brats should be beer, and in any case something lacking in pretension. But I am not conventional: I can be pretentious in any circumstance!

So off I went whilst the brats were defrosting, with my son Alex in tow. We arrived at MacLaren Wines in Bexley, whereupon he engaged in the office of making selections. I confess that he showed a remarkably consistent pattern in selecting bottles. Excellent reds, all with prices north of $40, sometimes significantly so. After I suggested after the third selection that we should not aim quite so high today. Perhaps to torture me, he then pointed to a bottle of white. “There might be a recession on, but let’s not be silly,” replied I.

Finally, the fifth bottle chosen showed promise. Truth be told, Alex isn’t a sommelier. His selections were simply guesses. As he is two years old, I presume that his selection criteria might differ from mine. Nevertheless, either his choices are unusually sophisticated for his age, or mine are unusually naïve.

We settled on a bottle of Educated Guess Cabernet Sauvignon 2006 from Napa’s Roots Run Deep winery. It’s a blend: 85% Cabernet Sauvignon, 7% Merlot, 6% Cabernet Franc, and 2% Petit Verdot. A lovely blend, too. Just a little spicy on the nose, it’s rich with black cherry and cassis. At $20, it’s a good buy.

A proper wine snob would likely meet the pairing with some disapproval. Brats really would go much better with something lighter, perhaps a beaujolais, or maybe a Syrah. Even so, I have no regret about the pairing and I’m sure to repeat it sometime in the future.

Now I just need to figure out how to prepare both brats and mixed vegetables on the grill so I need not run between it (outside) and a conventional gas stovetop (inside) in the course of preparation.