Cooking with Barbera wine

Of late, I purchased a bottle of Barbera wine.  I underestimated my tolerance for the tannins in the wine, combined with the high acidity.   These are two trademark characteristics of the wine.  Barbera grapes naturally have a high acidity.  The wine often has very high tannins when oaked in order to counterbalance the acidity, is my understanding.   Very often the barbera grape is used in a wine blend, but this time I was trying a whole bottle.  As it turns out, I prefer the blends better!  Then it occurred to me:   Not every type of apple is used to make apple pie.  What if this grape and this wine were better suited for cooking than drinking?   Wouldn't barbera make a nice jam or other food?  And that is where I found my answer to the best use for the Barbera variety! 

Wine Review - Renwood 2008 Estate Barbera
The Renwood barbera is a good example of the barbera type.  Strong berry flavors.  Blackberry, Currant, Raspberry.  High acidity.  Strong tannins.  Personally I picked up the taste of the American Oak quite a bit.  The winemaker also used French Oak.  Do I love this wine?  No, mostly due to the wine variety and not the winemaker.  It was not an out of this world wine but it was good for its type.  Would I give Renwood another chance?  Yes!  Their specialty is actually Zinfandel.  Knew I'd seen that label somewhere in another section of the store.  

Cooking with Barbera Grapes
I have half the bottle to cook with.  The first thing that came to mind was jam.  Going online, I found recommendations for making wine vinegar and a wine sauce.  Here are some recipes to consider!

Beef Short Ribs Braised in Barbera - by La Cucina Italiana 
 
Red Wine Poached Pears - by the Dirty Gourmet


Red Wine Braised Chuck Roast - by Food and Wine

Risotto with Barbera Wine - by Academia Barilla - Calls for ox marrow.  Says you can substitute with beef stock.