From the Archives: Featured Father ~ A Modern Day Marco Polo

In Memory of Hank Rossi, who left us last year...

Watch out, Bin Laden, "AK-47 Rossi" is on your tail

Enrico “Hank” Rossi has the wandering spirit. Oh, and he likes to wear black, makes it easy to pack a bag and disappear for months at a time. In the shot above he is at the Pakistan-Afghanistan border testing out his skills. He is my featured father for Dad’s day.

From the Khyber Pass to Lalibela, before it is all said and done, Hank will visit almost everyplace his heart desires on earth. He just returned from a 2 month journey across the Silk Trail, spent last Christmas holiday in Egypt and Ethiopia.

How Much Do Wine Expert Ratings Matter?

 

Luciano Pavarotti and young fan at Golden Gate Park, San Francisco

In the last year, I have been consulting with my local Italian wine shop, primarily making point-of-sale materials (shelf-talkers) for them. It’s been an interesting project and one which doesn’t take up too much of my time, but also allows me to keep a toe in the water of the wine trade, albeit in a passive and almost invisible manner. Just as I like it. But one of the surprises I have found in making these materials is the relative influence of the various wine writers who review and score wines. There are more now than ever, so the field has been diluted. Hence, it takes a little searching on the internet to find those voices and opinions (and scores) which I gather when making the shelf talkers for the store.

“Don’t Age Wine Longer than 10 Years!”

It was just a simple coffee meeting with an longtime Italian wine colleague, who, last time we talked, has since gone on to their version of fame and fortune. We were talking about how long, ideally, Italian wine should age before it is considered long enough. Seeing as 25% of the wines in my “cellar” are 25 years or older, I was interested in another person’s opinion, as I have had more misses than hits when opening these oldsters. I guess I was looking for advice or maybe validation? In any case, my friend launched into a prolonged jeremiad, which I recorded (with permission) and whereby this post now goes into that mode. Here goes:

In Memoriam: The Death of a Loved One

From the archives

In a world where there are so many tragic events  ̶  from the father who lost his wife and daughter when he was 30 and raised his two sons as a single parent, only to lose a son when he became a grown up, to a young boy who, at 5, lost his father to tribal warfare in Ruanda ̶  what does the loss of one tree matter?

Earlier this month, crisscrossing Texas by car, time and again, I recall the morning I was driving from Dallas to Houston and saw a large, mature oak tree in a field that had toppled over from the rain. I was going 65-70 and as I saw the newly fallen giant, I felt a sharp pain inside. Still green, still hopeful from a Spring filled with energy, this tree wouldn’t see another autumn.

A few weeks later, driving by the same spot, the tree was brown and lifeless now. There was none of that “It‘s still green, it might just be sleeping on its side” pretend one does to internally forestall the inevitable reality of death.

Is Your Favorite Italian Wine ‘Coded?’

It seems "things being coded" is all the rage these days. My preferred AI overview posits coded thusly:

In the context of social media slang, “coded” means that someone, something, or a behavior embodies or resembles a specific character, stereotype, or archetype. It's a way of using recognizable traits to make quick, playful connections and associations, often without explicitly naming the reference.

Jumping off from that point, it got me wondering if Italian wine is coded in these days of disruption. Almost anything can be, especially when one trawls the eddies of social media. Here’s what I have surmised from my brief but spectacular subterranean foray into the dark world of the coded.

An American in Rome – Can a world leader reshape the long tail of Italian wine?

By now the world knows there is a new pope and most of us have become acquainted with him, if just superficially. He, no doubt, will alter the conversation for peace in the world, which has been perched precariously over a precipice, caused by the wants and desires of men.

While the dance cards of peace and humanity and civility and truth and, while we’re at it, reality, get shuffled here in the 21^st century, what about little ‘ol Italian wine? Can Pope Leo XIV reignite the fortunes of growth for this sputtering agro-economic powerhouse? I’m sure there are a few households in Italy where the candles are burning, the altars are set and the prayers are coming at a feverish pace. Yeah, I’m in the “thoughts and prayers” stage over this matter.

A Master Plan for the Master Class

The decade we’re in started in 2020, and it was then that heightened consciousness was brought to racial injustices, and covered many aspects of life, from the way we talk about housing to the language that we use in general.

It was then that the term “Master Bedroom” had a light shone upon it as being indicative of those invisible prejudices we’ve lived with, seemingly, all our lives.

The Red Badge of Carnage (or the other wine that crashed and burned)

While rummaging through my wine stash, I came across a red from Italy and another red from Greece. We were having smoked brisket and I wanted to open up a few bottles of wine to try with the smokey, mellow red meat. I also had cooked up a pile of pinto beans ala Ranchero, the slow way, and they were simmering and ready.

The reds, a 2012 from Mt. Etna and a 2008 from nearby Mt. Ossa in Greece, were my choice after a brief consultation with a friend overseas. Both wines did not make it into my final cut a few months ago, when I consolidated my wine collection down to less than 200 bottles. There just wasn’t room. So, Easter Sunday, they were chosen to show their stuff.

The ˈknobbly road of business, camaraderie and wine compiling

Gran Sasso - Abruzzo

For some reason, I have been going over my wine career and the speed bumps along the road that I incurred during that 40+ year long journey. Not the successes, not even the failures. This dive was into the hearts and souls of people I worked with and for, and their sullied motivations. We are living in a moment where retribution and  grievance are center stage, I get that. And I’m not one to harbor a grudge for long. I’ve witnessed that in wine and friendships since retiring, some have come, some have gone. 

Italian Wine and its SMH moment

The annual Italian wine trade show, Vinitaly, has just ended, and the threatened US tariffs against Italy have just been adjusted down to 10% (for now). What a hell of a week it has been. Now what?

For those who are wondering what direction Italian wine should take in 2025, this could be a bit of a “shaking my head” moment. After all, Kyiv is 1,300 miles from Milan, less than the distance Houston is from New York. And with a protracted war that has taken trade off the table for Italy with Russia, and with an unstable reality driving the American economy (for the foreseeable future), where does Italy pivot to? Local consumption is down, as has alcohol consumption, worldwide. China is seeing their growth slow down, who is going to drink all that Italian wine? Is it time to pare down wine production in Italy? Have we reached that moment?

Where Does Italian Wine Go From Here?

The Quo Vadis Chronicles

Let’s start with the small questions, shan’t we? All kidding aside, as we are in an epochal shift, what shall Italian winemakers do to tackle the existential threat to their livelihoods, their families, and their land? What would I do if I had 5 acres of Sangiovese in Tuscany? Well, there are a number of hacks, short term, so I’ll start with that.

Spring Break

 

Back next week... 

 

 

 

 

© written and photographed by Alfonso Cevola limited rights reserved On the Wine Trail in Italy

wine blog +  Italian wine blog + Italy W

First there is a tariff, then there is no tariff, then there is.

Learning to love wine again in the era of Patrioligarchy

“Welcome to earth. Please take a glass and a seat. Someone will be with you shortly.”

I was hoping for a haiku, but the words were too long. It was that time of the year again, for my annual examination of my long-standing relationship with wine. What, you say, can one have a relationship with a liquid alcoholic substance? Well, if one can have a relationship with someone who lived and died over two thousand years ago, why not wine too? After all it was His first miracle.

But that was beside the point. What was really set before me, in that examination of that “relationship,” was a deeper look into the  nature of material reality. Anyone who enters into the world of wine thinks, on first glance, that wine is wine, much like water is water. But upon spending years studying wine, one might realize that wine isn’t just wine, it is a lot of other things. It is culture. It is sustenance. It is history. It is agriculture. It is business. It is beguilement. It is seduction. Yes, it is, all of that. And more.

And then….

Tariff Tornado Season: Steering Alee from Excess Wind, Dross and Excisions

"It's like déjà vu all over again" -Yogi Berra

There appears to be no bottom in the hustle to bloviate and sully us with all the excess bullshit that is being produced these days. Now we’re being sucked into the crisis-cycle of European wine tariffs. If only it were wine, and domestic wine at that. One thing for sure, most of it (the bullshit) is domestic production. It just isn’t anything we can distill, ferment or drink. But it’s a heyday for the honey bucket man - the septic and sewage systems are close to overload from our overlords, who have now proffered upon us the threat of a 200% tariff on European wines (up from 100% in 2020). There’s been a lot of wailing and flailing on this subject. We’ve gone down this road before. Before we, once again, surrender to fear and one more distraction, allow me, if you will, to unpack this manufactured crisis with a little bit of perspective from all my years in the wine trade.

Happiness, happiness…

…everybody wants happiness. Round and round we all do race, everybody looking in a different place.

Yeah, pretty much how it seems. I see so many wine professionals rushing all over the globe, living their best life.

Living large!

And I remember when I was in that stream. It rushed, all about me. I was caught up in it, just as they are now. And there’s absolutely nothing wrong with that.

But it is not forever. It is not permanent. Just like wine, it peaks. And it has a time when it is perfection. And a time when that moment has passed.

I say this as if I am speaking to any one person in particular. They might be laid up right now, healing. But this also applies to all of us in one way or another. I’ll speak for myself.