Imagining the perfect wine I n our everyday world, at the end of a day, many of us go home, change into something more comfortable, look...

The scene is an urban setting somewhere in the Western half of the United States. A wine waiter is working a large party of folks who are ...

M ost of the past week was spent in New Orleans. It’s the closest I can get to Sicily, and the food culture there is somewhat of a recharg...

I f there is one thing in our American’s DNA, it’s our tendency to look forward. We had a brief fling in the 1960’s with being here and no...

T hey told me I’ve been here long enough. Time to make room for new growth. Told me to prepare for my last harvest. It used to be that a...

I t was a late night and looked to be an even earlier morning. Shutting down the evening with a wine dinner, singing Neapolitan songs with...

A woman ventures out from her familiar surroundings with her daughter and her camera. The era is the 1930’s. An unusual act in those days...

I ’m a devout introvert. Ten minutes in a NY subway and I can’t wait to get upstairs, where there are even more people. Naturally shy as ...

J oe Piccola just landed in Rome. This will be the first of two trips in the same month to Italy. Joe just became a grandpa, his personal ...

T he hierarchies of the great wines of the Langhe are still a mystery to me. After 40+ years, I look over the panorama and am baffled over...

“Make your mistakes, take your chances, look silly, but keep on going. Don’t freeze up.”   -Thomas Wolfe T he past few days in New York,...

From the dies canulares storybook I t had been a brutally hot summer. Sangiovese came up to me and announced, “I can’t take it here anym...

The social hierarchy of vines A mong the many hundreds of Italian vines there is a pecking order. Some are more important than others. O...

Lighting the fire balloon at Ferragosto M any Italians have spent the day at the beach, in mirthful play. Back home, work proceeds. It’s...

Echoes from the archives  - posted 1/10/13 From the “Om mani padme om-erta” dept. T he single most asked question I get, on a regular ...