Working on Mothers Day

Today started out like most Sundays. A little coffee, some breakfast, a bit of work in the garden. But like the past two or three Sundays, I have spent most of the afternoon packing and preparing to go back on the road, working in another region. Last week it was Austin, this week it will be Houston. Such is the exciting life of Italian Wine Guy. Hotels, early flights (tomorrow the plane departs at 6:30 am) and early meetings. Not complaining, just the time of the business where we all must beat the streets.

Monday my colleague, Guy Stout, and I will conduct a 2 hour seminar on Italian wine for 40 or so salespeople, complete with about 20 wines to taste. All before noon. Another Monday. Weather in Houston will be around 90° F with thunderstorms. So, hot and humid. Real glamorous.


Today my son couldn’t make it for dinner because he had to work. The other children also had work or meetings, so it was empty nest day. I called my mom and sisters, but nobody answered. I could talk to the ones who have already passed over; at least I know where to find them. So today I talked with my grandmothers and aunts and fathers and grandfathers and uncles. There were all together, just like the old days.


I guess I am a little tristé. I long for the days where the family got together. That was before therapy. I still miss those long tables and the stories and the uncles and aunts and cousins. Tables where I had my first sips of wine among family who guided my journey on the wine trail so that it would be sane and sober, most of the time.

Those wines from northern California; Zinfandel and Carignane and Alicante Bouschet.

Last week I was fortunate to taste the brash and unapologetic wines from Four Vines Winery in Paso Robles. Wines with names like The Heretic ( old vine Petite Sirah), Anarchy ( Syrah, Zinfandel and Mourvedre) and Maverick ( 100 year old Zinfandel from Grandpere vineyard in Amador County). Wines not ashamed to express their lineage, but wines that can still rock with the best of them, from Clapton to Modest Mouse. Old California strutting into the 21st century. Wines like I grew up with; red, smooth, delicious and proud to be alive.

Now I, or is it we, just have to get our families together by the long tables again and keep the fires stoked.

Three That Stood Out

Photo by Giuseppe Pino

You’re on the road four, maybe five days. Maybe it’s New York or New Orleans or Phoenix. And you’re ready to go home. A week in Austin well, I’m ready, il conto per favore.

Three wines that have stood out this week. A week filled with nothing but tasting. There were many wines not from Italy but I want to get us back on the wine trail in Italy. Sans weirdness, sans snark, just playing the part, without wise saws or modern instances.

Castellare Chianti Classico 2003
I often forget about this wine, usually I am breathing heavy over a bottle of Rampolla or Querciabella. A little ways down on the SR222, in Castellina in Chianti, the winery is situated on what the local people call “i sodi”, land too hard or steep for horses, vineyards that have to be worked by hand. This is an illusive wine, or maybe it is just too direct. Maybe I am looking round corners for an explanation of this wine, when right in front of me it stands, simply naked. Honest. True to its origins. It could be one of those ancient southern wines that I dream about or one of those wines made 4500 years ago in the Northern Sinai for the Egyptian rulers.

I am still tasting this wine, trying to figure out how it will fit into a world that wants it “right now”, because this isn’t a wine that will yield so quickly. Yes it’s right there in front of me, but the problem, Horatio, is that this isn’t part of the philosophy folks in many parts dream of. In hipper-than-California Austin? Let me slip my i-pod on and listen to a little Modest Mouse and I’ll get back to you. Maybe.

Back….better now. This is like a pair of jeans that are torn and worn and dirty, real cool. Only thing is, you didn’t buy it that way, you wore the jeans for years. You turned them that way by living with them, wearing them, sweating in them, dancing in them. This is not a store bought, plug-and-play Chianti Classico. This isn’t “old school”. This is “ancient school” Chianti. But like the winemakers of 2500BC, they had eight generations to polish their craft, get something to gleam.

Austin, or anyone who cares, take this bottle onto a porch in the late afternoon and spend an evening with it watching the earth turn.


Altesino Rosso di Montalcino 2003
Rosso di Montalcino used to not sell and then the wholesalers would close it out and give someone a good deal. Rosso di Montalcino is now as expensive as Brunello used to be. Rosso do Montalcino isn’t a shadow wine of the big brother. Past, present and future. We just have to get to the future part. It’s a funny thing, wine geeks go out of their way to dig up interesting wines from the Loire or Margaret River or Paso Robles. They exist; I was sipping on a very nice Bourguiel last night, followed by an old vine Petite Sirah from Lodi. Yeah, yeah.

So what are we gonna do with the not-so-big-Mamou?

I reckon all of Alesino’s Rosso di Montalcino is opened and drank sooner or later, so let someone else worry about that, for now.

I got up at 5:00 am and drove 200 miles. Around 9:45 I was tasting the Altesino Rosso do Montalcino on 6th Street in Austin with a client and the winemaker. After three plus hours of driving from Dallas I had arrived to Montalcino, I was in the Tuscan Hill Country. The glass was the passport. Smoky, dusty, oregano, dried porcini, a walk in the fields. Nice way to rid myself of driver’s legs. Sweet fruit, thick and juicy. Steak and eggs, with a side of garlic grits.

Viviani Amarone 2003
I know I probably talk too much about this winery. I get perturbed when I hear folks talking about what they think a great Amarone is. Walk the hills, get lost in your car in Negrar at midnight. Drive past Dal Forno’s place three or four times looking for a place more “garagista” than it is. Then talk to me about great Amarone.
Walk the walk first.

I shouldn’t even have to talk about this. You should already know the greatness of this wine, this estate. You should have already “gotten” this. I am an altar boy in my starched cassock, preparing the implements for the priest. Everything is ready, the candles are lit, the incense is loaded. The wine is poured into the cruets.

The aroma of this wine is reminiscent of the little San Gabriel Mission, tight, fine, ancient wood beams, light incense floating in the air, deep-roots sweat-and-blood. A high mass wine, the cardinal and the courtesan dine and drink alike when this wine is present.

So, while I haven’t exactly swerved back into the vortex of a reality most people would find recognizable, these are just a few notes gathered while trying to find my way back to the base camp.

Zapped in Spillville

Brunello on the Brazos
There must have been a vortex that I slipped through. Drove to Austin on Monday to meet Guido Orzalesi of Altesino. All went well; a little 2003 Rosso, some 2001 Brunello and an amazing 1997 Vin Santo. After work, driving around Austin tasting these and other wines, I took Guido to a non-Italian place. Not too far from the hotel, Sandra Bullock had just opened up her café, Bess. It was either that or Guero’s Taco Bar, and the last time I was there, the tacos al pastor were dried out and tasteless and the bartender treated me like a Yankee. Pineapple in a taco al pastor? I know, but this time is seemed so much like yuppy chow.

Talking with Dottore Guido, a young man who is really trying to help take Altesino and Montalcino into a realm of the world view. It was refreshing how he said the signs were good, but folks still compare their Brunello to their neighbors. Or rather talk about how much better theirs is than their neighbors. Invidia.

“Folks in Bordeaux say, our wine is better than Brunello, than Burgundy, than Napa” Guido said. “In Montalcino they say how much better their wine is than neighbor over the hill or the big company down the road. They cut down Brunello. Lafite and Mouton don’t cut Bordeaux down.” Amen.

I would so love to talk to the producers, say at Benvenuto Brunello, and offer my perspective. We must all work together, first, getting people to drink wine, then maybe red wine. Then Italian, and then Brunello. Over the next generation.

“The older generation went out in the 1980’s and told people around the world a little about Brunello. Then the land became valuable and more growers started making wine. But they ask a price for their wine without considering what the market can bear. All they see is their wealthy neighbor asking so much for their wine and the think, because they are next door or down the road, that they can ask the same, or more.”

Gold Bands on Grape Stained Hands
”What they don’t see is that large winery, or even a small one like us, going to America and elsewhere in the world, traveling away from home, from our families, to listen to wine buyers and sommeliers tell us what they are looking for. We don’t always hear what we want, sometimes we hear them angry with the prices and they tell us about the other wines of the world that are competing for their dollar. It is very sobering, how do you say, a reality check?”

Yes, a reality check in Austin, that’s an anomaly. Maybe we have slipped through a vortex.

The next day there was a ZAP tasting here in Austin, so everything stops. Italian wine business, etc. And Thursday there is a vertical Malbec tasting, so we must sell tomorrow and shovel coal, solo, the next day. Jeesh, the Italians in this town just don’t ever seem to get their due.

At the ZAP, I overheard a wine-industry wonkette, say, “Yeah, we spill more Zinfandel at our winery than all these folks make.” Sweet. Nice bragging point in ever-so-greener-than your town-Austin. Now, if you spill more Zinfandel than let’s say, Shiner Bock, maybe that would impress the locals. The ones who make the Berkeley-lovin’ guy feel like a Yank. Well, Mr. Borrego, back in Dallas, with his Mutton tacos and not-so-cool crowd, is seeming cooler and more grounded than these dreaded hipsters. The only thing he does with pineapple is juice it and serve it with a straw.

Scalpel, Suture, Winelist
So I get word an Italian restaurant, that a friend of mine is opening (and one of the reasons I have come to Austin) has a partner, a doctor, who is writing the wine list. So I have decided the only thing I can do is, buy a book and learn how to do open heart surgery. Without anesthesia. Just like in sales.

I called back home as I was driving up Congress Avenue; just thought I’d ask if maybe I died in my sleep last night and this was all part of hell. No answer. My watch said 6 o’clock, though the sun was directly overhead. Maybe I had sunk even lower than hell.

Who Wound Up the Wine Doll?
Back at the Zap tasting, some hand pats my butt, and I look around to see one who shouldn’t be. Someone who doesn’t even know the difference between a Dolcetto and a Roero. That can be a real turn-off. I’m now not just in hell, but Dante’s layer-cake hell. With only Zinfandel to drink.

Fortunately Donn Reisen of Ridge had a table with his Lytton Springs, York Creek and Geyserville Zinfandels.
A Berkeley alum, red wine that doesn’t burn, something I can swallow (after the umpteenth joke about, "hey Alfonso, where’s the Primitivo?")

Before yesterday, I was proud to be from California, and Palm Springs at that. The Old Mountain that I used to stare at as a kid, talking to San Jacinto. Now even that memory has been tarnished by an experience that I can only allude to, in a Schrambling-like crypticism.

I’ve gone way over my limit, and only a little hint about wine, the Ridge. Great stuff. Nuff said.

Back to the cake; see if we can burrow past the pineapple, out of this bete noire.

IWG & Baby B

Finding Your Spot

Have you ever had a wine that just hit all the points on your palate? It touched the sweet, the salty, the bitter, the sour, the spicy, the astringent, all the points. It hit the spot. That’s better than a 95 point wine, for the experience you are having is your unique interaction with a product that has been made by another person who doesn’t necessarily know you or know your tastes. So when it happens, it is pretty special.

I know, I know, just give us tasting notes or tell us about Italy, enough of this rambling. Maybe you just want to be told what to like, where to go in Italy, what to eat and drink, what pictures to look at. And you will be disappointed with what I am about to lay out. It’s just a map, not to anywhere you can find that easily. But once you get there, once you find your spot, you’ll be as good as the experts.

So where do you start? Let’s take a wine, let’s say a Primitivo from Puglia. Cantele makes a good one, basic, moderately priced, readily available.

Opening the wine, let it roll into your glass and swirl a little bit, give it some time, no need to rush. Get to know the wine, look at the color, note that is has a pretty, bright ruby color, is clear and fresh. As you take it to breathe in, close your eyes. What does it remind you of in your past? Is there something from childhood, or yesterday? Is there a memory of something from a walk, an earthy memory? What kind of fruit does it recall? Is there any of the barrel or is it unoaked? What about the wine reminds you of something totally not about wine?
Does it have a variety of aromas, or does one stand out?

Take a sip; don’t spit it out this time. Take another slightly larger taste; let it roll around your mouth like it did in the glass. Let it roll all across your palate, let it break upon the shores of your tongue and your back palate, let it roll. What’s your first impression? Is it pleasant? What does it make your think about, how does it make you feel? Do you have any cheese nearby? Give it a taste, and go back to trying the wine. How does it change the wine? Are your starting to feel hunger? Does it make your mouth water?

After you swallow, walk away from the wine, go sit somewhere away, go back to your book or your work or your computer. Or your garden. Wait about 10-15 minutes and involve yourself in some activity. Let it sink in.

It’s like looking at it from another point of view; maybe the distance gives another perspective. That simple.

So what do you think? Did it hit your spot? If so, really nice. If not, try again. That’s really a simple exercise that anyone can do. It takes more time than expertise but if you are taking at a relatively slow pace, one can, over time become pretty adept at finding your spot.

You don’t have to load up a cellar with trophies, or buy the most expensive wine on the list. In fact the discipline of finding the wine that was put on the list for you (the expert) can be like a treasure hunt. So very much fun. And buying wine becomes more like going on a vacation, looking for something unique that resonates with your points. Today there are many places where you can taste wine before buying. You don’t have to worry about what the masters or the influential journalists think about it. By the way, they are also on a road to discovery every time they taste. They too are learning, if they are going about it with humility and a love of discovery.

It’s not all black and white, finding your spot. Sometimes you can go right to it, sometimes you stumble upon it and sometimes you walk right past it.


Whatever you do, don’t let anyone tell you what you are tasting and smelling, that which is unique to you. And don’t let them tell you what you are smelling or tasting is wrong, how can they know what your experience is anyway? Experience in life, not wine tasting. That is your unique experience and it colors your sensory experiences.


Finding your spot is something we all look for in wine tasting, and other experiences on the wine trail in Italy, and everywhere esle, in time and space.

















As a matter of note, all the pictures were taken at Dealey Plaza in Dallas. The occasion was the 40th anniversary of the assassination of John Kennedy. There were tourists milling around the spot where the infamous deed took place, in fact they were having their pictures taken on the very spot (or spots) where the bullets took their toll.

Why Italians Are So Confusing

So, the intern was a little concerned? Just a busy week, is all. End of the month, beginning of another, get off one bronking bull and hop on another one.

In the local market, at a boutique wine shop this week, one of the best in town. At the Italian aisle, and a lady is asking about the difference between these two wines that have similar labels.

She really liked the Guisto di Notri from Tua Rita, but the Di Majo Norante Sangiovese was also interesting to her. I explained the differences; one is from Tuscany, the other is from Molise. Both are IGT wines, Indicazione Geografica Tipica. The Tua Rita is a Cabernet/Merlot blend and the Di Majo Norante is a Sangiovese. Both have superstar wine consultants, Tua Rita has Stefano Chioccioli; Di Majo Norante has Riccardo Cotarella.

Tua Rita has a total production of 4,000 cases, and this Giusto di Notri has gotten high marks from all the wine reviews for the vintage on the shelf (2004). The Di Majo Norante Sangiovese is a larger production (20,ooo+ cs), but has also gotten high marks (90) for the wine on the shelf, also a 2004.

But one wine was $95. And the other was $9.99. Her question to me was, what makes that $95. wine worth almost 10 times the other one that is $9.99?

In reality both wines cost pretty well much the same to make, maybe a dollar or two more a bottle? The Tuscan wine is a new area, so maybe the real estate is approaching a high-water mark. The Molise region is inexpensive and production costs there are probably not too bad. So, what gives?

Status, rarity, cold-hard caché. Simple? Or are you confused too?


If I’m looking at these wines and getting into the heads of the people who come into a store for a bottle or two of wine, I’ve got to try and see it from a couple of points of view.

I know the Giusto di Notri is a delicious wine. And I like drinking it, even if it is a Bordeaux blend from the fashionable Maremma area of coastal Tuscany. Sassicaia and company. 16th arrondissement. Saturday night wine. Alto-borghese. Now do you begin to see the arrangement?

Molise is a mark on a map with an Autostrada going through it. It isn’t a destination. There is not a Metro that goes to this neighborhood. Working class, backwater, are you beginning to see the difference?

Wait, you say? It is still Italy, it’s not like it’s third world or developing economy. By God, it is still Italy. Yes it is, and it is sure to grow its prestige in the next generation or so, because of the real estate. Is the wine stellar? Is that what you need on a Tuesday night, have you become so jaded that all wines must be revelations from a higher more intelligent Being? It’s Tuesday, pizza night, remember? It will be just fine.

But, as a friend likes to say, the reality is, that looking at these two wines, unless one knows, one would probably do what that woman did. She picked up the $9.99 wine because she could relate to it. Oh, and well, she was having pizza. After all, it was only Tuesday.

Faster, Pussycat

Guest commentary by Beatrice Russo

Well, he’s at it again, gone all Willy Wonka on us. After I texted him on a question about Albarino he seemed to go into another dimension. I talked to his son, he said he’d been over to his apartment a few days earlier and had tried out his new inversion table, took two turns at being upside down. I came over to the house to bring him a bottle of his special Italian orange liqueur, thinking we could talk about my upcoming first level sommelier test, but all I could find was a bunch of papers, what seemed like an interview with a fried potato, I tell you, he's pushing it.

Last week I was helping him with a new project. Numbers stuff, easy, basic algebra that my dad taught me (he was a math teacher). Italian Wine Guy has a new project, top secret stuff, and he has been asking me to gather national figures from the Italian Trade Commission and other places that gather sales and import figures.

I know he was going out of town, but I thought it was next week. Austin? He said something about Chicago; I know there’s a Wine Spectator Grand Tasting event there next week. But that’s not his deal. He once showed me an old WS from the 80’s, he collected them and old Rolling Stone magazines when they were both printed on newspaper. Weird.


He said he dreamt about his first real car, a Porsche Speedster. I’ve seen a picture, nice looking wheels. And this new wine label with the three girls and a donkey has him trying to figure out if it will work or not. I like the Falanghina idea, not too cool on the Montepulciano, though. Maybe he should rethink that, but hey, what do I know, I’m just an intern.

I did get an email about what a tough month April was, even though he seemed to be having a pretty good time, going all over Italy while I watched his house and his stray cat and watered the vegetable garden. While he ate at Perbellini and Belvedere and Bottega del Vino and Ciccarelli. Yeah, I feel for his sorry old donkey-butt.



I did see an open letter from his doctor, something about cholesterol and thyroid. My grand-dad had something wrong like that, used to pass out once in a while. I hope he’s OK.

I just got a text from him, he’s with a Spanish wine producer from Galicia, they’re eating blue crab and drinking Albarino. Wait, I was just asking him about that darn wine and now he’s, what? He’s in the zone.

So the text ended with “Faster, pussycat.” Dude is out there. I’ve got to get to yoga. He'll be back, just sounds busy with his glorious life.
















Comments to me here:Beatrice

Today's Wine Cellar ~ Half-Empty or Half-Full?

Was there ever time when one could think of wine as just something so natural, like the wind and the sun?

In the model of my perfect planet, wine is not a fantasy for the wealthy or the affluent. It is only a small part of the daily life, but an essential one.

In my perfect cellar, there are only a few wines, because most of the have already been opened and enjoyed.

Tonight I tasted a few Brunellos, 2001 and 1997. Both of them seemed ready to drink. In fact the 1997 was already on its way down. But the 2001 was just perfect. That would be for me the way I’d like it, not having to store a lot of wine, just a little and always on the lookout for another 3 or 4 bottles. Small footprint in consumption, but good, very good quality to keep searching for.


No need for special agents, near and far, to protect my personal interests. When it has gotten that the cars and the foods and the wines and the homes have exceeded their value, I can remember the early days when money was tight. But quality remained something worth seeking out, even if we had so little discretionary income.

It wasn’t a barren desert; there was the occasional oasis from which to draw from.


Then time and ambition and work starts to push everything back so far it’s hard to see the important, the essential, that which is important, friends and family, a simple life.

The fall from grace, the original sin of the wine trail, is to look too much for the defining moment in wine tasting and wine loving. There is a little of the narcissist in those who search only for the 98 point Brunello, shunning the lowly 91 or 92 pointer.


Italian wines that have a sense of the place they come from have less of a sense for their “point-worthiness.” Who cares?

Do you really think that wine is being made by a person who cares more for a review than their relationship with their plot of land, their earth? Yes, it takes more work and diligence, and yes it might not be a status symbol to order it at the hot new place in town. All the more reason to care about these kinds of wines.

Sure sometimes a wine, by virtue of its quality and the trajectory of its popularity, will become “cult.”

That is like the beautiful girl you knew in high school who went out west and made it in the movies. She no longer belongs to where she came from. Her new world has taken her into another ambience. Forget about her.

She won’t be at the table, nor will those wines, anymore.


Is it sad? A world one grows up in that seems foreign and unrecognizable? Or a world with mystery and new encounters, waiting for you to step on over into the secret corridor and launch into an interesting and fulfilling universe of discovery?

Thank God It's Flight-Day

I’m now officially out of my special Italian Orange liqueur, which means my secret writing weapon is spent. After a week of working long hours and nights writing these posts, I am cooked. But onward, through the fog, toiling, ever vigilant of the need to move onward, upward into the light. Man, sometimes I just want to jump out, pull the rip-cord and head for my island.

Fortunately the weekend is near, so I can get some work done. Hundreds of arugula sprouts are screaming in my hothouse, begging to be taken outside and planted in the earth, with the bees and the sparrow hawks and the outlaw coyote that is cleaning up the neighborhood of meandering felines.

Later today, if anyone reading this is in the Dallas, Texas area, I will finish up the week with a Friday Night Wine Flight, five Sicilian wines. I’ll be taking those folks, who show, on a Sicilian Carousel, starting with several Nero d’Avolas, a white Grillo and a surprisingly good Syrah.

This is not for Master Sommeliers-in-waiting; besides they’re way too busy developing their careers (and, apparently, to return calls as well). No, this is for regular folks who want to hear stories about wine and friends. Details here.

Speaking of wines and friends, the importers have come a knockin’ this week. Seems they’re back from Vinitaly with their sample cases full of new stuff that the market can’t live without. We’ll see. I still am looking at wine from last year's Vinitaly (and the year before), some of which are in my employers warehouses, still looking for someone to love them.

These guys know how to "slice the pie"

If you are an importer or a marketing person or a hopeful-wannabee, please know this. We want you to make a pile of money and be happy, just as long as you don’t expect us to be thrown out of the plane in mid flight. Come as a partner with realistic expectations. Respect the experience some of us have gained over the years, it could save you a lot of time and heartache. And please, many of us are working 60-70 hours a week for 20+ years at this. We may live in a backwater market, that doesn’t mean we are “jejune”, as Woody Allen would say. We're not "all hat-no cattle", as we say, in the local dialect.

Wine note this week- not Italian, but a nice beverage, Pierre Sparr Alsace One. Five grapes. Had it twice, once in a tasting, once at a lunch. Great with lentil soup and some sautéed perch. The wine had a clean backbone of crispness aligned with the spices of the fruit (Riesling, Gewurztraminer, Pinot Blanc, Muscat and Pinot Gris)
Pierre Sparr Alsace One – Under $15.

Wine before it's time - 1 Liter Italian varietals in tetra-pax. The 17 and 18 year olds will be ready for this in 3-4 years when they are legal and looking for a good value that is 100% recyclable. That is, if the World Bank doesn't devalue the dollar anymore.

So, for the moment I'm writing dry, and it’s late again. Big developments coming. The writing thing will soon blossom. And the day job, well it soon will go to the next level too. I must do something big, before my heart bursts. Passion, baby.

And lastly, too crazy, but I actually heard this tonight (see cartoon below). The world turns and gets more and more interesting in a wicked sort of way.

Like I said earlier, got to rise above it.

And good night.

Comments here:Italianwinetrail[at]yahoo[dot]com

Storming the Tower with Straw

Have you ever experienced moments when you look forward, and also to the past, and have been seeing the space between them compressing? Did the 1950’s exist, or are they a history that you didn’t really experience, like the 1940’s or the 1930’s or renaissance Italy? Or ancient Rome?

All through this time grapes grow, wine is made. I read of a time, 4,500 years ago, about the winemakers who traded with the Egyptian rulers. This area, Northern Sinai, had a period of 200 years when they did a lot of business with the Nile leaders. Imagine, 8 generations or winemaking, just how good they could have gotten at making wine great. Passing along information, sharpening their skills, improving their winemaking, and handing it over to the next generation. I would love to have tasted those wines. Or maybe I did.

Now, the 1960’s don’t seem so far away, just a generation ago. It was the beginning of a move towards living lighter off the land, more in harmony with nature, what we presently call living with a smaller carbon footprint.


Well there I was, walking in the Sierras, heading for a little tree house by a river for a short time. Nearby a giant fig tree pushed out fruit for the birds and the lucky humans who witnessed the ripening. Behind us was a mountain range that was gentle and rugged and ancient. In front of us, the south fork of the American River rolling, waiting for us to jump on.

Simple. Happy. Timeless.


Meanwhile, halfway across the planet, war was waging, ripping, burning forests, poisoning rivers, destroying shelters for many souls, and lives lost.


We were heading towards our Summer of Love, while some would never make it past the Fall. Many marched, taking a trail towards the Promised Land.

Hey, look yonder, tell me what you see
Marching to the fields of Gettysburg?
It looks like Handsome Johnny with a flintlock in his hand,
Marching to the Gettysburg war, hey marching to the Gettysburg war
-Richie Havens

Winemakers marched too. They marched, but returned to their fields. Some set about putting into practice some of those convictions that inspired us to our life of adult activity. It was called the One Straw Revolution.


At Universities, Campaniles rang out the hours, the days, and the eras.

What have we learned? And what will we hand over to the next generation? Rows of zero-lot houses off some road leading from the cities? Fields of crops looking for the bees to return and pollinate them in an ancient and necessary rite.

The vines will wait for them, can't make it without them. We might end up with Barolo in Bernkastel, Sangiovese in Soultzmatt.

Thank God the young winemakers of Italy, and the world, are hearing the warning signs. People like Marco Torriti at Mongrana (il primo vino di Querciabella in Maremma), who mentions Masanobu Fukuoka with a look in his eye that takes us back 4,500 years ago, to the 9th generation.

Hey, look yonder, tell me what's that you see
Marching to the fields of Argentaria?
It looks like Handsome Gianni with a Green-Mix in his hand,
Marching to the One Straw Revolution, hey marching to the One Straw Revolution.

The sirens have been sounded; it's time to storm the tower, ragazzi. March, but make your footprint light, in preparation for the generations to follow you.

Carbon Footprint Calculator

Photos by Alfonso Cevola

You'll Like This Wine, It Doesn't Taste Italian

It was Friday afternoon and there was a meeting with a broker, more affectionately known as the “wine criminal”. He has been given this name because he has shown wines that seem to be priced way below the market, hence there might be something about them that might involve practices outside of the law.

And while folks such as Piero Antinori say: “ancient roots play an important role in our philosophy, but they have never held back our spirit of innovation”, I don’t think this is quite what he had in mind.

Anyway, we were doing our part, listening, tasting, being led by a young supplier and his agent. We were attentive, but not as naïve as I felt we were perceived as being. Not a problem, I don’t mind being “mis-underestimated”.


Sealing the Deal
What really made my day, though, was when the broker opened up a bottle of red wine and said the words,” You'll like this, it doesn't taste like an Italian wine.” My response, “Great, all the better to go with the food at Italian restaurants that doesn’t taste Italian.”

I am not making this up. I will only say that this is not the way to my heart. And while I am not a snob, I am assuredly looking for authentic Italian experiences in wine.

Later that night I finished up the week at a very fancy and highly regarded Italian restaurant. Great pizza, innovative cooking, we had a carpaccio of pesce spada (swordfish) that was downright there-on-the-island good.


Pizza and Primitivo
A red wine was suggested to go with the pizza. A Primitivo from Puglia was opened and poured. I have liked Primitivo and wines from Puglia, since my first trip there 30 years ago. In those days we carried a one liter bottle and filled it up along the way. In 1977 a liter of red cost about 46 cents. Negro Amaro or Uva di Troja, maybe an occasional Primitivo. Decent, wholesome, tasting of a region, with lots of sun. Not a problem for me. But on this night the Primitivo tasted of manipulation, especially in the finish. Too creamy, too smooth, it also didn’t taste like an Italian wine.

You'll Like These Wines, They Do Taste Italian
So rather than live in a world where things Italian don’t taste Italian, here are two wines we have been tasting, alongside made-by-hand meals.

Cantele Primitivo
A simple wine, clean yes, but tan and healthy. People treat Puglia like some sort of Appalachia, but that is incorrect. Puglia is far from the center, a lot of tourists never make is that far south. Fine with me, and the Pugliese too. Fruit of cherry, rustic like a well-worn rocking chair. The press likes it. Good for them.

Ver Sacrum- San Savino
Holy Spring, the Latin translation. No wood, thank you. Montepulciano in purezza. From the Marche, an almost New World growing zone. This vineyard could be in Santa Barbara, California. Fortunately, in this climate the winemaker manages to make a wine that is Italiano in purezza. Fruit is rich, yes. Alcohol is high, but somehow it manages to maintain its balance. More info here.

So while I am not the kind that writes wine notes exclusively, I am of a mind to find an alternate, a wine or two that do “taste Italian”.

Italy makes many wines, many styles. Just try to find ones that taste like they come from somewhere. Open them up, pour them into your glass, close your eyes and breathe in. If it smells like you are in Italy, take a sip and give thanks. You have landed.

With Gianni and Paolo Cantele in Lizzanello,Puglia

Comments here:Italianwinetrail[at]yahoo[dot]com