Life at the Table

From the Archives ~ Dec.12, 2007

Why do we eat out? That was the question I was asking myself today at lunch. I was in a little Italian-styled restaurant where we had convinced the owners to do a progressive wine list. Unfortunately they hired a manager, still wet behind the ears, who thinks he knows better. “The people can’t find the wines they are looking for; we need to make it easy for them.” We were – by arranging the wines in the order of their styles so they wouldn’t have to depend on the constant turn of wait staff and managers who have no real life experience in these matters.

Young people with old minds – old people with young thoughts – the argument about people wanting something more traditional is just not correct. If that were the case, this same style of wine list, which we put into use in the most traditional Italian restaurant over 10 years ago and which worked magnificently, well it would have failed there and then. But it didn’t. So what we have here is a failure to communicate.

The picture above was shot in 1969 on Telegraph Avenue in Berkeley, California, in what is still known as Café Mediterraneum. It was a magic moment for me seeing the light coming though the windows and on to the table.

The table, that one ring circus where it all takes place; food, wine, romance, engagements, break ups, life and death.

All through the world we break our stride and stop. Today a friend and I just took the time to talk about our world, our families, our time on earth, and yes a little of the wine business. With this new crop of ill prepared restaurateur, it gives us much to ponder over; lots of mulch for the fields in which we still must toil.

The Italians have been wonderful for all of us. Who would have thought a simple plate of pasta would give so much pleasure day after day, throughout the generations? A little flour, an egg, some water. A little tomato or maybe some porcini. And cheese, my heroin.

Not just the Italians though. One day on a Good Friday in Frankfurt, we happened to walk by their Wall Street, the Börse. Outside, tents had been erected and impromptu wine bars were pouring Riesling and Muller-Thurgau to the businessmen and women. What a grand revelation – the leaders of business for one of the strongest industrial and economic powers, lollygagging outside, talking to each other on the eve of a holiday. Drinking wine, not making money. How civilized, I mused, how very wonderful.

The fabulous city of slow food, Eataly, in Torino. Table after table of the different stages of eating, with people, families, sitting together, enjoying prosciutto or gelato. The table, always the table.

A picnic in Perigord. A visit to the farmers market and a wine shop or two. A roasted chicken, some potatoes, and green beans. And red wine from Cahor. A light breeze through the trees that were shading and cooling us, and people we just met were strangers no more. Today one of the couples emailed me from New York. They were at Babbo and were wondering about a Traminer on the list. Not some traditional, tired wine list. They had their hands on a list with spunk, with balls. For lovers and fighters, with passion and purpose.

It doesn’t always have to be life changing. After all, it’s a meal, something we do thousands of times in our lives. But it needn’t be mundane. We have plenty of choice in the matter, how we nourish ourselves through the days of our lives. Sometime it might be a simple freshly baked loaf of bread and some cheese. And of course the wine. It could be burgers and Brunello or it could be Fontina and Fumin. Or it could be a bottle of cognac and a lifetime of stories.

But restaurateurs take notice – we are traveling more – we are expecting more from you and your concepts. It is too easy to make a simple, wholesome meal at home. We aren’t always looking for some epiphany over Peekytoe crab. We just want you to treat our future memories with the proper care and feeding.

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

Heart and Soil

From the Archives ~ Sept.13, 2006

This week I have been immersed in Piedmont. Barolo, Castiglione Falletto, Serralunga, Cuneo, Barbaresco and on. Sorting out some information for the young sales force. This link between humans and the land that makes one wine taste one way and another, over on a hill 2 miles away, taste another way. The Italian wine trail ends today in the Langhe, but starts in the Marche.

15 years ago I landed in a little town, Matelica, to taste the wines of Aldo Cifola from La Monacesca. On that visit we were looking at his new vineyard, Camerte, where his Merlot and Sangiovese vines were newly planted. That will be another story for another day. What happened on that day, and how it leads to Piedmont, is something totally out of the linear way of seeing things. They really have nothing and everything to do with each other.

The inspiration for this came from a photograph I took back then at the estate, of the La Monacesca caretaker and his sons. After a wine tasting, in a little room, with prosciutto he prepared from his happy pigs, they brought out the accordions. Now I’m a sucker for accordions, used to own a couple of them till I donated them to some missionaries in Central America. Maybe it’s the um-pap-pah music of Calabria or the Zydeco of our beloved southwestern Louisiana nearby. If there’s an accordion nearby, count me in. Accordions, the mobile musical terroir machines, for me.

To see this father and his sons, now grown up, let’s back up. The food was raised at his farm: The grapes were made into wine, the prosciutto, the bread and so on. The children were raised here, too. Heart and soil. That’s Italy in a New York second.

This man and his wife took on the stewardship of a land he didn’t even own. They are caretakers. Correction, they are caregivers. From the dirt to the denim, the family was infused with caring, for their vines and their children. The Camerte vineyard, when I first saw it, I wanted to lie right down and die in it. And that’s not a morbid wish, please understand me. I wanted to be a part of what was going on there, on a molecular level!

There are other occurrences. Italy is rampant with them.
In Calabria , in the Veneto .

Three years before that trip to the Marche, I was looking at some newly planted vines in Barbaresco. The area was called Montestefano, and the family there was quite excited about this vineyard that would be ready in a five or so years. Five years! We’ve gone through a mate or two, two cars, two houses, a stereo system, two computer upgrades and 3 cellular phones in that time. And for what? Those vines on those steep hills, patiently working their way up, easing the love from the dirt into the vine, year after year, grape after grape. And what do we understand about that, back in the meeting rooms? What do we need to know about that, how do we convey that sense of connection to our fledgling wine-drinkers back in the U.S.of A.?

Look at the way the youth of Italy are exposed to the traditions, but even more important, the love for the obligation to share in the caring for the land and the fruits of one’s labors. For the young boys in Matelica, it first started with a baby pig. The young sommelier, for her, it started walking with her grandmother, picking chestnuts in the Langhe. It grew in them, and they grew into it. Not another new Game Boy or another new pair of designer jeans. Not just that. Time, the influence of the daily communion with the earth.

That’s what makes it so difficult to help our wine industry professionals and the clients. I can’t put that on a sheet of paper with a score and a good price. I try. But it seems so much less than the inspiration that I feel when I take an hour and think about it, reflect on it. Question is, as it has been for some time, how do we get folks to slow their world down to take a peek into this wonderful Emerald City of Wine? How do we impart this in a meaningful way, to the person who decides which wines go on the rack at the wine shop, to the neighbor in the new house who wants to know more about Italian wine? And how do we get it to stick?

This ain’t plug and play. This is day by day…really hard work. But it is so rewarding when, at the end of the day, one is drawing a glass of Nebbiolo or Barbera and looking at some incredible site across the hill (even if it is only on this page or in your mind). The neighbor’s house may not be new and improved, and the internet connection might still be dial-up. That’s right. Very, very right.

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

All Roads Lead To...

From the Archives ~ Jan. 2, 2008

My adult introduction to Italy was August 15, 1971. I had decided on my twentieth birthday in July that I would go to Italy by myself. So I bought a round trip ticket from Los Angeles to Rome for $900.00, a tidy sum then.

When I landed in Rome on that hot August day, and decided to try walking from the airport to the city, all it took was to get as far as the giant statue of Leonardo da Vinci, to convince me, backpack and all, that I should probably catch a bus.

Once I arrived at the Stazione Termini in Rome I decided to look for a place to exchange dollars for lire. Impossible, it was a national holiday, Ferragosto. It was also a Sunday. To make matters worse, Nixon had just devalued the dollar. I walked around the neighborhood of the train station, found a little pensione on the Via Palestro near the university and somehow managed to talk the landlady into letting me have a room.

I was excited and a little bit jet lagged, so I set my gear down and decided on a little nap. Some hours later I awoke to the sounds of an Italian television program in the kitchen. I thought I had slept for days, but it was probably 4 or 5 hours, just enough to keep me from getting on Italian time.

The kind landlady made me a plate of pasta and some vegetables, and offered a glass of red wine. How wonderful it all tasted. Here I was in a strange boarding house in a big city with people I didn’t know, who were treating me like family. It was a moment that really made me see Italy and Italians through a lens that I still sometimes use. We were only 25 years away from the liberation of Italy during World War II; perhaps the landlady took pity on the young American. It wasn’t that much money, I think with half pension it was about 1,500 lire, or $2.50 a day. My room I would have to share if someone else came in. But it never happened that anyone else came to that pensione in August.

Walking around Rome during the day would be my introduction to Italy. And I walked everywhere, with my cameras, photographing everything in black and white, Tri-X film, with my Canon rangefinder cameras. I was living the dream of a young man to be a street photographer, and Rome was my canvas.

From the Villa Borghese to the Fontana di Trevi, the Sistine Chapel to the Baths of Caracalla, there was no backdrop that I wouldn’t shoot in the blistering heat and humidity of Rome in August.

In that time the city was quiet, many people out of town in cooler places. Just a few tourists and the workforce of Rome, who stayed behind to keep the city running. Many shops were closed for the month, but there was enough life in the Eternal City to get a feel for a place that humans have inhabited for thousands and thousands of years.

Even though I don’t get to Rome so often these days, I have an affection for the city that took me in as a young man, without lire and without being able to speak much of the language. I had my Michelin guide, my cameras and my desire to learn about the country of my grandparents. This would not be my last trip to Italy, but rather the beginning of many visits to Italy and to Rome.





Notes on the photos - they were all taken in Rome in 1971 with my Canon rangefinders.

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

Fuga Dalla *Fattorie Cube*

Will return September 24. In the meantime, enjoy selections from the archives.



* Escape from the Cube Farm

Brunello is Dead. Long Live Brunello!

This has been a long day. A very long day. First of all, happy birthday to Gia Galli and to David Burnett. Also buon anima for Eugenio Spinozzi, now three years gone from earth.

Today started at 6:30AM in preparation for a flight to Houston, and then a drive to Galveston, for an industry tasting. More like a huge showcase for anything and everything in the wine beer, water and spirits industry. Lots of scantily clad women showing lots of skin and very little fat. Racy cars displaying caffeinated vodka. And a whole bunch of colleagues showing their stuff to their willing clients. A little bit old home week, a little hustle, a lot of BS’ing, and very little damage done. A late evening flight back home and here we are sitting up trying to figure out what just happened. Probably something for another post, though there won't be a lot of those in the next few weeks. It is harvest time in Tuscany and Italy and one must go prepare for the vendemmia.

In the last week there has been an inordinate amount of chatter about the state of Brunello. My own feelings are that, what we witnessed this week, was the death of Brunello as we know it.

Anyone who has read On the Wine Trail in Italy knows that I am not just saying this to create controversy and drive traffic to this site. I couldn't care less. There are 10,000+ who read regularly, that is good enough for me. But I do think something happened this week that when we look back it will be seen as a transition for the history of this wine, Brunello.

First, let me just say this. I could care less about the gossip about who is doing what with their grapes, grown or purchased. There are some traditionalists who have their point of view, some of them are good people and some of them are toxic. And there are some “outsiders” who preach change and some of them know what they are talking about and some of them are in it for a buck. There has been so much inaccurate and misleading reporting, blogging, suppositions and allusions. Give me a break, who the hell really knows? Some folks write me with info and all kinds of verbal iterations. To what end? Where has this taken us? Italy has a political situation that makes the American political log-jam look like the Indy 500 race. I have even heard Machiavelli's name invoked, the original gangster. Others have harkened back to the early days of Berlusconi and Mussolini. With such a fecund past it is difficult not to look back. But it is a fruitless crusade, for we only have forward gear in this vehicle, and so we must press on.

All through this week we have had the procession of winemakers from Italy making their post-Ferragosto pilgrimage to America. One player, Stephane Schaeffer, export director from Argiano, was in town towards the end of the last week. The last time I saw Stephane it was during Vinitaly in Verona and he was heading into Bottigleria Corsini, the “other” wine bar that we were frequenting, having a glass of Prosecco. Stephane was doing a wine dinner for some important clients and he was carrying wine inside. He had a furrowed brow, not the look of someone who was comfortable. But why should he have been? News was circulating all over Vinitaly about the problems in Montalcino. Argiano had a bulls-eye painted on its front door. Someone wanted blood.

A month or so later Argiano did what I thought at the time was a dramatic and slightly silly thing. They declassified their Brunello, calling it Il Duemilatre, and sent it out into the world. It was still the wine they call Brunello. But they were taking a detour around the political.

Now it looks like genius. Who cares what you call it? We in America have other things pressing for our attention and we like wine that taste good. California prepared us for all kinds of names of wines. Opus 1 is a perfect example. In those days (1979) it was considered suicide to not call a Cabernet-based wine a Cabernet. Now we have a diversity of names, and the strong survive.

Argiano took a risk; I’d like to think it was calculated. It was quite brilliant. If Brunello as we know it is now dead, Argiano has taken the high road out of hell.

Now let me say this. I do not care what grapes are in their wines. And I am not saying this in a Napoleonic-guilty-till-proven-innocent way. I am not fazed by this current ongoing tantrum-cum-soap opera that just won’t let us think about anything else in the world of Italian wine. It’s like Montalcino has hired Fox to run their press for the world. So much tragedy, so many car chases, so much schadenfreude. Enough doom and gloom already.


Back to Argiano. We did a tasting for 60 people here in fly-over country and they loved the wines. Not one wine was called a Brunello di Montalcino and it didn’t seem to matter. Sure there was some discussion from corners of the room by enthusiasts. But try as he did, what could Stephane say? I don’t know. The investigation is ongoing. Some people are still being questioned. Some wines are still in limbo. We shall see. In the meantime, Argiano has moved on.

The wines:

2006 Rosso di Montalcino – for me one of the most enjoyable wines of the night. I cringe when I hear that the Biondi-Santi camp disagrees with the Gaja camp about proposing two different kinds of Brunello, as reported on Vinowire, “One...would be reserved for “artisanal” producers... who continue to make their wines with 100% Sangiovese grapes. The other would be used by “large” producers who require more “elasticity” in their production, producers whose fruit is sourced from vineyards that do not possess “pedoclimatic [soil and climate] conditions” suitable for the cultivation of superior Sangiovese." I flinch because it seems that the Biondi-Santi camp is saying, not let’s not make two kinds of Brunello, but let’s change the Rosso di Montalcino to reflect more of the second style sense. I think that would be unfortunate because Rosso di Montalcino is a wine for those of us who don’t always have the pocketbooks of the elite-economic class. We keep losing the ability to enjoy the wines we grew up on, those of us old enough to remember Petrus and Gaja and Biondi-Santi. This Rosso from Argiano was perfect – fruit, balance, mouth feel, it has that typical sensation that a Tuscan red can have in its youth: slightly astringent and earthy, like walking in a forest after a light rain. I’d hate to lose access to wine like that.

As an aside, the first picture on this post is of Lisini. Stephane says folks usually think Biondi-Santi is the oldest Brunello estate. He says no, that claim belongs to Lisini. I have a bottle of the 1975 Riserva settling to be opened this year. Fortunately Beatrice didn't crack it open, though it seems she threatened to. Good girl.

The 2003 Il Duemilatre- identical wine to what they had previously bottled as their 2003 Brunello, but this time no mention of the appellation. Now a Toscana IGT and, for the vintage, reflecting more of the spirit and soul of Argiano than many of their neighbors “Brunelli.”

The 2006 “NC” (Non Confunditor) - touted as the wine that Argiano is looking to spread around as their entry level wine. NC also is the initials of the proprietress, Noemi Cinzano. They mix it up here, Sangiovese with Syrah, Cabernet Sauvignon and Merlot. Argiano hasn’t been afraid of those varietals and Tachis hasn’t discouraged them from seeking expression from their soil with these grapes. At first I thought this wine was a marketing gimmick and then I drank it several times and it grew on me. Remember, I am first a Californian, then an Italian and then a Texan. I didn’t grow up drinking Blue Nun or White Zinfandel. So this wine eventually recast itself in my vinous memory as a pleasant one. I can be persuaded by sybaritic virtues too.

The 2004 Solengo – And older gentleman in the crowd, now beginning his octogenarian ascent, called me over to his table and asked me what I thought of this wine. It sells for close to $100 in the retail world. I looked at him and told him it wasn’t for him. “Why,” he asked. “Because you have enough wine to drink in your life and you don’t have time for this wine.” Tough love, baby, but he got the gist of it. This is a wine for men with testosterone and money to burn. And for the women reading this, this is a lusty wine that pushes your power buttons. Go for it. Climb the mountain and tell us all about it.

The night ended with a few of us hightailing it to one of the fashionable wine bars in town, the kind that screams Dallas, with roving bands of long legged blond beauties, blackberry’s in hand. Looking out over the twilight Dallas skyline we sipped a Priorat Blanc and a Bordeaux Rose as if to say to the wine gods, we have had enough red wine tonight, we need no more of that. We have been to the mountain top. This week we buried the old moribund Brunello and we crowned a new King. Or so we have imagined. We shall see. Sooner or later.

Galveston Beach Sept. 7, 2008

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

Family Management & Anger Values

This blog seems to have been zigzagging on and off some trail. Not sure if it is wine or Italy, but for sure it is a glimpse inside the head of yours truly. Nothing is really bugging me lately, the usual issues of work, aging, family and civility, the same concerns we all might be facing one time or another. My intern has been ranting, but that is her way; youth has so many expectations of easy delivery and then they find out that they are beholden to the same powers of gravity and time as the rest of us. The wine business is plodding ahead; even in slow economic times there is always an opportunity to make something happen. I seem to be getting myself out on ledge from time to time, but like I recently read, if you don’t go out on a limb how do you expect to pick the fruit? So I ask for forgiveness if I can’t get permission; 'e la nave va'.

All these families, native born and foreign, assemble their fragile little kin and go about putting their lives in order, one step at a time. And it is through time that we find ourselves shifting and being tested by some of the adjustments. Humans seem to naturally resist change, whether you are Italian or American. Both countries are being faced with huge transformative issues that must be decided upon.

Tastes vary. The Italian salesperson of 30 years ago was faced with introducing Brolio and Bolla and Ruffino. Twenty years ago it was Santa Margherita and Brunello. Now it is Amphora wine from Friuli, resuscitated reds and whites from Campania, fruit bombs from Puglia and the Veneto, and extracted and alcohol driven big reds from Piemonte, Tuscany and Sicily. You ask for permission and hope like hell you don’t have to repeat too many mea culpas. But even if you fall, you must climb back up and move on up the hill.

And when the fashions advance so must this family of wine. In any event, looking back will always make it seem strange from another era; one wonders what made that wine or that clothing so darn attractive. And then one goes right on looking for the next pretty shiny thing.

Along the trail some of us stop and look back on a time that appears to be more desirable than what awaits us in the future. But how many babies have returned to the womb? In this Annie get your gun era, looking back at an age will always be colored by the lenses of hindsight. Don’t try backing the Nina, the Pinta and the Santa Maria into the Old World.

And if we move forward, will there be mistakes made? Without a doubt. Just like those who came before us made. Sweet fizzy white wine from the Veneto seemed like a good idea, just like staying out all night with your girlfriend did. But it passed, and most of us moved beyond it. Every generation likes to think they discovered sex or red wine. “Those who forget history…connect the dots.”

And like those who forgot history, have they also have conveniently misplaced their better judgment about the sanctity of life? Is this reverence just something to direct towards the unborn? Our children, of all ages were not brought into this world to kill and die. When a society truly reveres life then they will value families. Managing their anger might lead towards a world in which we don’t feel compelled to send our babies across the world to do our misdirected bidding, in this time or 40 years ago. To value that unborn soul only to send one’s son or daughter to the gates of hell is something I cannot fathom. It’s a horrific trend in the time I have spent on earth. My Italian friends ask me what it is we hope to do with these dissonant concepts. I point them to their history and remind them they have not been untouched by the same waves of inexplicable behavior in a supposed civilized society asking neither for permission nor forgiveness.

And the torch is passed to the next generation and it begins all over again. Learn to swim, learn to drive, learn to drink, learn to love, learn to forget. And round and round and round we go.

A Republican and a Democrat were arguing about the American flag waving in the wind. The Republican said: "The flag moves." The Democrat said: "The wind moves." Back and forth they argued. Coming upon a giant duck, he said, "Partisans! It is not the flag that moves. It is not the wind that moves. It is your mind that moves!" The partisans were awestruck. The duck then asked them to get off of his diving platform; and a new Zen Koan was born: Nothing above me, nothing below me, so I leap off.

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

Foreign Influence

Sitting back home, listening to the remnants of Gustav rattle the bamboo chimes and Solari bells, I have taken to thinking about influences. Gustav slipped in over the walls and the gated communities and now the region is wetter and windier. Italians crept into the American landscape and wine and the kitchen flourished under their influence. American film makers have transported their visions across the continents and moved audiences in the dark around the world. So it is in this new world where we all are under the influence of something, many things.



How did the American armed forces influence farming in post war Southern Italy? For instance, did the Marshall Plan get Italy “up and running” in a way that once the daily needs had been met the farmers looked to their history and went about resuscitating the old lost vines?


Tourism, at once a dreaded scourge and a needed shot of economic stimulus to any economy. But how has all the tourists changed a place like Rome all these hundreds of years? Or would Rome not be the Rome it is if it weren’t for the constant flow of people through her gates? After all it also attracted great artists like Caravaggio and Michelangelo. Their Roman holiday became our must see attractions. Rome has always been under the influence of something or other, even its past.


When young women in medieval Sicily became pregnant outside of marriage, often these fatherless children would be put into orphanages. They would be given surnames such as Esposito (from ex positum, "of this place"), Trovato ("found"), Proietti ("cast out") and d'Ignoti ("parents unknown") until 1928 when it was deemed those names would unduly influence the lives and the future of the unfortunate children.


Nobility has long been an influencing factor, on the Italian canvas and anywhere in the world where someone seeks power and status. We call a wine noble or assign nobility to certain grapes, be it the “French varieties” or some other way to parade one’s ossified rational. So those ancient workhorse "bastard varieties", Cannonau or Corvina, Malvasia or Montepulciano, because of their identification with a rustic past, have no opportunity to claim title to nobility? I think the influence of the democratization of taste has uplifted the alluring and the authentic to new levels in the post revolutionary world of saporosity. New masters arise in the hierarchy of hunger; a young virile flavor replaces a silverback languishing in the crowded forest of flavors.


Not to say some of the old champions’ day is done. But in the streets of New York and bayous of Baton Rouge, the heavyweight must still be relevant, still be able to wield with some influence. Cabernet, Pinot Noir, Sangiovese, Chardonnay, Pinot Grigio still have an audience, even if we sometimes daydream that they’ve fought their last fight.


A young winemaker from Tuscany or Piemonte makes a tour through America. People come to listen and taste and take some of the wines home. It happens all the time. The same winemaker who has just influenced those 60 people will go to a western shop and buy a pair of Lucchese boots or Ed Hardy slip-ons. Foreign persuasion with mutual permission to change, alter and reset one’s way of thinking about something. When a French wine making family sends one of their young ones off to harvest in Australia or when a Davis grad picks grapes in the Côte-d'Or do you not think they will walk away from the experience unchanged? We are all connected by our mutually non-exclusive influences.


You can cover your head any number of ways, but it won’t exclude you from the locomotion of influence that you are under in these times. And while it has become fashionable to go back to simpler times and recast this or that philosophy as more essential, because it resists pressure from outside forces, that is simply trying to shield oneself from the inevitable. Politicians get people all worked up with this because they try to influence voters into thinking they (the voters) can be immune from outside persuasion. But that is exactly what the pols are working up to.


And likewise with food and wine. There is no Kansas to go home to. Everyone and everything touches one another, like it or not. We have not arrived at the end of the river to carry out a mission that does not exist – nor will it ever exist.


At least not as we could ever imagine, without some outside influence.

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

Graphics from the Polish cinema poster site