Langhe Report: Nebbiolo "Full Immersion" Day 1

I had no longer said goodbye to my Austin amigo, Devon, sending him on his way to the Real Madrid –Barcelona game in Barcelona, than I set upon to make my way to Marseille, so I could catch a very early plane to Milan to gather up another Austinite friend, John Roenigk. Before that though I had to endure a night in a smoky room and some Colombard-Chardonnay to go with my (most-likely) Atlantic farm raised Salmon. But after 36 hours of being the walking dead, and working through it, it was not too bad. Other than I had to leave behind the pure and wonderful wines and friends I made in Montpellier. But that is the life and… Italy calls.

So a 4:30 AM alarm to catch a shuttle and a plane to get to a noon appointment in Serralunga. No more Grenache or Carignan. No more Viognier or Grenache Blanc. On to Nebbiolo and company.

All went well as I found my traveling companion earlier than expected. A sturdy little Lancia and before long we were in the Langhe.

Millésime Bio: Three days, too many wines and only one master sommelier

From "the times they are a changing" département

Somewhere in the last few days, here at Millésime Bio 2012, the subject of Gravner came up. Millésime Bio is a three day expo of organic and bio-dynamic wineries from France, Italy, Spain and all the rest who showed up. Pretty impressive showing for the natural yeast, sans sufre, bio-groupies. Nirvana for the hairy armpit lovers.

Oddly enough, friend Alice was nowhere to be seen. I reckon she was off in more fertile pastures, ensconced in egesta, harvesting the fruits of her desire. Still, there was plenty of folk at the show to make three days in Montpellier a time well spent. Outside it was La Californie.

Zero to 80 in two hours

I’ve been under the weather. And I’ve been over it too. The past few days I have been in many airplanes. Houston, Chicago, Dallas, Paris, Montpellier. The O-N-D season seems light in comparison. But this is the life. Well, not exactly “the life” but a life. Freely chosen.

I knew I wasn’t feeling good when I went to Chicago. An early work week in Houston, and a layover at my house. When we got to Chicago is was bitterly cold. What does one expect in January? We shuttled between hotels, meetings and restaurants. On the return back to Dallas (for another brief layover) the temperature was zero and the storm was approaching rapidly from the west.

Barely made it off the runway. Landing in Dallas was another world. 80 degrees, cloudless, smoggy like LA, but no storm, no chill. But my head was throbbing, my throat was raw.

Baby, baby, don'cha go away mad

We’ve all had it happen to us. You walk into an Italian restaurant, somewhere in America, and the place is bustling. Waiters are carrying trays of steaks, pasta, chops. Bartenders are mixing up classic drinks. Women have their bright red lipstick on. And resounding from the ceiling, good old blue eyes is crooning. You think, “now we're in for a good time, Sinatra is in the house.”

Music doesn't seem that crucial to the success of restaurants in Italy. It’s a place to eat, to talk to friends, hear one another, even. But it’s not a scene you see that often in Italy, using music to recast nostalgia as cutting edge.

Booking passage on the 2012

Babies are born. Winemakers die. Ships take people to different places. Clothes sit in a dryer until they get folded. All part of life’s laundry list.

This is the time of the year when winemakers in the Veneto start thinking about their second wine. The grapes dry, to press for Amarone, are just about ready. The Valpolicella has been sitting in the tanks for a few months now. Some of that wine will be transformed when the pressed grapes for the Amarone lend what little life is left to re-infuse the Valpolicella with its energy. We call it Ripasso.

Vin Santo: Full Moon in the Microcosm of Tuscany

I recently drove from Dallas to San Antonio for a meeting. It was decided at the last minute; the plane ride would have cost more than one to California. So my frugal being got up early one morning, before sunrise and with sheets of rain falling from the dark heaven. It’s what we do in the wine biz. Go see potential customers, taste wine with them, and try and get them to like the stories we tell, enough so that they will buy the wines or better, let us improve their wine lists.

The meeting went well enough, but we didn’t make a sale. We weren’t there to take an order, but to plant seeds. Ok, we did that well enough. My colleague told me, “He never spent that much time with me, " referencing the wine buyer I had driven 300 miles to see.

What John Fahey Taught Me About Wine, Women and Song

A reminiscence

College life was one of my most cherished periods. I was away from home and the parents for the first time. My college was in the San Francisco area and the era was the late 1960’s - early 1970’s. Radio stations in the Bay area were progressive and the music scene was unlike anything I had ever experienced. Sure, during high school I had gone to concerts and love-ins; seen Jimi Hendrix and Iron Butterfly, Country Joe and The Electric Prunes. I’d had the rock ‘n roll indoctrination just like all youth in that generation. But when I got to Northern California, the music scene took me in a direction I had never expected. Folk music was still popular, tied in with the anti-war movement, and the general changing of the guards associated with the times. One night I’d even sat around with a group of folks and we all had dinner with Joan Baez. My little town upbringing, somewhat isolated in the desert of Southern California, didn’t prepare me for the larger world I was stepping into. But that was alright with me; I was all ears and eyes and heart as I stepped into an uncertain adulthood.

John Fahey was an acoustic guitarist who made simply some of the most melodic and beautiful music I had ever heard. Listening to his music was like falling in love over and over again. And it seemed some of the young, long haired ladies in my generation also fell for his music.

Out with the Old, in with Newton's Italian Wine DOCG +

from the "Pour Me a Little More Wine" desk

Giuseppe Martelli = DOCG                   Wayne Newton = DOCG +

It no longer appears to be a secret that there are 73 Italian wine DOCG’s. Everyone's discovered it. Walter Speller is writing about it for Jancis Robinson’s Purple pages. Giuseppe Martelli is proclaiming it within the pages of Gambero Rosso. Even bristly architechts in Southern Italy are laying claim to advancing the information. We’ve come a long way baby, from Wiki pages describing a scant 23 DOCG’s to various Italian government agencies reporting different numbers. Now the whole world knows. But what Walter Speller or Giuseppe Martelli or the occasional draftsman down South doesn’t know is that a whole new category of Italian wine DOCG has been born. Not in Italy but in the good old U.S. of A. That’s right, what Italy cannot do, America will. And who better to do it than Americans of distant Italian ancestry. So here it goes. You heard it here, first.

The statement:

In order to keep up with the demands of the marketplace and to insure the continued appreciation of Italian wine, we the people of distant Italian ancestry, have so proclaimed the creation of Italian Wine DOCG +. The criteria for the first group of Italian wines selected, the initial 10, are that they be:

1) From a traditional producing region.

2) That they utilize indigenous grape varieties that have been historically established in Italy.

3) That the use of popular blending grapes, such as Merlot, Cabernet or Syrah not be exploited to enhance the wine flavor and garner high scoring points from the dominant and influential international wine press.

4) That the use of oak be only for subtle purpose and not as a flavor substitute.

5) That the wines respect tradition but do not shun technology.

6) That the wines exhibit Italian character and delicious qualities.

Simply these wines offer a solid bulwark for the patrimony of Italian agriculture and viticulture to the world at large and represent all that is pure and good and fine about Italian wine.

This is not to limit these claims to these 10 wines solely. But initially that these wines are national treasures and should be so designated.

Can Italy be Roused in 2012?

Posted from a sunny perch in America ~ Somewhere between a "cloud of unknowing" and "unknown knowns"

2011, that was the year that was. The numbers aren’t all in yet, but for the world I chart, which is the mid-section of America, Italian imports are up 8% for the year. Maybe we should have started an Italian wine import index fund; it surely would have performed better than most investments in 2011. But that is looking backwards, and today is a day to look the future straight in the eyes and move forward.

That said, I will channel my inner Don Draper and attempt to offer any Italian who would care to know, how to succeed in business in America in 2012.

20- 25 years, max…

Lately, folks around me have either been dying, dropping out or retiring. Yes, I know almost everyone living looks in a mirror and sees the young person they were or indeed they are. For the moment. After a day of throwing boxes in retail, my knees tell me what my mirror won’t: You don’t have that much time. And that goes for all of us.

I have seen some ridiculous things this year. Folks who got the boot who not only showed up for work, but who also stayed after the lights went out in the office. And other folks, who by merely being in the right place at the right time, caught the big fish. There is no pattern of reason – sometimes it just gets down to luck. But in the time department – time, the great leveler – luck has no chance. Whether it is a big-face watch that costs $5,000 or a $50 Timex, the clock, she keeps on ticking.

Let’s say you are in your early 30’s. You have a good job or a position in a company somewhere that allows you to think you’re in a good place. Let’s talk about the wine business, and let’s drill down to the Italian wine business. You travel, stay in places like New York, Hong Kong, Helsinki, Berlin. It all seems so important, balancing the travel and the business with the stuff you have at home. Maybe you live in the Tuscan countryside by the winery. Maybe you live near Alba. Maybe Palermo. And when you are out “in the world” you are making a difference, moving Italian wine forward. Maybe you allow yourself the indulgence to feel powerful, important. You are a game changer, a force of nature. You are young, with all of life handed to you on an enormous buffet plate. It’s all there; all you have to do is show up, wearing the nice clothes, whether it’s the snazzy suit or the shabby but chic jeans. You’re Italian, and Italians are known for this kind of thing. You come from a great country with a great heritage and a history and a mission and a purpose, and you are in the stream and you are fishing for your fortune and fame and you catch a fish every now and then, and life feels just bloody wonderful. Yes?

Prosecco vs. the world

Sergio Mionetto on top of Cartizze

Wine writers must be running out of meaningful subjects, the latest diversion from significant stories being this little piece about Prosecco finally triumphing over Champagne. Perhaps this is just an unconscious jab at France and Sarkozy over dragging the Italians into the current existentialist predicament of the Euro zone. Or maybe it’s that folks have run out of things to talk about between Christmas and the New Years. It would be better for most of the writers to take another stab at a turkey sandwich, watch the “Law and Order” marathon and let the ship pass. This is not important news. Somewhere in the world other sparkling wines are outselling Prosecco and Champagne combined. Should we write that once again for the 25th year, Andre has outsold Champagne too? That’s the image I get in my head when I see these silly stories.

I don’t have a bone to pick with Prosecco. They are riding high. Price increases are forthcoming, by the way, so the Ferris wheel, she goes up, the Ferris wheel, she also goes down. Rarely does the Ferris wheel stop for one at the top. So there will be challenges in 2012, with an election year in the USA, to move the category forward in double digit growth territory.

Champagne, what do they care? They sell everything they make. Veuve-Clicquot (I was told by a highly placed person in the company) has been in “allocation” mode this year. Regardless of how you fell about any brand of Champagne, one can rest easily knowing the plans the Champenoise have for their brand can take you or leave you. Not so with Prosecco.

A very complex grain of sand...

...this little orb is - twirling, seething, rushing at an almost unimaginable speed through the universe. And inside it and all around it are us, thinking, feeling, worrying, hoping, laughing, crying, wishing, loving.

Merry Christmas everyone!

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

Pivot or Persevere

Pan di sudore, miglior sapore

The messages emanating from the Italian peninsula in recent days have been ones of concern for their future and whether or not the average Italian will be able to live a life as their father and grandfather have. The reality is that the life their father and especially their grandfather lived wasn’t a bed of roses. Funny how the human mind forgets history so fast. Thankfully the human heart is there to redirect the course of one’s life. And in the average Italian’s life here is what I see.

Please Send Me Some Wine to Love

The week before the holidays and the wine and food shops across America are buzzing with people looking for food, for wine, for connection with something that descends upon humanity in these times, allows for a few moments to stop the machine, get off, and let a little fresh air in. I saw it all weekend in the stores, as we go into the final stretch of the O-N-D selling season. For Italy and her food and wine, this has been a very good year, again.

“What Chianti do you suggest to go with our spaghetti and meat ball dinner?” “Do you have that Brunello with the coat of arms that has the wings on it?” “Where is the Orvieto?” All these and many more questions are peppered at us, like at an important press conference. Except we aren’t solving the massive problems of a country. We are merely trying to help folks set their tables for their friend and their families.

Show the world how to get along,
Peace will enter when hate is gone,
But if it's not asking too much,
Please send me some wine to love.

Three Wise Wines

From the "I'm Dreaming of a White (Wine) Christmas" Collection

In the traditions of the wine world, the conventional wisdom has been that the real serious wines are red. Old wine books push the adage, “The first duty of wine is to be red.” And scores of wine connoisseurs wandered into Burgundy or Bordeaux, Piedmont or Tuscany. But the times they are a changing.

For all of my wishing, I have hoped to be one of those types, where red wine was placed high on an altar so I could too worship it. And I do love red wine. This evening we sampled an Etna Rosso next to a Chateauneuf du Pape. But I cannot get over how much I love white wine. I really have affection for cool, crisp, luscious wines. They seem to go with the foods I love and I never have enough of them around the house.

Here are three wines that I do hope to have around for the holidays. Please read on.