On the Wine Trail in Italy

When I first went to Vinitaly in 1984, I arrived with the single-minded energy (and arrogance) that I might just be one of the experts on Italian wine. Upon walking into a guided tasting by the Italian Sommelier Association, I quickly realized that I was nowhere near having any kind of voice of authority. All around me were people who had spent a lifetime in the ranks, learning, honing and refining their knowledge of a very complicated subject.

And so it goes, every time I walk into one of the pavilions at Vinitaly or attend a Gambero Rosso tasting. There are hundreds of folks who know the difference between Cappuccio and Mascalese, or Nebbiolo and Chiavennasca and surely, Prugnolo from Morellino.

This week in NY and the Vino2010 event, was also one of those moments. This time, however, there were young and old alike, vying for their place on the ladder of preeminence. Is it any surprise in today’s emotional climate that there are so many people who do believe they are the world expert on some form or another regarding Italian wine?

Chatting with a couple of wine guys who have acheived mastery (MS & MW), there was posed the question of who might actually be the world’s authority on Italian wine. Who might that person be? What would their qualifications be? How old might they be? Male or female? Native speaker or interloper?

There emerged several archetypal candidates. One is from a memory of an older gentleman, Franco Tommaso Marchi, one of the sommeliers who led that first tasting I sat in on at my first Vinitaly a generation ago. I would read about him in the Civilta del Bere, really the only magazine, at the time, about Italian wine in English. He had many students and followers and seemed to be highly respected for his working knowledge of Italian wine from a sommelier’s perspective.

Another candidate might be the educator/consulting winemaker. There are quite a few of them around these days. Someone like an Attilio Scienza might fit that category – published, with a very nice way of understating the layers of wine from the roots to the finished product. Someone who blends the historical with the practical and provides a path to a finished product. This archetype actually participates in the process and shares in the evolution forward as well as delving into what came before.

The wine evaluator, someone like a Luca Maroni or an Anthony Galloni, seem to exhibit a route for expertise, based upon tasting, evaluating, and ultimately sharing their knowledge and assessment to a large following. They move wine into the hand of many people, they propel the idea of Italian wine forward rapidly. They are influencers.

And what about the Italian wine blogger, someone like a Ziliani or a Parzen? Here we have ones with a command of the Italian culture and politics, whether in Italy or back and forth between the old country and the new frontier. There is intellectual capacity and understanding of the scene from the ground up, with the ability to disseminate their passion and their knowledge to a new audience and in a rapidly moving medium.

How about the wine geek- you know the type? This is the person who goes to a tasting and tastes all the wines in the room, makes notes about all of them, keeps copious notes, categorize them and has a photographic memory, able to remember every wine, every perceived nuance and has the ability to draw it up on a moment’s notice, from memory?

Maybe it is a merchant, drawing from the importing side all the way to the wine shop? I have often been dazzled by the bright people with their working knowledge. To be able to know the difference between a southeast vineyard in La Morra and a rough-and-tumble plot in Serralunga, and be able to clearly evoke the difference and the reasons for those difference, isn’t that in some way a highly evolved form of expertise? I remember meeting someone like that in a little coastal town on the Adriatic. Might this perhaps be the kind of person to lead us all?

What if the person who was really the world’s authority on Italian wine wasn’t any of this, what if instead it was a cellar master who toiled below ground for years like a monk? Maybe he (or she) wouldn’t know all of the DOC or DOCG’s (does it really matter?) but have an intuitive, visceral connection to the root of all Italian wine inspiration? Someone with a direct line to Bacchus?

I don’t think I have ever met the world’s authority on Italian wine, although I have met many people who have thought they were. And I’m not sure if such a person could even exist, the subject being so complex and dynamic. But it is a matter for reflection, in that where we do gather our information, and inspiration, is an important thing. Whenever I get in a seminar or a tasting and, as it is often clear, I am not the smartest guy in the room, I look to the one who is, and mine a little nugget, to put in my vault. And while I am long beyond wishing to be what I am not, all of these kinds of people have been an enormous help in my continuing education along the wine trail in Italy. So for me the world’s authority on Italian wine is perched safely inside my mind, like the conglomerate wizard, constantly changing, morphing evolving, dying and being born. And that will have to suffice, until the next best thing comes along.

Photos scanned from ancient issues of Civilta del Bere

“You aren’t going to put any of this on your blog, are you?” Those were the words I heard from my friend Carmen Castorina. “No Carmen, not the juicy stuff,” I said, as I made the zip-the-lip sign. Omerta.

We were sitting in the corner table of Manducatis, sipping espresso after a memorable meal, made special, thanks to Anthony Cerbone, whose family owns the venerable restaurant. Years ago Lou Iacucci recommended the place to me. I made a note of it, put it in my file and proceeded to forget the advice. Years later another friend, Dr. P, would bring the subject up again. I reckon I was ready this time. But I wasn’t going without my buddy Carmen.

How can I say this? I will speak as plainly as possible. Life is made for the times when you can take a subway, two short stops from Grand Central into Queens, and walk into a shrine for Italian wine without all the hoo-rah that sometimes goes with it. We were spending an afternoon in Manhattan at the Vino2010 event, where the subject of Italian wine was being scrutinized by every manner of Italian wine expert. So where were all these folks now? Manducatis is the destination after all the talk has been laid out on the seminar tables, no?

They must have gone to Le Cirque or Del Posto.

In fact, those were the venues for the night. Somewhere along the line, my vouchers were redirected and I, having adopted a newer mellower, kinder persona, just walked away from the tables with the computers and the forms and resigned to go to dinner on my own. Oh, what a lucky man I am. And with Carmen as my Sicilian co-conspirator, to Manducatis we did go.

Carmen just reached his 30th year in the wine business, all with the Gallo family. He directs communications for the company, but Carmen is an avatar, an early adaptor, an idea guy. I like talking to him, and especially over a hard to get bottle (and most likely the last of its kind) of Italian wine. And as good as the wine list is (and it is really good) and the food (and it is plenty fine), it’s the stories, the stories; that’s the banquet when one has dinner with Carmen.

Where to start? This man has a life story that’s got book deal plastered all over it, if such things were still being considered. But they aren’t too much. The publishing biz is in the crapper, but people still want the stories. And that’s the strength of the blog and the blogger.

440 words in already and all just as a set up? I know – get to the point, all y’all are saying.

If you think I’m going to reveal Carmen’s secret, you better think again. Suffice it to say – Carmen has seen kings made and kings die in the wine biz. He’s had 11th hour dinners with giants of the wine world, like his old boss Earnest Gallo – but I can’t tell you about them, yet. He is the wizard of the wine biz – he makes ‘em – he bakes ‘em – I am just really glad we are on the same side. Carmen knows what will sell in these times (hint: they dont sell for $50+).

I gotta get him to write all the stories down. His story is the history of the wine business in America in the last 30 years. Big plans, broken hearts, monumental successes, big picture stuff, the view from 30,000 feet. All done with a strategically inserted good deed, and a smile straight out of Lewis Carroll.

Man I wish I could tell you. But I promised my friend – Omerta – No way. At least not until we finish this last bottle of wine Anthony just brought.

I wouldn’t have believed it if I hadn’t heard it with my own ears. A couple of salespeople were discussing an account and the wine buyer. One of the salespersons mentioned that the new wine buyer was always cock-blocking her from the owners, with whom she had a good rapport. And while a wine list can sometimes be testosterone-fest, it got me to thinking about how much of that kind of energy is expended to make wine lists.

In the old days, the snobbish approach was de rigueur. But in today’s coarser cultural times, it seems that the one who shouts loudest is the dominant (and deciding) force. Is this a widespread occurrence? Am I just imagining this? The salespeople discussing this over drinks sure seemed to think it was a reality. If that’s the case, what can they, or any of us, do about it?

I have been asking wine directors and sommeliers around the country to help me out here to understand this: Is the modern-day wine list an Opus Magnus, or an enigma?

This seems to be one of my common themes lately: how to make sense of the wine list for all kinds of people. I would add: how to make it self-actuating, freeing up the wine steward for more creative matching. Antonio Gianola’s wine list is the quintessential wine list for the wine lover, but it is also very user-friendly. Able to function as a stand-alone (self-serve) with being self-serving. It offers enough information for people to know something about the wines rather than the name the region and the price. After all, what good is that to even the most seasoned wine aficionado? Does someone in that world really want to find what they are looking for (safe, predictable and highly rated) or to discover something that they might like?

One of the faults of many large wine lists is the sheer volume and the lack of information about the wine. Gone, in my mind, is the old-school practice of just listing the region – or even a latitude of flavors that folks might be able to home in on. I’m not at my dry cleaner looking to alter my pant length or clean my suede jacket. It doesn’t even have to be a large wine list – in fact, small is beautiful, about 40 to 60 wines is where the skilled wine director can deliver an incise, focused, exciting list to help the diner delve into a virtual adventure along the wine trail.

A few weeks ago, I was dining in an upscale restaurant, adjacent to a trendy hotel in the Dallas/Ft. Worth Metroplex. The presiding chef was famous and had a slew of spots across the world. The food was clean, wholesome and delicious. Our table decided on roast chicken with a wild mushroom risotto and some roasted cauliflower. On the wine list was a Gaglioppo from Calabria. Discovering this on the wine list was unusual, but a very welcome one in my book.

Combined with the earthiness of the vegetables and the style in which the chicken was prepared, the match was perfect; the wine had its own character, but it danced in harmony with the sensibilities of the chef. It was really one of the best pairings I have had in some time – and all thanks to a wine director who put that wine on the list because he liked it.

Surely he wasn’t going to be winning any Wine Spectator Award for having it on the list, but he earned huge kudos from our small party. We walked away that evening having been served great food with a wine that graced the menu – no blunt force, no sumo match to the death. What many people are looking for are simple pleasures in an over-revved modern world. That night, thanks to the sensibility of a sommelier putting his restaurant’s food and their clients’ gratification first, the wine list functioned as a tool of enjoyment rather than a statement of prowess. What a refreshing idea and a direction in today’s economy that works for everyone.

This is going to be one crazy week. Going from the sunny seashore of Southern California, where we are celebrating the wedding of Jeremy Parzen and Tracie Branch, to the Vino 2010 events in NY, where the forecast is for cold and snow and more cold and more snow. I’ll think about my coastal run this morning when I am trudging through the canyons of Skyscraper National Park.

But it should be fun.

I will be moderating the panel on Gaglioppo, with a handful of winemakers from Calabria alongside the esteemed Attilio Scienza. I am a huge fan of the work Dottore Scienza has done in the Maremma with my friends at Petra and on the island of Pantelleria , where I have spent some time. Dottore Scienza is one of the great wine gurus of Italy and this is a dream of mine to share the time promoting the wines of my dear Calabria. My mother’s family came from Calabria and settled first in Texas and then on to Sunny Southern California, where I am sitting right now looking at the Pacific Ocean, sharing the sunlight with a family of seals.

To properly prepare for the event, last week I sat down with James Gunter, who is a wine giant in the company I work for (and a friend) and Guy Stout, who is our Master Sommelier on staff, also an old friend. We tasted through some Calabrese wines to “prime the pump” for the event next week in Manhattan. I have to say the folks down in sunny Southern Italy will have some surprises in store for the attendees of the seminar, which I am told is “Sold Out.” Needless to say, I am “pumped!”

In local news, the wedding of the decade between Do Bianchi and Tracie B is going to be underway in a few hours. I will save the details for Dr. P to elaborate on, as it is his and Tracie’s special day. But suffice it to say, we are in full celebration mode. I am here to stand next to Dr. P as his best man ( full disclosure: I suggested they “friend” each other on Facebook a little less than two years ago – the rest was up to them). Yesterday the rehearsal went off without a glitch and all parties seem to be calm, collected and in control. Now – cue the constant sunshine and chill the bubbles – take-off @ 15:00PST.

Before getting to La Jolla, I spent a day with my 95 ½ year old mom in Newport Beach, where she lives. We spent a great day together and she cooked me her signature manicotti. I paired it with an Illuminati Montepulciano d’Abruzzo “Ilico” 2005 – it was, in the words of Dr.P, “a killer combo.” My mom is famous for her manicotti – when we lived in Palm Springs when I was a kid, my dad would bring home all kinds of Hollywood royalty for Mom’s Meatballs and Manicotti. She was an icon of Italian cooking long before Mario Batali, at least amongst Hollywood’s Golden Age Glitterati. Way to go, Mom, I sure love your cucina casalinga!

That’s all from here- more later in the week when things aren’t so hectic. Raise a glass to those who are starting a new life, and to those who cannot be here with us, who have gone before and are waiting for us at the gates.

Sometimes, it seems I don’t throw anything away. There are some who would say I never let things go. From the tossing and turning the other night (was it the buffalo steak or the stake in the heart?) I couldn’t argue. But, with the grace of patience and the hope of wisdom, some of the bumps on the wine trail might eventually smooth out.

This has been a long, arduous month. I thought after Christmas we’d get a respite. But the history of January, in my life, hasn’t been one of rest and reflection. More like throw some more wood on the fire, let’s crank it up in here, ’cause we aren’t through yet.

So, there we are.

Earlier this week I had arranged to meet a salesperson out in Ft. Worth. The rodeo and stock show season is on and the town is busy. We arranged to meet at an old friends place, Bella (Italia) West. Carlo (Pietro) Croci has been buying wine from me since the early 1980’s and I hate to tell you what great wines he has gotten from me, usually for a song. But he is a generous guy and will share his wines and his stories. Carlo comes from Tuscany, but for some reason I have always kidded him that he was really the child of forgotten prisoners that were left on the Elba Island. Of course he kids me about being from Africa, because of my noble Sicilian roots.

Years ago I sold him a ton of ancient wines, from the 1968 Sassicaia (first year released) to some very rare 1937 Capezzana Carmignano. So it was only fitting that we share a bottle of the 2006 Carmignano to see how the wines are doing in the new century. Odd, that behind him was visiting from Tuscany Violante Gardini; the grand daughter of Francesco Colombini Barbi.Violante has her own Brunello wine from the Cinelli Colombini estate of hers. She represents a strong line of woman winemakers in Tuscany, dating from the times when her grandmother had to run an estate in a day and age when grown men were not used to taking commands from a young lady. But she persisted and now it is part of the history of Montalcino. Violante is carrying on in her grandmothers steps.

Why odd? Because the very next day I would be out in the market, “blitzing” with the representatives of the Barbi Colombini estate, Violante’s grandmother’s wines.

I first went to Barbi in April of 1984 (about 4 months before Violante was born) to taste the 1979 -1983 Brunellos at the source. In those days Montalcino was a sleepy little hamlet and quite rustic. I loved the local dialect of the people with their soft c’s (like an “h”) and their sturdy nature. My colleague, then and now, Guy Stout was on the wine trial in Italy with me on that trip, the first of many adventures we have had.

The long time Barbi manager, Pietro Cavalli, with Marcello Mastrioanni good looks (and a genuinely nice person as well) was running the route with me. Pietro and I had some good conversation in the car as we went from account to account tasting the wines from Montalcino.

Along the way I got nervous that we wouldn’t have enough wine for lunch, so I stopped off at home and picked up a bottle of the Barbi riserva red label 1997 to try with Sausage Paul and Joey the Weasel (aka Joe Strange Eye). What a good move that was! The wine was supple and ready, 12 plus years old and, maybe because of the hot vintage (or the less than stellar cellar conditions that we have to deal with here in the infernotti of Texas). But whatever, the wine was jumping for joy into our glasses. It was interesting to compare the 1997 with the 2004 Brunello from the same estate.

I noticed that the 2004 had a similar structure in that the wine was full-fruited. There is talk of the 2004 vintage being compared to the 2001; several of us in my circle think that comparison is odious at best. During the 2004 vintage there were recorded heat spikes, creating mixed results around the appellation. Last year at Benvenuto Brunello I tasted many 2004’s and was surprised by the variation. So, another 2001? I don’t think so. 1997? I hope not. No, I think the 2004 is going to be a good wine for restaurants, better than the 2003 or 2002, but to me more similar to the 1980. Barbi, Pietro tells me, still stick to their traditional methods, and they produce a large amount of Brunello (about 1/5 of what Silver Oak makes – 20,000 cases). I remember last year when we opened the 1978 (a classic year) and it was a perfect example of normal Brunello – no steroidal oak or magical vineyard blend. And I have had some great older Brunellos; the 1964 Costanti comes to mind as one of the great ones alongside the 1955 Biondi Santi and the 1971 Il Poggione. So there is some history there, from the first time I was in Montalcino, one short generation ago. But what a difference that generation has made. And now the young tribe, with the likes of Violante and her peers, gives me high hopes for the rehabilitation of Brunello. I know it’s a long row to hoe, but everyday I find there are people who don’t want high octane, Cabernet wannabees Brunellos – they are seeking out authenticity. Isn’t it once again about time for the recalibration of intent, not just in Montalcino, but all over McItaly?