Susumaniello, what a sususurprise! (and Georgia P’s photo shoot)

February 3, 2012

Honestly, I really didn’t know what to expect from a 2010 IGT Tarantino Susumaniello (100%) by the Poderi Angelini winery in Manduria (west coast of Puglia).

The craze for indigenous varieties has inspired a number of producers to deliver monovarietal bottlings of grapes that were used strictly for blending in the past.

In the entry for Susumaniello in the landmark Vitigni d’Italia (Grape Varieties of Italy), last revised in 2006, the editors underline the fact that “the grape is never vinified on its own” and is used strictly to produce vino da taglio, i.e., blending wine (employed historically to beef up otherwise “thin” wines).

Unfortunately, some of the well intentioned efforts to champion such indigenous grapes has been misguided (Uva di Troia in purezza, anyone?).

But Angelini’s 2010 Susumaniello was delicious last night: bright and surprisingly light on the palate, with the acidity that we crave, high but balanced alcohol, and juicy, chewy red berry fruit. I loved it, as did the group of wine professionals with whom we tasted it.

Inspired by our tasting, I went into the stustustudio and dug out some footage of my good friend Paolo Cantele pronouncing the grape’s name for us. Phil Collins ain’t got nothing on this baby!

In other news…

Georgia P went to one of her first photo shoots (I am such a stage father!) yesterday with our good friends and AWESOME photographers the Nichols here in Austin yesterday (remember when they shot our wedding?). Here’s a preview… WE LOVE HER SO MUCH! :)

6 Comments | de austinopoli, de rebus familiari, de vino | Tagged: , , , , , | Permalink
Posted by Do Bianchi

Eat my puccia (in Austin, Texas) cc @PaoloCantele

January 27, 2012

Above: The art of the puccia lies in the creativity and freedom of ingredients that you use to dress it. At the puccia truck in Austin, they make a pastrami puccia! I love it!

The word puccia first became part of my gastronomic lexicon when my good friend (and client) Paolo Cantele took me to one of his favorite puccia shops in Lecce (Puglia, Italy).

The puccia is a savory flatbread indigenous to Puglia: it is griddle-fired and then stuffed with a wide variety of toppings — often clashing flavors. When I questioned Paolo’s wisdom off requesting a puccia stuffed with prosciutto and tuna, he didn’t miss a beat in responding “that’s the whole point of the puccia!”

You can imagine my delight when I discovered that Austin — the capital of trailer dining and food trucks in the U.S. — has its own puccia pimp, an Apulian dude named “Lucky” Luciano who runs a puccia truck downtown across from the Whole Foods Market on Lamar on 5th St.

But the coolest thing about Lucky’s puccia is that he embraces American foods in the toppings he uses, like the pastrami puccia above. And of course, all things being equal, in Austin you can pair Lucky’s puccia with Texas beer.

Here’s the Yelp and here’s the Facebook.

HIGHLY RECOMMENDED!

Buon weekend, yall! :)

3 Comments | de austinopoli, de cibo | Tagged: , , , , | Permalink
Posted by Do Bianchi

Friuli meets Japan @UchikoAustin

January 12, 2012

It’s not everyday that you dine at one of the top Japanese restaurants in the country with the woman who wrote its cookbook. Last night I finally caught up with Jessica Dupuy and executive (and celebrity) chef Tyson Cole who took time out to talk about some of his dishes and his approach to cooking at Uchiko with me and travel and wine writer, my friend Bruce Schoenfeld who was in town on business.

Bruce suggested we pair the [Tocai] Friulano by Livio Felluga with a dish of uni, cuttlefish, and lemongrass (above). The minerality and grassy aromatic character of the wine worked gorgeously with Tyson’s creations. I’ll let the food do the talking…

Nantucket bay scallop with nasturtium blossoms, cantaloupe sorbet, and sherry vinegar.

Buri sashimi with pickeled hakurei turnip, saikyo miso, and crème fraiche.

Abalone nigiri with lemon, maldon, and garlic.

Yokai berry with Atlantic salmon, dinosaur kale, Asian pear, and yuzu.

Dewberry Hills farm chicken, short grain sweet rice, banana leaf, and Thai chili vinegar.

2 Comments | de austinopoli, de cibo, de vino | Tagged: , , , , | Permalink
Posted by Do Bianchi

Vita servare: Pediatric CPR Training

December 4, 2011

Vita servare is the motto of the Austin-Travis County EMS department. Vita means life in Latin and servare means to make safe, save, keep unharmed, preserve, guard, keep, protect, deliver, rescue (isn’t Latin awesome?).

Yesterday I completed my Pediatric and Adult CPR training at their main office.

I was the only layperson in the class: all the other participants were professional health care providers who were obtaining or renewing their certification (nurses, paramedics, etc.).

After 3 hours of performing CPR on manikins, man, I was exhausted! G-d bless all the folks who do this for living. We’re lucky to have them…

My heart filled with emotion and my blood with adrenaline when I held the infant manikin in my arms for the first time. I hope I never have to perform CPR on Baby P but I’m glad that I’m ready.

We’re just a few weeks away from our due date at this point. The discomfort is not easy to deal with but we’re hanging in there. I’m doing my best to make Tracie P as comfortable as possible. And, every day, I love her all the more for carrying our little one… My Italian friends call her la piccola Parzen…

And, btw, I passed! :)

I highly recommend the class. Here’s the info.

Buona domenica, yall…

3 Comments | de austinopoli, de rebus familiari | Tagged: , , , , , | Permalink
Posted by Do Bianchi

What to pour for Alice Feiring in Austin?

October 23, 2011

In a remarkable confluence of cosmic events, Comrades Howard and Alice both found themselves in Austin last night: he, to speak at the Austin Film Festival; she, to talk about Natural wine and her new book today at Whole Foods Market (Lamar) and tomorrow at Vino Vino.

When we all met for dinner last night at one of our favorite restaurants in the world, Fonda San Miguel, it was only natural that we would drink López de Heridia. After all, Alice wrote “the book” on the winery.

It may seem facile to pair Mexican cuisine with Spanish wine (for the overly obvious reasons). But the fact of the matter is that the attenuated fruit in the López oxidative style works gloriously well with the intense flavors of great Mexican cooking. The wine paired brilliantly with our mole, for example, where the gentle astringency of the wine played counterpart to the chocolate in the mole.

Tracie P and I are thrilled that Fonda San Miguel wine director Brad Sharp has continued to support these unique wines, even in a world where 99% of his guests ask regularly (and nearly exclusively) for Chard, Cab, Merlot, or Pinot.

After dinner, perhaps inspired by the brio of the evening, Alice insisted that we make a pilgrimage to the chicken coop out back behind Ginny’s Little Longhorn Saloon.

Last night was 100% irony-free at Ginny’s and Sarah and The Tallboys, a country outfit out of Chicago, played a smoking set (imho).

Ginny and daughter Sharon are so sweet to me and Tracie P whenever we visit.

But their wholesome Texas hospitality reached its limits last night when Sharon had to kick out a couple for getting to frisky! Never a dull moment at Ginny’s…

Leave a Comment » | de austinopoli, de cibo, de vino | Tagged: , , , , | Permalink
Posted by Do Bianchi

Chili cheese fries, Texas style, at 24 Diner Austin

October 23, 2011

Cousins Joanne and Marty were in town for the wedding of their close family friends but they snuck away from festivities for a few hours so we could visit at 24 Diner, where no one could resist the Chili Cheese Fries.

In Texas, the designation chili is highly codified, denoting chili con carne, a dish which rigorously and canonically excludes beans. The sliced jalapeño took this expression of Chili Cheese Fries, an American classic, over the top.

The food at 24 Diner is always solid and the atmosphere is fun. Great location, next to Waterloo Records, and across the street from Book People and the flagship Whole Foods Market.

1 Comment | de austinopoli, de cibo | Tagged: , , , | Permalink
Posted by Do Bianchi

Alice Feiring in Austin Sunday & Monday

October 21, 2011

It seems like a lifetime ago that Tracie P and I met Alice on our first trip to Europe together. Tracie P and I were in Paris to play with Nous Non Plus and Alice was there to write a piece on Natural wine and our paths happily crossed.

I’ve known Alice for more than 10 years and she’s one of our dearest, dearest friends. A big sister, a mentor, and one of the most fun people to be around on this planet, no matter what mischief we’re up to.

Alice has a new book, Naked Wine: Letting Grapes Do What Comes Naturally, and she’s coming to Austin for a few readings: Sunday at Whole Foods Market on Lamar and Monday at Vino Vino. Both events are being presented by the Wine and Food Foundation of Texas.

Tracie P and I will be at both events, of course, and I hope you can join us to hear Alice read from her new book and taste some Natural wines with us.

Beyond our deep friendship, I support Alice in her cause to spread the word about Natural wine not just because I enjoy Natural wines but because I believe that Natural wines and the people who make them (and drink them) can save the world from the ills of our increasingly industrialized food chain.

In other news…

I’m making one last trip before Baby P arrives: Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday evenings of next week, I’ll be pouring wine on the floor at Sotto in Los Angeles where I’ve curated the wine list this year.

We’ll be debuting one last flight of wines for the fall before I take a break for daddy duty, including one of the best wines I’ve tasted this year… More on that later…

Thanks for reading and stay tuned!

2 Comments | de austinopoli, de cibo, de urbe angelorum, de vino | Tagged: , | Permalink
Posted by Do Bianchi

Redd Volkaert at the Austin airport holy smokes!!!

September 14, 2011

Posted with WordPress for BlackBerry.

2 Comments | de austinopoli, de musica | Permalink
Posted by Do Bianchi

“If it’s a blend, I will not attend!” (And the Texas fires)

September 8, 2011

Cousin Marty had a hunch about what wine I’d be bringing to our BYOB dinner last night in Houston with friends. And when I arrived and revealed my bottle of 2006 Brunello di Montalcino by Il Poggione, he opened the evening with the line of the night: “If it’s a blend, I will not attend!”

Of course, he was referring to yesterday’s news that Montalcino producers voted NOT to allow international grape varieties in Rosso di Montalcino, a step that many of us feared would irrevocably reshape the appellation.

According to results posted by the Brunello producers association, roughly 2/3 of voting members voted not to adopt either of the two options proposed by oligarchy that controls the body’s technical council. One option would have created two categories of Rosso; the other would have created three; in either case, international grape varieties would have been allowed in wines labeled Rosso di Montalcino.

But that figure is misleading because consortium president Ezio Rivella had called for an “ordinary” assembly whereby the number of votes is allocated according to the size of the winery. In other words, larger wineries had more voting power than smaller wineries. If the voting had been based on a one-vote-per-winery basis, the results would have been a landslide against the proposal to change the appellation.

I am fully convinced that efforts by my colleague and partner in VinoWire, Franco Ziliani, played a fundamental role in shaping public awareness of the issues in question.

Chapeau bas, Franco! IF IT’S A BLEND, I WILL NOT ATTEND!

The 2006 Brunello by Il Poggione was gorgeous last night, rich in body, bright in acidity, with ripe red fruit and that wonderful horse sweat note that often distinguishes great Brunello. The wine was muscular and still very, very tight, young in its evolution. But the green notes that emerged the last time I tasted the wine about 6 months ago have disappeared. There’s no doubt in my mind that this is going to be a great vintage for Il Poggione.

In other and sadder news…

I wanted to share these photos that I took on Hwy. 290 from Austin to Houston of the Texas fires.

In the first photo, above, taken about 20 minutes west of Giddings, the fire had just started and the firefighters had just arrived. Man, it was scary and you could see the fear and the stress in the faces of the firefighters. G-d bless them.

In this second photo, you can see a plume northwest of Houston. Pretty spooky and so sad.

In this last photo, you can see the smoky haze over Houston this morning. That’s not morning mist. It’s ugly, brown smoke. My eyes are burning and my throat is itchy. It reminds me of LA during the riots when I was a grad student at U.C.L.A.

Tracie P and Baby P are fine and even though there are uncontained fires burning not far from our house in Austin, the smoke is not affecting us there.

Please say a prayer for all the folks who are suffering here… It’s so sad…

2 Comments | de austinopoli, de rebus texanis, de vino, de vinographia | Tagged: , | Permalink
Posted by Do Bianchi

Blogger malfeasance: a unique solution?

August 21, 2011

Above: The cinnamon roll this morning at a favorite Sunday morning Austin breakfast joint, the Kerbey Lane Cafe.

One of the more appalling bits of information to emerge from the Alfonso and Jeremy wine bloggers seminar at the Texas Sommelier Conference last Saturday was the fact that food bloggers often try to extort money from restaurants and other gastronomic destinations.

According a publicist from the Dallas/Ft. Worth offices of Whole Foods Market and a publicist from Annies Cafe in Austin (who both attended the seminar), there have been numerous instances when bloggers have demanded that they be paid to attend marketing events and/or to review the venues.

Above: The cheese omelette with ham and ranchero sauce at Kerbey’s.

The problem is so widespread and nasty that in Austin a group of food bloggers have created the Austin Food Blogger Alliance (see its code of ethics, including an entry on “negativity”).

Evidently, they ask restaurateurs not to deal with local food bloggers who have not become members of the alliance.

    Any member of the alliance or of the community may contact the membership chair or President to register a violation of the Code of Ethics. The membership committee will investigate the claim and recommend to the board if action should be taken. Members will receive two warnings from the board before revocation of their membership can be considered.

Above: Tracie P says this ham was better than most. Serve with maple syrup.

Also, in a dialectic with my follow-up post to the seminar, Should wine bloggers write about wines they don’t like? (And Tracie P is looking great!), there were a couple of fascinating posts and threads by two different European bloggers.

In Britain, Juel Mahoney of Wine Woman & Song writes about “How to be a blogger as a journalist.”

And Wojciech Bońkowski of the Polish Wine Guide writes about “The $ issue.”

I recommend both posts and threads to you.

I’m not sure I know all the answers and am still working through these issues on my blog.

But I do know one thing for sure: we wine bloggers are here to stay!

Thanks for reading and buona domenica yall…

3 Comments | de austinopoli, de cibo, de vinographia | Tagged: , | Permalink
Posted by Do Bianchi

« Previous Entries
Follow

Get every new post delivered to your Inbox.

Join 5,785 other followers