First kiss: Tracie P. First sip: Brovia 04 Barolo.

January 4, 2011

I dream of your first kiss… And then I feel upon my lips again…

The first kiss of 2011 tasted just as sweet as that very first kiss of 2008. A taste of honey, tasting much sweeter than wine…

Tracie P and I had wonderful New Year’s eve at Tony’s with cousins Joanne and Marty, Dana and Neil, Mary Kelly (Neil’s mother), and prof Jonathan, who took the photos above. Don’t I look like I just won the jackpot? ;-)

That first kiss was followed by a first sip of 2011: Brovia 2004 Barolo.

I have long been a fan of traditionalist Brovia and I finally got to taste at the winery in March 2010 when I was visiting Piedmont with a group of wine bloggers. That’s Brovia son-in-law Alex in front of the winery’s cement vats. (Check out Saignée’s excellent post on Brovia here.)

No pharmaceutical yeast here: Brovia’s wines always captivate with their balance of freshness, purity of fruit, and their power, and this wine drank surprisingly well as young as it was, with not overly generous fruit tempered by mushroom and earth. It was a fantastic way to start our 2011.

I posted some of the food shots from that night over at Tony’s blog, btw: Chef de Cuisine Grant’s risotto is always stellar IMHO, and his rich beef stock carnaroli topped with fried sweet breads were served perfectly al dente that night.

All in all it was an unforgettable night, our first New Year’s as a married couple and a celebration of all the wonderful things that happened for us in 2010. We have lots of adventures (and challenges) ahead of us in 2011 and we’re looking forward to our upcoming trip to Italy (more on that shortly).

But in the meantime, I’m gonna keep on dreaming about that first kiss, tasting much sweeter than wine… Happy new year, everyone!

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Posted by Do Bianchi

06 Barolo Ravera by Cogno INSANE! (06: so far so good)

January 3, 2011

For our Christmas day meal in Orange, Texas (at sister and brother Misty and Ricky’s house), we opened this bottle of 2006 Barolo Ravera by Cogno (sent to us by winemaker Valter Fissore).

While I’ve tasted a lot of 2006 Barbaresco at this point, this was one of the first expressions of 06 Barolo that I got to spend some time with. The more and more 06 I taste, the more I’m convinced that this is going to be a fantastic vintage for Langa wines, despite the controversy stirred in 2008 when B. Giacosa decided not to bottle his 2006).

06 may not be as great as 01 and 04, but it’s an indisputably balanced, classic vintage, where people who make and made honest wine are going to be rewarded for their faith and integrity.

I was stunned by how good Valter’s 05 Ravera was: beautiful nose, bright acidity, and a great balance of earth and fruit. Chapeau bas, Valter!

The other star of the Christmas day meal was this 2004 Vinsanto by Boutari, also sent to me as a sample (for the Boutari Social Media Project, which continues in 2011). At a youthful 6 years out, this wine showed the depth and complexity that the appellation in known for, with a gorgeous balance of candied white stone fruit and saltiness. The Assyrtiko grape and its unique expressions, whether vinified as a dry or dried-grape wine, continue to fascinate me and the Boutari Vinsanto is one of my favorites (for the record, it’s actually a blend of Assyrtiko and Aidani, which imparts a wonderful aromatic character to this wine). Tracie P and I have been blown away by how well new oak and small cask aging works with Assyrtiko and in this case, the wood gives a nutty counterpart to the fruit and salt (the label reports that the wine was bottled in 2008, leading me to believe that it spent nearly 4 years in wood). I also love how this wine clocks in with a judicious 12% alcohol, remarkable for the dried-grape category but in line with overarching attitudes among Greek winemakers. Great stuff…

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Posted by Do Bianchi

95 B. Mascarello and Alba truffles, a marriage made in heaven

December 21, 2010

Within the gentle heart Love shelters him,
As birds within the green shade of the grove.
Before the gentle heart, in Nature’s scheme,
Love was not, nor the gentle heart ere Love.

(the incipit of “The Gentle Heart,” by Guido Guinizelli, 1230-76)

You can keep your DRC, your Bond, your Pétrus… No, those wines are not good enough and do not deserve to touch the lips of the one I love. No, their aromas and flavors are not worthy of her noble nostrils and chaste tastebuds.

No, when I dine with my wife, my signora, my lady, my dame, my donna, my domina… such wines will not suffice.

When I share a special repast with Tracie P, bring me Barolo by Bartolo Mascarello.

Many great wines have been opened, tasted, and drunk in 2010, but perhaps none thrilled us more than the Bartolo Mascarello 1995 Barolo that we shared on Saturday night at Tony’s in Houston. Over these last two years (my first two in Texas), Tony has become a friend and now a client (I write his blog). Over the weekend, he generously treated Tracie P and me to dinner in celebration of our first year as a married couple.

Sometimes a wine is only as good as the person you share it with… Tracie P had never tasted Bartolo Mascarello and it was high time that this travesty in the annals of enological history was rectififed!

Bartolo Mascarello is one of the great icons of Nebbiolo, a steadfast defender of traditional winemaking, producer of one of the greatest wines in the world, and more recently, a founder and promoter of the “real wine” movement in Italy. Like many of the great houses of Langa, the Mascarello legacy began with a grape broker, Bartolo’s father Giulio, who intimately knew the best growing sites for Nebbiolo, as his granddaughter Maria Teresa explained to me the first time I tasted with her at the winery in 2008. Today, their Barolo is still made from grapes grown in four vineyards purchased by Giulio: Canubbi, San Lorenzo, Rué, and Rocche. Extended submerged cap maceration and large-cask aging are still employed at the winery today, a tradition that now spans three generations.

The pairing of great Nebbiolo and shaved Alba white truffles is no cheap date but it’s one of those gastronomic experiences that will literally change your life (and when done correctly, is worth every single penny).

Tony had captain Vinny shave us truffles over a perfectly cooked white risotto by chef de cuisine Grant.

95 was a classic although not great vintage for this wine and at 15 years out, it was drinking stupendously. Bartolo Mascarello has all the hallmarks of great Barolo: the savory tar and earth flavors. But to my palate, its sottobosco flavors, notes of woodsy underbrush, are its signature. Gorgeous acidity and IMHO perfectly evolved tannin for this vintage, although this wine could certainly age for another decade or more.

Regrettably, B. Mascarello is tough to find in this country and Tony is the only restaurateur I know in Texas who features the wines on his list (in a mini-vertical no less!). Thanks to my line of work, I’ve been fortunate to taste a lot of B. Mascarello and I was thrilled to share this bottle with the love of my life.

What else did we eat?

We were disappointed that we missed Tony’s bollito misto (with bollito cart!), but he had reserved a poached capon studded with black truffles just for us. Utterly delicious…

And a night like that just couldn’t end without chef Grant’s soufflé, expertly sliced and served by captain Vinny.

What a night!

Some guys have all the luck and Nebbiolo and truffles are some girls’s best friends. I am one lucky dude to be married to one such lady.

Thanks again, Tony! That was one of the most memorable meals of our life together! We had a blast…

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Posted by Do Bianchi

97 G. Mascarello Barolo Monprivato Ca’ d’ Morissio and great food at Tasting Kitchen LA

December 16, 2010

The Schachter factor was in high gear on Tuesday night at The Tasting Kitchen in Los Angeles. Good friend David Schachter reached deep in his cellar for a bottle he knew would thrill me (as it would anyone who knows the great wines of the world): Giuseppe Mascarello 1997 Barolo Monprivato Ca’ d’ Morissio, Mauro Mascarello’s top bottling, from one of the great if somewhat maligned vintages of the twentieth century.

The 1997 harvest was and remains a classic example of semiotician Harold Bloom’s “misunderstanding,” what he would have called the anxiety of influence (@Comrade Howard, I know it’s a stretch but I think you would agree!). Similar to what happened for 2000, many American wine writers (and you all know whom I’m talking about) praised the warm 1997 vintage for the fruit-forward, hot (read highly alcoholic) wines it delivered. In the view of most Piedmont producers, 97 was a good vintage… not a great one. Wines from this harvest, in their view, were not “classic” expressions of their territorio. They were good and sometimes great but not worthy of the hype that they attained in their trans-Atlantic crossing.

Winemaker Mauro Mascarello’s bottling of his Ca’ d’ Morissio vineyard (above, visited by me and Tracie P and top Italian wine blogger Mr. Franco Ziliani in February 2010) was an exception to this paradigm: thanks to the unique microclimate of this deservedly famous growing site (owing to exposure and elevation), Mauro is able to obtain Barolo benchmarks even in hotter vintages. In fact, to my knowledge, he was the only Barolo producer in the five core townships to produce his flagship single-vineyard wine Ca’ d’ Morissio for the extremely hot 2003 vintage (that’s the Ca’ d’ Morissio, “Maurizio’s house,” at the top of the hill, btw).

Mauro Mascarello is a remarkable man, a 19th-century man, a man whose spiritual integrity and wholesome warmth are expressed in his warm, sturdy handshake and personal manner. I’ve had the opportunity to meet and taste with him three times now (each thanks to Mr. Ziliani) and I am always as impressed by the man himself as I am by the incredible wines he produces. Many Barolo insiders point to his winery as the most recently canonized member in the pantheon of the truly great producers in the appellation.

One of the hallmarks of traditional Barolo is large-cask aging: Tracie P snapped the above photo of me when we visited with Mr. Ziliani to show how large “large” is at Giuseppe Mascarello! Mauro’s father was in the lumber business and he built the cask in the photo as an experiment in dimension, said Mauro. (For a fantastic English-language profile of G. Mascarello, I highly recommend this excellent post by my blogging colleague Gregory dal Piaz who knows this winery and its wines perhaps better than anyone else in the U.S.)

I am very fortunate to have tasted a lot of fantastic wine this year (and many of the highlights have been in the last few weeks) but 97 G. Mascarello Barolo Monprivato Ca’ d’ Morissio? An astounding wine. Layers and layers of nuanced fruit and earth on the nose, with this fantastic black licorice, almost menthol note that is always a signature in wines from this vineyard. Rich tar and mushroom in the mouth, with harmonious red berry and red stone fruit. But it was the acidity, tongue-splitting acidity, as Tracie P would have said — even in the warm 1997 vintage! — that took this wine over the top. In Italian wine parlance, you often say that the acidity is a “backbone” that “supports” the flavors of the wine: this wine was the embodiment of this notion.

O, and the food at the Tasting Kitchen (yesterday named 4th best new restaurant in the U.S. by Alan Richman in GQ)?

Buckwheat bigoli with lamb and anchovy ragù was my favorite.

I also loved Chef Casey Lane’s unabashed use of heat in dishes like this tagliolini with baby squid (the fact that my WordPress spellcheck knows tagliolini is remarkable, no?). We spoke to Casey before our meal: he is a super cool, mellow guy (unusual for chefs of his caliber) and he’s from Texas! Awesome dude…

Housemade chorizo and roast pork loin were FANTASTIC with the Ca’ d’ Morissio.

Thanks again, David! And congrats, Casey! An amazing meal and an UNFORGETTABLE wine…

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Posted by Do Bianchi

Bartolo Mascarello 2008 Langhe Nebiolo [sic]

October 18, 2010

Talk about mimetic desire! You can imagine my envy when I read Mr. Franco Ziliani’s post this morning on tasting the 2008 Langhe Nebiolo [sic] by Maria Teresa Mascarello of the Bartolo Mascarello winery in Barolo.

For those of you who don’t read Italian, I’ve translated Mr. Ziliani’s tasting notes at VinoWire (here).

Maria Teresa made only 2,000 bottles of this reclassified Barolo (for a vintage, 2008, not ideal in Piedmont because of excessive rainfall).

Man, I hope someone will save a bottle to open with me!

In the meantime, read about it here…

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Posted by Do Bianchi

Drinking well with Peter Wasserman in Austin, thank you very much

October 15, 2010

Above: What a treat to get to taste with Peter Wasserman (center) yesterday! He led a superb tasting at Jeff Courington’s Vino Vino (that’s Jeff, right). And we were joined by our friend Julio Hernández (left), who made a name for himself in the wine world as Emeril’s wine director and now distributes fine wine here in Texas.

In case you were concerned that there weren’t any good wine for Tracie P and me to drink in Austin, Texas, I just thought I’d share yesterday’s flight.

Before heading to dinner in the home of friends, we got to taste some fantastic French wines with Peter Wasserman, who was in town to “work the market” as they say in wine parlance. I’d never met Peter in person and what a delightful, charming, and engaging fellow he is! There were some impressive wines in his flight (including the 2007 Domaine Mugnier Nuits–Saint-Georges 1er Cru Clos de La Maréchale).

But the wine that blew me away was this 2007 Aligoté by Lafarge. Some late ripening and large, old cask aging give this wine a richness and gorgeous unctuous character I’d never experienced in Aligoté. Stunning wine (not cheap, unfortunately).

Regretfully, I had to leave Peter’s excellent tasting, as Tracie P and I had a long-standing invitation to dine in the home of our new friends Sonia and Steven (check out Sonia’s very exciting new gallery in Austin).

Steven hadn’t revealed what he was making for dinner and surprised us with one of my FAVORITE things in the world to eat…

Lasagne verdi, the way they make them in Emilia. Steven is a fascinating dude (from a Taiwanese-Veneto family) who’s lived in NYC and Italy, a top wine collector, and an AMAZING cook (I like his taste in music, too, with the playlist ranging from virtuoso country guitar to Nino Rota).

We paired with the Rivetto 2004 Barolo (Serralunga d’Alba) Riserva which had been sent to me by my friend Enrico Rivetto (Enrico is perhaps the most prolific Italian winemaker blogger I know).

The Barolo showed nicely (great acidity from this very classic vintage in Langa) but Steven also opened a 2004 Domane de Montille Puligny Montrachet 1er Cru Le Cailleret because Tracie P was in the mood for some white and he just happened to have some in the fridge.

So, in case you were concerned that Tracie P and I weren’t eating and drinking well in Austin, you can sleep soundly tonight…

Thanks for reading! Buon weekend ya’ll!

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

Barolo, I’m still in love with you on this harvest moon

October 15, 2010

The world is such a grand, beautiful place, isn’t it? But it’s a small world after all…

Yesterday, trading emails about this and that, my friend Giuseppe Vaira of G.D. Vajra in Barolo sent me and McDuff this amazing photo of sunrise in Barolo (click image for full effect).

“Moon Nebbia Dawn on Bricco delle Viole. View of the western slope. October 5, 2010, 6:35 a.m., two days to the new moon.”

Barolo, I’m still in love with you… On this harvest moon…

Come a little bit closer
Hear what I have to say
Just like children sleepin’
We could dream this night away.

But there’s a full moon risin’
Let’s go dancin’ in the light
We know where the music’s playin’
Let’s go out and feel the night.

Because I’m still in love with you
I want to see you dance again
Because I’m still in love with you
On this harvest moon.

When we were strangers
I watched you from afar
When we were lovers
I loved you with all my heart.

But now it’s gettin’ late
And the moon is climbin’ high
I want to celebrate
See it shinin’ in your eye.

—”Harvest Moon,” Neil Young

Did I mention that Giuseppe’s Dolcetto d’Alba is mama Judy’s favorite wine?

8 Comments | de musica, de vino, de vinographia | Tagged: , , , , , | Permalink
Posted by Do Bianchi

Barolo confessions

August 27, 2010

It was delicious…

Above: I was cold, I was hungry, I was tired… and, yes, damn it, I sat in my lonely hotel room on a damp, cold evening in Asti and watched TV, ate takeout pizza, and drank a bottle of 2005 Barolo Ravera by Elvio Cogno.

Forgive me, readers, for I have sinned. I can already hear the E-Bobs and WineBerserkers wailing, “infanticide!” It was a very lonely evening for me in the heart of winter in Piedmont: the Barbera 7 had abandoned me in my hotel, just as Jeremiah’s lovers had “forgotten him.”

My only companion was a bottle of 2005 Barolo Ravera given to me by Valter Fissore of Elvio Cogno. I was cold, I was hungry, I was tired. So I ordered takeout pizza, popped the cork, and watched TV.

I don’t know where food maven Arthur Schwartz said this, but Italian cookery queen Michele Scicolone often repeats his chiasmatic adage regarding pizza: if you can’t be with the pizza you love, love the pizza you’re with. Well, honey, I loved me some pizza and Barolo that night and I lived to tell about it!

Thanks for letting me get this off my chest… Buon weekend, ya’ll!

10 Comments | de cibo, de musica, de vino, nugellae | Tagged: , , , , , | Permalink
Posted by Do Bianchi

97 Barolo, mole, and blues pair well in Austin, Texas

August 17, 2010

From the “damn, I love this town” department…

Our friends Mike and Magaret (whom we know because they come to nearly every wine tasting I lead here in Austin!) wrote the other day saying they had a very special bottle of wine they wanted to share with Tracie P and me: Guido Porro 1997 Barolo Lazzairasco (!!!). We were thrilled, of course…

Regretfully, not many places allow corkage in Texas (in part due to the fact that the Texas Alcohol and Beverage Commission discourages it, even though it’s not illegal). But working in the wine business has its perks: my friend and colleague Brad Sharp, wine director at one of our favorite restaurants in the world, Fonda San Miguel, allowed us to bring in this bottle, which Mike hand-carried back from Barolo in 2001. (Btw, whenever we BYOB we always buy a commensurate bottle from the list, in this case some López de Heridia, and we tip generously, keeping in mind that the bill is less than it would have been had we ordered a second bottle at dinner. Fyi, Fonda does not allow corkage.)

In Piedmont, summer months are for Barbera, Pelaverga, and other lighter-bodied red wines that pair well with the lighter foods of warm months. In Mexico, however, heavier foods like mole (a chocolate and chile sauce used to dress meats and enchiladas) are served all year. And so in the spirit of transnational culinary fusion, I paired with carne asada tampiqueña and a cheese enchilada dressed with mole sauce. The combination was FANTASTIC!

Like its brother cru Lazzarito, Lazzairasco (just a few hectares) is one of the great vineyards of Serralunga d’Alba, where some of the richest and most austere Barolo is produced by the appellations oldest subsoils (on the east side of the Barolo-Alba road which divides the “natures” of Barolo).

Although it was one of the indisputably great harvests of a remarkable string of excellent years in Piedmont, 1995-2001, 1997 is not one of my favorite vintages: it was the warmest (as was 2000) and while it was highly praised in the U.S. for its ripe fruit, it didn’t have the balance of, say, 1999 or 2001 (my favs).

Porro is one of the great traditionalist producers of Barolo and this wine entirely surprised us with its lip-smacking acidity and its wild berry fruit character. I knew we were going out on an organoleptic limb with this pairing but wow, did it deliver a sensorial treat — an usual pairing that rewarded us for our daring.

And in keeping with the Austin cosmic cowboy spirit, after dinner we headed over to meet other friends at the Gallery at the Continental Club, where Jimmie Vaughan was sitting in with Hammond B3 player Mike Flanigin. The Gallery at the Continental only holds 50 persons and the “guest” musicians are not advertised (you have to be in the know to find out about which super stars might be appearing on any given night).

Jimmie’s riding high these days, with an awesome new album (that we LOVE) and world tour. He’s also a super sweet guy and he took a moment out for me to snap this photo of him and Margaret.

The dude is a living legend. I mean, how many people in world once lent a wah-wah pedal to Jimi Hendrix?

If only they served Nebbiolo at the Continental Club…

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

2003 Oddero Barolo in magnum: that’s what friends are for

May 10, 2010

Above: Giacomo Oddero 2003 Barolo in magnum was fantastic last night.

What can I say? Being a wine blogger has its perks. My buddy John Rikkers (whom I met through wine blogging) brought in a bottle of 2003 Barolo by Giacomo Oddero (one of my favorite traditionalist producers) to drink last night at Jaynes Gastropub following the Mamma Mia! tasting at the restaurant.

NOTA BENE: Jaynes does allow corkage. For a great guide on corkage, check out Lettie Teague’s article from a few years back, “Corkage for Dummies.” It’s a great set of rules-of-thumb for bringing your own bottle.

Above: John (right) and I met online through wine blogging and we always have a blast tasting together.

The 03 Oddero was simply singing last night: tar, goudron nose… earthy manure on the palate… mushroomy and elegantly tannic… Let me just go ahead and say it: cow shit in a glass and I loved it…

It’s a great example of how a lot of great wine was made in 2003, despite the challenging vintage, especially by those who take a traditional approach to Nebbiolo. It’s also a great example of how 2003 — an aggressively warm vintage — is drinking wonderfully right now. (I recently tasted 2003 Barbaresco by Produttori del Barbaresco and again, showing great right now.)

A propos wine blogging and folks I’ve met through the wine blogger community, check out this superb post by Gary Chevsky on his dinner with Mariacristina Oddero of Giacomo Oddero the other night at Donato Enoteca in Redwood, CA (a restaurant, I’m DYING to check out btw). Gary gives a great profile of the producer and the wines, definitely working checking out…

Thanks again, John. The 03 Oddero blew me away last night and was an awesome pairing for my Bangers and Mash. You R O C K!

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Posted by Do Bianchi

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