Above: national treasures Ed McCarthy and Mary Mulligan with winemaker Luca Currado of the Vietti winery at the Modern.

Whenever you get to rub shoulders with the likes of Ed McCarthy and Mary Mulligan, be sure to have notebook in hand. I gladly caught up with them at the Modern, where Luca Currado poured his recently released 2004 crus.

Ed agreed that 2004 is going to be a great vintage for Langhe and he told me that he recently returned from Piedmont where he tasted Giacomo Conterno’s as-of-yet unreleased 2002 Monfortino. An early-fall hail storm dashed the hopes of most Langhe producers and few made wine that year. But “the 2002 Monfortino is fantastic,” Ed told me, “and with a price to match,” he added.

While Giacomo Conterno is arguably Barolo’s top traditionalist producer, Vietti — Ed and I agreed — is one of our favorite modern-leaning producers, “definitely one of the top-five,” Ed noted. (I’ve profiled Ed previously in this post.)

Above: we tasted the 04 Vietti Crus and the 01 Villero Riserva.

Mary Mulligan and I enjoyed a glass of Luca’s 2003 single-vineyard Barbera La Crena (previously released). The perfectly Italophone Mary is one of our country’s leading experts on Italian wine and its first woman Master of Wine. She pointed out that Vietti makes some of the best Barbera available and has really set the standard for single-vineyard bottlings. No disagreement from me on that count…

Above: one of the many works on display. The exhibit featured drawings and paintings commissioned by Vietti for their labels.

Not thoroughly modern at the Modern: Luca’s wines fall somewhere between modern and traditional in style. Although they have some of the fruit-forwardness that you find in excessively modern expressions of Nebbiolo, his wines retain Barolo’s classic characteristics and are never too extracted or concentrated for my palate. I’ll be tasting with him later in the week… so look for my notes in an upcoming post!

Above: the main dining room at the Modern is one of the most elegant and glamorous spaces in NYC. Even I felt fabulous…