O tempora, o mores, to borrow a phrase from Cicero. Times are tough all around and these days I’m slinging a wine bag on my back and hitting the streets, hawking wine. I’m a traveling salesman like my maternal grandfather Maurice (poppa, we used to call him; my paternal grandfather was a rabbi, our zaidi — Yiddish for grand-père — but that’s another story). But as fate would have it, I consider myself lucky inasmuch I get to sell a lot of wines that I genuinely love (my new gig is with the Austin-based Mosaic Wine Group; check out the new blog we launched here). The other day I got to pour multiple vintages of one of my favorite wines (as anybody who follows my blog knows so well), Produttori del Barbaresco: I led a guided tasting of the 2004 and 2005 Barbaresco and 2006 Langhe Nebbiolo the other night at The Austin Wine Merchant in downtown Austin, Texas.
I didn’t get to participate in the Piedmont edition of Wine Blogger Wednesday, orchestrated smashingly by David McDuff at his excellent blog McDuff’s Food and Wine Trail, and so he graciously honored me with a guest blogger spot writing about Produttori del Barbaresco and my recent tasting notes at his kick-ass web log (one of my daily reads).
To read my tasting notes (including my translation of the winery’s 2006 vintage notes), click here.
In other news…
As my friend and dissertation adviser Luigi Ballerini used to say whenever we ate Japanese: oh tempura, oh soy sauce!
Do Bianchi 
I was thinking of writing to you to ask you about your new job. Will you tell “the other story”?
and pour you did! so much info, 2B…great fun today too :)
getting down and dirty with kermit..I think you’ll do just fine.
Dott.J, if I taste any good Calabrese wines apart from Ciro, I’ll pass on info about a producer to you and you can scout them.
Simona, the new job is going great and is a lot of fun. Last night I got to pour some fantastic Kermit Lynch wines (right on Genevelyn!). My father’s adoptive father was an orthodox rabbi who led a large congregation in Southbend, Indiana. My love for music comes from his teaching me prayers as a child (the only interaction he and I had). He liked desserts and used to order ever dessert on the dessert cart at the Whaling Bar at the La Valencia Hotel in La Jolla.
Genevelyn, right on! I’m stoked to be working with these wines. Last night I got to pour 2005 Bandol by Tempier! Over the top good!
Adrian, keep us posted of your adventures. I need to look up some interesting passages about Calabrian wines and how good they were in the 1950s.
Tracie B, wasn’t that a blast to taste the three vintages side-by-side? Nebbiolo never tasted so good (as it does when I taste it with you…)
While Reggio Calabria looks like East Berlin before the Wall fell, at least I can see Sicilia from my balcony. Check out the Vino Italiano chapter on Calabria…very poignant and beautifully written.