Southern Californians: please come out and taste my favorite Franciacorta with me and my bromance Giovanni on Saturday, February 25 at Jaynes Gastropub in San Diego. And Houstonians, registration for seminars at the Taste of Italy festival March 6 is filling up fast and some seminars are already completely full (when you click the “register” button, you will see the individual seminar registration options). I’ll be leading 4 tastings that day. Please join me!

The Italian Grape Name and Appellation Pronunciation Project was born after I got fed up with hearing self-proclaimed Italian wine experts offer “alternate” performances of ampelonyms.

The idea was to feature native speakers who live and work in the appellations and who grow the grapes. Who better than them to share their indigenous pronunciations? Since its inception, I’ve filmed and posted a number of episodes and many growers and winemakers have submitted videos (I encourage producers to send me videos; just PM me and I’ll give you a few notes on how to shoot them). The more the merrier and creativity and colorful videos are always welcome!

In this latest installment, Gavi grower and producer Paola Rosina of La Mesma offers an indigenous pronunciation of the grape name Cortese. We met up in Austin at the Slow Wine tasting there last month.

Thank you, Paola! And thank you for coming to Texas to share your superb wines!

Buon weekend, yall!