From the department of “still catching up on remarkable wines that I tasted in 2012″… This extraordinary bottle was the gift of an overly generous friend who sent it to me from Italy, where the bottle once resided in his cellar. After it had rested in my San Diego cellar for a few weeks in […]
Yesterday, I received yet another round of remembrances of the great Giulio Gambelli (who passed away a few days ago), including one by my good friend Francesco Bonfio, president of Vinarius, the association of Italian wine shops. He was an exquisite, deeply humble person whose humility was rivaled only by his extraordinary knowledge of Montalcino […]
Photo via Decanter. A few more remembrances of Giulio Gambelli, whose transcendant personality galvanized a generation of Sangiovese growers, bottlers, shippers, and lovers… From Lavinium, a passage quoted from Carlo Macchi’s hagiography of Gambelli (in Carlo’s voice; translation mine): A few years ago I was with Giulio at the Isvea Laboratory. A woman approached us […]
Sit tibi terra [tuscolana] levis Juli. When Italy’s top wine blogger Franco Ziliani wrote me yesterday to share the news that the great Maestro of Sangiovese, Giulio Gambelli (left, photo by A. Pagliantini via Enoclub Siena) had left this world for another, the feeds were already overflowing with tributes for the man who shaped a […]
Look at the color of Gianni Maccari’s Brunello. That’s the hue of classic Sangiovese. When my client Ethica Wines sent me to Italy a year ago in January, their Brunello producer Ridolfi wasn’t even on my radar. Montalcino is where I first became interested in wine (while I was a grad student in Italy in […]
In a normal year, I’d make roughly 6 trips to Italy between research and tastings, trade fairs, my teaching gigs at Slow Food U., and a press junket or two (a few years ago, I made nine trips over the course of 12 months!). At this point I don’t know when I’ll be able to […]
Above: a geological survey of the Chianti Classico DOCG was presented by a group of leading grape growers and winemakers in Florence in December, 2013. Yesterday, Italian wine writer and wine professional Andrea Gori published his notes from a Chianti Classico subzone held in Florence in early December 2013. (Even if you don’t speak Italian, […]
Above: I recently asked legendary Tuscan enologist Carlo Ferrini (and historic consultant at Casanova di Neri) what he considered his great contribution to Italian wine. “I took the traditional role of the Tuscan enologist from the cellar to the vineyard,” he told me. My brother-in-arms and close friend flying winemaker Giovanni Arcari often asks rhetorically: […]
It’s been incredible to see the heartfelt, poignant reaction to Quintarelli’s passing on Sunday. With the loss of Quintarelli and Gambelli, January has been a “cruel month” in Italian wine, as Italy’s top wine blogger Franco Ziliani put it. With uncertainty looming over Europe and an ever shifting wine industry, this passing of the old […]
Do Bianchi 