If you’ve ever studied Italian as a second language, you know that you invariably encounter irregular nouns early on in your class.

In nearly every curriculum, the examples the pedagogues use are the same: amico (friend) is pluralized as amici (and not amichi as the velar-paroxytone model would suggest); greco (Greek) becomes greci; and porco (pig) becomes porci.

It’s only natural that amico would come up frequently in Italian 1 class. The word greco is not as common in rudimentary Italian but it also has a place in introductory Italian language instruction since Greek culture pervaded the fabric of ancient Italy.

But porco? Ask any Italian instructor and she or he will answer similarly and without skipping a beat: gli uomini sono porci – men are pigs (a sentence that incorporates not one but two irregular nouns!).

It’s an aphorism that evidently comes up frequently in Italian colloquialism.

I can only wonder how many times the expression has been uttered in Italy as the American and Italian media has devoted ample coverage to widespread allegations of sexual harassment among U.S. politicians and in the U.S. entertainment, news, and restaurant trades.

Any member of the U.S. wine trade would be hard-pressed to deny that sexual harassment is sadly all too common in the industry.

While I was in Italy teaching earlier this month, many Italians — consumed, like their America counterparts, by this watershed cultural moment — asked me about it. When I got home to my wife Tracie in Texas, we spent a lot of time talking about it over the holiday weekend (the allegations began to circulate before I left but they seemed to explode in their scope and reach while I was gone).

We both remembered myriad episodes of highly inappropriate behavior over the course of our careers in wine.

When I first met Tracie nine years ago, she was a sales rep for Glazer’s in Texas (now Southern Glazer’s, a major American wine distributor). I’ll never forget her telling me about having to sell wine at an adult entertainment venue (an account that was assigned to her by her superiors; she had no voice in the matter). The club’s owner regularly harassed her.

Over the course of our conversations this weekend, she also remembered a ride-with with a particularly aggressive supplier rep who was widely known in the Texas wine community to harass young women (a supplier rep[resentative] is a sales agent for a particular brand or portfolio of wines; a ride-with is typically a day of sales work, when a rep for a local distributor hosts a supplier rep and the supplier rep rides with her or him).

I remembered a 2010 trip to northern Italy with a group of leading sommeliers from across the country. There was one woman among us. During one of our daily bus rides, the conversation became so sexually charged that I insisted that it stop. We rode in silence for the rest of that day.

I also remembered a 2007 dinner in lower Manhattan with a Tuscan winemaker. It was clear to everyone at the table that he was harassing his importer’s publicist. I tried as graciously as I could to separate them. But looking back now, I am filled with regret: I should have told him, however discreetly but firmly, that he had to stop. I feel so bad about that now. I can remember the look of terror in her eyes and her inability to reach out for help.

By the time we went to bed on Saturday night, my mind was swirling with memories of similar episodes: a so-called American wine writer who asked a Neapolitan publicist to take a shower with him (sound familiar?); a celebrity wine writer who literally groped a publicist at a popular Manhattan restaurant in front of the whole table (we all hovered like flies waiting for a windshield on a freeway); a respected old-line wine writer who agreed to take a trip to Italy with a publicist and then expected her to have sexual relations with him (she broke away from the trip on the first day).

And who can forget the immensely popular wine blogger who regularly attacks women wine writers with sexually crude language? Sexual harassment also occurs in the virtual realm of the U.S. wine trade.

Following the revelations about rampant sexual harassment in the U.S. restaurant industry, many high-profile restaurant groups are taking steps to address the issue.

It’s time that wine industry leaders do the same. When is the other bottle going to break?

Image created using Wikipedia Creative Commons images here and here.

The magnetic Alicia Lini (above) and I will be pouring her wines at Rossoblu in downtown LA on Tuesday. Alicia’s one of my best friends in the wine business and her family’s wines are as contagious as she is.

Please join us. I’ll also be pouring in Houston and again in LA week after next.

Happy holidays everyone! I hope to see you and taste something great together before year’s end.

Alicia Lini and Lini Lambrusco at Rossoblu (Los Angeles)
Tuesday, November 28
6:30 p.m.

CLICK HERE FOR MORE INFO AND REGISTRATION DETAILS.

*****

Native Italian Grapes at Mascalzone (Houston)
Monday, December 4
6:00 p.m.

I’ll be pouring 3 wines at Mascalzone where I’ve been writing the wine list since this summer. $35 per person, including (very generous portion) light bites. I’ll also be working the floor that night at the restaurant.

PLEASE CALL (832) 328-5151 TO REGISTER.

*****

Prince Ludovisi and the wines of Fiorano at Rossoblu (Los Angeles)
Thursday, December 7
7:00 p.m.
Featuring a flight of Tenuta Fiorano reds from the 1980s.

CLICK HERE FOR MORE INFO AND REGISTRATION DETAILS.

This event will sell out for sure. Please register to ensure availability. These wines are EXTRAORDINARY, true unicorns!

Thanks for your support. Buona domenica…

There’s a first time for everything and one of my firsts this week in Italy was tasting the Birrificio Montegioco Italian Grape Ale, a new category of beer that has come into the spotlight this year.

Known as IGA, after its official designation (Italian Grape Ale), it’s beer that’s been brewed with the addition of grape must.

In the case of the Open Mind IGA, must from Croatina grapes farmed by Piedmont legend Walter Massa is added. Walter is one of a small group of top winemakers who have coalesced around brewmaster Riccardo Franzosi, founder of Montegioco. They also contribute barrels for his cask-aged beers.

I like the Open Mind a lot and you could really taste the grape flavor, which gave the ale a nicely fruity and slightly sweet character.

(Thanks again to the amazing Carlo Fiorani for turning me on to this!)

In other news…

Today, I’ll teach my last wine writing seminar in the 2017 Master’s in Wine Culture at the University of Gastronomic Sciences.

That’s my class above, a great group of bright students.

We covered the history of ampelography from Columella (ancient Rome) and Andrea Bacci (Renaissance Italy) to modern-day writers like Eric Asimov and Alice Feiring and beyond. Along the way, we encountered a lot of what Eric rightly calls “wine anxiety” and we discovered that wine writing may be more about the Greek notion of aletheia or disclosure than the Latin notion of veritas or reality.

The students even coined a neologism: wine haters.

We realized (borrowing from Joseph Conrad) that the only thing we know for certain is that we see through a glass darkly.

All in all, we had a great time together.

Getting back to teaching has been really rewarding for me and I love how the Master’s program gives the instructors ample liberty in covering both practice and theory (like my colleague Armando Castagno who incorporates art history and the history of aesthetics in his wine tasting seminars).

In case you’re interested in learning more about the program, click here for the overview. As of this year, all the courses are taught in English. Enrollment for next year’s session is currently open. Thanks for reading…

Some of you may remember the famous line by John Landau, music critic and later record producer, published in 1974: “I saw rock and roll future and its name is Bruce Springsteen.”

His words sprang to mind yesterday as I left the Cremona province estate owned and managed by the amazing Carlo Fiorani (above) — rancher, farmer, pork butcher, baker, and brewmaster.

Carlo grows his own wheat and makes his own bread.

That’s his classic Pugliese olive bread in the basket above.

He raises his own pigs and makes his own salumi.

Those are his cotechini in his aging room.

He farms his own barley for his line of beers.

That’s his Belgian blonde. “Orzomio” means literally my barley.

His salame, considered one of the best artisanal salamis in Italy today, was as creamy as butter (for real).

Beyond the incredible texture and consistency, I was really impressed by how the flavors were so evenly distributed between the fat and meat.

He prepared a pork loin from one of his pigs and then seared it — without any oil, other type of fat, or salt — in a non-stick pan to show us how flavorful it is.

The pink of the meat was like sashimi in terms of its tenderness. Considering how wholesome his ranching and farming are, you could probably eat his pork raw.

He also sells preserves and eggs from his farm. Here’s his product page.

His entire estate — once a commercial corn farm owned and managed by his parents — is farmed without the use of pesticides or herbicides. No additives are used in any of his products.

Over lunch he shared his interest in Texas BBQ and BBQ in general. We’re already planning his visit to Texas: in the light of his admiration for Texas smokers, he agreed that his first stop in the U.S. has to be in the Lone Star state.

Beyond what an all-around cool and hip guy he is, Carlo has all the right stuff to continue building his brand in Italy and beyond.

Carlo’s also a graduate of the University of Gastronomic Sciences in Piedmont where I’m currently teaching (he was a member of the first graduating class). He speaks English perfectly, he’s actively engaged in social media, and au courant on international food trends etc.

Man, there’s no stopping this dude. And the world will only be better for it… Seek out his products when you’re in Italy next. You’ll thank me.

Back in my grad school days, my dissertation advisor — the great Milanese poet Luigi Ballerini — used to boast that he would never let our department become a fabbrica dei disoccupati, a factory churning out unemployable graduates.

I can’t convey the thrill last night when I ran into three of my students last night in Bra (in Piedmont, where the University of Gastronomic Sciences is located) and learned that nearly everyone from their graduating class is gainfully employed: from left, Marco at Josetta Saffirio, Filippo at Domenico Clerico, and Valentina at Matteo Correggia (each an iconic winery in its own right).

Just yesterday, I was reading Beppe Severgnini’s New York Times op-ed wherein he reports (not that we didn’t already know) that “youth unemployment is at a record high” in Italy.

To know that nearly all of last year’s matriculated Master’s in Wine Culture students have jobs (they do!) fills my heart with gladness.

In other news…

What a meal last night at Ristorante Battaglino!

That’s the restaurant’s “Carne cruda e salsiccia di Bra,” classic Piedmontese beef tartare and raw veal sausage (the latter, a specialty unique to Bra). Music to the ears of anyone who suffers from Jewish boy stomach (like me).

The food scene in Bra (much more international than you might imagine, btw) would be worth the price of admission alone…

I’m on lunch break this afternoon following a seminar I led on Eric Asimov’s “Tyranny of the Tasting Note.” Now it’s time to dive into the enoblogosphere… Back to the factory I go! Thank you for being here.