Above: “As good as Fiumicino.” That’s what Chef Andrew Weissman told me this morning when he made me an espresso at his new Italian restaurant Il Sogno in San Antonio, meaning that it tastes as good as that first espresso you crave and drink as soon as you get off the plane in Rome. He wasn’t kidding.

This morning found the San Diego Kid leading an Italian wine seminar and tasting for the staff at Il Sogno in San Antonio, Chef Andrew Weissman’s new Italian restaurant, slated to open July 25 in the old Pearl Brewery complex in downtown.

The wine list will have about 100 wines and lot of great values. I was really liking the 2007 Barbera by Giacosa (despite the current “fatwa,” as Franco has called it, that the winery has issued on the 2006) and the 2007 Produttori del Barbaresco Langhe Nebbiolo, which they told me would be about $35 on the list.

Above: Kinda looks like a Pink Floyd album cover, doesn’t it? The old Pearl Brewery complex in San Antonio is about to become one of the hottest food and wine destinations in central Texas.

Beyond the guided tasting I led and the “as good as Fiumicino” espresso Andrew made me, I didn’t get to taste any food but judging the from the cheese expert who followed me, Il Sogno is going to be as good as Andrew’s flagship restaurant, Le Rêve (click to read about the night we I ate there). Tracie B and I are entirely and totally geeked…