#Wine& #SlowFood in Piemonte
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Showing posts with label Italia. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Italia. Show all posts
Tuesday, October 29, 2019
Friday, October 28, 2011
In Piedmont, Seasons of Truffles and Barolo - NYTimes.com
Wine
In Piedmont, Seasons of Truffles and Barolo
Vietti
A view over some of the Vietti vineyards in Castiglione Falletto.
By ERIC PFANNER
Published: October 28, 2011
ALBA, ITALY — This city in the Piedmont region of northwestern Italy takes gastronomy very seriously.
Michelin-starred restaurants lurk around every street corner. The Slow Food movement, which champions the use of local produce and time-honored cooking techniques, has its headquarters in the nearby town of Bra. The aroma of toasted hazelnuts and chocolate, from a Ferrero Rocher plant on the edge of Alba, hangs over the region.
The interest in food grows especially intense in the fall, harvest season for the Alba white truffle. For a few weeks in October and November, these pungent-smelling tubers, unearthed from the forests around Alba by wizened hunters with specially trained dogs, are sold in a market in the old city center. There, the truffles are prodded, sniffed and haggled over before changing hands at breathtaking prices.
The fall is also the season of Barolo, the great wine produced in hillside vineyards from a cluster of villages southwest of Alba: La Morra, Castiglione Falletto, Serralunga d’Alba, Monforte d’Alba and Barolo itself. As truffle season arrives, so do the autumn mists that are said to have given the late-harvested Barolo grape variety, nebbiolo, its name. (“Nebbia” means fog in Italian.)
Like food, wine arouses passions here. For more than two decades, the so-called Barolo wars raged, pitting traditional producers of the wine against modernizing winemakers in what each side saw as a struggle for the soul of Barolo. Fortunately, a cease-fire finally seems to be taking hold.
What was there to fight over? Barolo is one of the most complex, aromatic and delicious red wines in the world. At its best, it has the delicate fruit of Burgundy, the age-worthiness of Bordeaux and a broad register of flavors, from cherries to dried flowers to eucalyptus to Darjeeling tea, that is entirely its own.
Yet Barolo is also one of the hardest wines to handle, for winemakers and consumers alike.
Traditionally, Barolos were made in a way that emphasized the tannins, the astringent, mouth-puckering substances that give serious red wines their structure, but that also make them difficult to enjoy before they have spent many years in a cellar. The problem with some old-school Barolos was that by the time the tannins softened, the fruit and the color had faded, robbing the drinker of any pleasure.
“People talk about all these great old Barolos from the 1960s, the 1970s, the 1980s,” said Fabio Fantino, the winemaker at the Conterno Fantino estate, which was founded by his father and a partner. “But in any of those decades there are only two or three vintages that you can still drink. We have only one life to drink wine.”
To try to make their wines more approachable, the so-called modernists imported new methods from France. They shortened the period of maceration, in which the skins from crushed grapes soak in the juice, as well as the fermentation. They encouraged the wines to undergo a second fermentation, which converts harsh malic acid to gentler lactic acid. And they started aging their wines in small oak barrels, known as barriques, bucking the local tradition that favored giant casks.
These and other changes produced wines that are softer, rounder and deeper in flavor and color. But some winemakers overdid things, producing wines that were virtually indistinguishable from other plush, oaky reds, like California cabernet sauvignon. A number of winemakers added grapes like cabernet or merlot to their nebbiolo; under Italian wine regulations, this cost them the right to call the resulting wines Barolo.
The interest in food grows especially intense in the fall, harvest season for the Alba white truffle. For a few weeks in October and November, these pungent-smelling tubers, unearthed from the forests around Alba by wizened hunters with specially trained dogs, are sold in a market in the old city center. There, the truffles are prodded, sniffed and haggled over before changing hands at breathtaking prices.
The fall is also the season of Barolo, the great wine produced in hillside vineyards from a cluster of villages southwest of Alba: La Morra, Castiglione Falletto, Serralunga d’Alba, Monforte d’Alba and Barolo itself. As truffle season arrives, so do the autumn mists that are said to have given the late-harvested Barolo grape variety, nebbiolo, its name. (“Nebbia” means fog in Italian.)
Like food, wine arouses passions here. For more than two decades, the so-called Barolo wars raged, pitting traditional producers of the wine against modernizing winemakers in what each side saw as a struggle for the soul of Barolo. Fortunately, a cease-fire finally seems to be taking hold.
What was there to fight over? Barolo is one of the most complex, aromatic and delicious red wines in the world. At its best, it has the delicate fruit of Burgundy, the age-worthiness of Bordeaux and a broad register of flavors, from cherries to dried flowers to eucalyptus to Darjeeling tea, that is entirely its own.
Yet Barolo is also one of the hardest wines to handle, for winemakers and consumers alike.
Traditionally, Barolos were made in a way that emphasized the tannins, the astringent, mouth-puckering substances that give serious red wines their structure, but that also make them difficult to enjoy before they have spent many years in a cellar. The problem with some old-school Barolos was that by the time the tannins softened, the fruit and the color had faded, robbing the drinker of any pleasure.
“People talk about all these great old Barolos from the 1960s, the 1970s, the 1980s,” said Fabio Fantino, the winemaker at the Conterno Fantino estate, which was founded by his father and a partner. “But in any of those decades there are only two or three vintages that you can still drink. We have only one life to drink wine.”
To try to make their wines more approachable, the so-called modernists imported new methods from France. They shortened the period of maceration, in which the skins from crushed grapes soak in the juice, as well as the fermentation. They encouraged the wines to undergo a second fermentation, which converts harsh malic acid to gentler lactic acid. And they started aging their wines in small oak barrels, known as barriques, bucking the local tradition that favored giant casks.
These and other changes produced wines that are softer, rounder and deeper in flavor and color. But some winemakers overdid things, producing wines that were virtually indistinguishable from other plush, oaky reds, like California cabernet sauvignon. A number of winemakers added grapes like cabernet or merlot to their nebbiolo; under Italian wine regulations, this cost them the right to call the resulting wines Barolo.
Wednesday, September 14, 2011
UK worst place to live in Europe: Quality of Life Index - while France and Spain are the best
UK worst place to live in Europe: Quality of Life Index - while France and Spain are the best
Ha!!http://www.uswitch.com/news/money/uk-worst-place-to-live-in-europe-uswitch-quality-of-life-index-890419/The UK and Ireland are the worst places to live in Europe, while France and Spain are the best, according to the latest uSwitch Quality of Life IndexThe UK came 9th out of the 10 European countries in the Index, thanks to high living costs, below average government spending on health and education, short holidays and late retirement. The Index shows that people in France enjoy the highest quality of life, closely followed by Spain.People in the UK pay the highest prices for food and diesel, yet the government spends below the European average (as a percentage of GDP) on health and education. We also work longer hours, retire later, receive less annual leave than most of our European counterparts and get less sunshine along the way - not to mention the fact that we can expect to die two years younger than our French counterparts.The UK no longer has the highest net household income in Europe, after falling behind Ireland, the Netherlands and Denmark. In the past, the relatively high net income in the UK has offset the poor quality of life, but this year net household income it is only around £5000 above the European average, compared to £10,000 above last year.France enjoys the earliest retirement age (joint with Poland), spends the most on healthcare (11% of GDP) and has the longest life expectancy in Europe. Its workers also benefit from 36 days holiday a year, compared with just 28 in the UK, and it comes only behind Spain and Italy for hours of sunshine.Spain has the most sunshine, the lowest prices for alcohol and the highest number of days holiday in Europe at 43 days a year. However, the Spanish government spends the least on education.
Tuesday, September 7, 2010
Alla Vecchia Bettola
Alla Vecchia Bettola
34r Via Luigi Ariosto Phone ++-39-055-22.41.58 stagimax@libero.it
If you're in Florence, don't miss Alla Vecchia Bettola: eat the penne bettola and the Florentine steak- you will not regret it!
Tuesday, August 10, 2010
Piemonte addresses
Tags:
Alba,
Europe,
FOOD,
Francesco Maglia,
Italia,
Italy,
Living,
MISCELLANEOUS,
Monferrato,
Piemonte,
Signora Gallina,
Slow Food,
Tartuffo,
Truffles,
Wine
Great Food and Wine in the Piemonte region of Italy
Dre Caste, or Il Mongetto
Hotel, restaurant, wine producer, as well as sauces and stuff. Great place.
Find more info by googling Dre Caste, or Il Mongetto
Nice Wine estate:
Gallina restaurant:
Long heavy meals. Nice and Cheap.
Great Moscato d'Asti but other wines not great.
great restaurant:
Del Belbo da Bardon
San Marzano Oliveto
Via Valle Asinari 25
Tel 0141 831 340
Well-known as the ‘Bardon’. Large, easy-going and friendly. Fine local cuisine and the largest wine list in Piedmont. Seats outside.
(Closed Wed p.m, Thurs.)
other place I've been to:
Trattoria della Posta ‘da Camulin’
Cossano Belbo
Via Fratelli Negro, 3
Tel 0141 88 126
Cossano Belbo
Via Fratelli Negro, 3
Tel 0141 88 126
Well-known and critically acclaimed for its top quality food.
Excellent wine list.
(closed Sun pm, Mon)
Excellent wine list.
(closed Sun pm, Mon)
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