Aroma Cucina

Fisticuffs in Friuli?

One of our last workshops at the Salone del Gusto was a tasting of wines from the Friuli region of Italy.  We’ve been huge fans of Friulian wines ever since our bike trip through the region and we were both looking forward to this tasting and the opportunity to hear the maker’s philosophy on wine making. Little did we know there was a rebel in the crowd and that passions were going to run very high.

Fulvio L. Bressan of Bressan winery did not mince words as he told us his particular view of the current wine world.  He vehemently believes in not tampering with the grapes. No fertilizer except that which comes from his barn. No irrigation lest the grape flavor becomes diluted.  No oak barrels because “Do you want to drink wine or eat the kitchen door?”  After the pressing, he does however keep his wine in very large wooden vats to start the fermentation process. Bressan uses only indigenous yeast, and if that retards the fermentation process and we have to wait a little longer, then so be it. In Bressan’s opinion vines need time to mature, and only after the first 25 years will you start to get good fruit from the vine. What happens if you get thirsty in the meantime? Drink beer. Bressan believes the vines have a memory and will protect themselves from pestilence while the use of insecticides will weaken the vine’s resistance.   He strives to produce the most natural expression of the wine possible.  He repeated something we had heard from a number of other wine makers: the wine is made in the field, not in the cellar.

Well.....

Although there was another vintner on the panel many of these remarks seemed to be directed at Gaspare Buscemi, an elegant gentleman and producer of artisanal wines. Buscemi does not own land and buys his grapes, so theoretically he does not control the fruit, but he is very hands on and knows his suppliers intimately.  Buscemi chose to keep his remarks to a minimum, but you could feel the tension mounting between them. About the only thing the two men agree on is that they both use natural cork.  The poor panel moderator kept trying to reel in the conversation by saying soothing, non-confrontational generalities, but it was a losing battle.

By the time the panel was open to questions from the floor, all of us were squirming in our seats wondering how this was going to play out.  A gentleman asked Bressan, “If you have this elitist view of winemaking, how do you supply the world with affordable wine.”  The guy couldn't have given Bressan a better soap box if he tried. Bressan launched into a lengthy explanation that he does not care about the elite, he only makes wine the way he wants.  He does not care about trendy. He makes pure, clean wine because he thinks it is trendy to safeguard his liver, his health and to not have a headache in the morning. He understands the need for grape cooperatives, or where people buy grapes they do not grow, but for him, this is the same as drinking a Coke.  Buscemi bit his lips and patiently waited for the panel to end. Which mercifully for the peace and sanity of the panel moderator, it finally did end.

And the wines? How did they taste? Buscemi’s wine was a clean, clear, crisp and elegant expression of a Pinot Gris.  Bressan’s wine was velvet in the mouth, it almost had the consistency of a passito wine on the tongue, nearly syrupy, but it was complex, and lush with the full ripe flavor of the harvest. Perhaps it is like Sophia Loren who is another unadulterated expression of her heritage?

Who ever thought wine tastings could be so exciting?  Viva Italia!

Zone Diet and Cocktails at the Salone del Gusto

Day 3 and we’re about to rename this event the Salone del Bust-Out because the temptation to taste is so strong, we can’t resist, and now we are about to Bust Out of our clothes! I keep hoping we are on a variation of the Zone Diet. Isn’t that the diet where you eat many small meals? If so, then we should walk out of here svelte as a Milan fashion model, but why do I feel as though I’ll waddle out like a San Daniele prosciutto? 
There is a “Cucina del Strada” or Street Food area that is the belly button of this whole event, people gazing with glassy eyes at the carnival surrounding them. Could the Street Food, Food Carts trend be any hotter?  Or more delicious? What beats a plate of piping hot, perfectly crisp fried anchovies? I tell you what would beat it...a place to sit down, a real fork & knife and a napkin. The simple things in life.  Grazing for three days is hard work I tell you, hard work.

We finished off last night with a rousingly good cocktail workshop hosted by Agostino Perrone. He runs the fabled Connaught Hotel Bar in London and just won Barman of the Year at the Tales of the Cocktail competition, so the guy knows his way around a shaker.  Italy doesn’t have much of a cocktail culture, although it is slowly coming alive. What Italy does have is great cocktail ingredients: vermouth, Galliano, American Cocchi, Maraschino, bitters, infusions etc., etc.
Agostino and Dom Costa hosted a lively, informative and tasty workshop, demonstrating how classic cocktails can be enhanced with top notch ingredients and techniques.  For example, the Martinez which is a gin, vermouth, maraschino gets an update by swapping out the gin with tequila and a spritz of balsamic.
Don got his chops on the cruise ships and has an encyclopedic knowledge of the evolution and trends of cocktail drinking. He shared the story of the Yellow Bird cocktail, how it originated in the Caribbean using available ingredients: rum, lime juice and Galliano and then Agostino shared an updated version using a Bergamot velvet froth (zucrose whipped with the Bergamot liquor, this creates a very stable foam and no eggy taste).

 Chris McMillian, one of the founders of the Museum of the American Cocktail was behind the Salone Bar the other night. No, he wasn’t just behind the bar, he was holding court, telling stories and snatches of history all while mixing an original cocktail, the “While New Orleans Drowns”.  The bar was full of world class shakers, local chefs, Chris’s gracious and beautiful wife Laura, and a blogger or two. Gee, a bar as a gathering point, what a novel idea!  You should have been here.  It always amazes me how generous the bar men and ladies are about sharing their knowledge. 

Today we head to learn more about Fruili, discover Calabria and who knows where else the great goddess Serendipity will take us.

Palette Chaos at Salone del Gusto

This Slow Food “Salone” thing is huge.  The conference center, our hotel, and enormous shopping mall are all part of the old Fiat factory. It’s impossible for me to gauge the size, as there is no anchor to use to get perspective. Employees get around on bicycles, scooters, and a hybrid big-wheel motorized scooter transport thingy.  We’ve gotten the lay of the land and now talk about making a left at Puglia, or you should go past Liguria to find Umbria, and do you want to eat in Spain today? It’s a maze of cultures, flavors, smells. Despite my best interests to not get sucked into tasting yet another olio novello (the first pressed olive oil season), I can’t resist.  Could you resist walking through Liguria and not tasting five varieties of pesto?
We are taking advantage of the numerous workshops that are offered and I started the day watching Eneko Atxa of the Azurmendi restaurant located outside of Bilbao explain how he does what he does. Chef Atxa takes the traditional flavors he grew up and figures out a way to bring the diner into his world. An oyster dish that is served with a magical seawater potion that transports you to the sea.  A whimsical vegetable dish that literally looks and smells like a garden.  We were treated to a tasting of an oxtail ‘ravioli’ where the rice paper thin shell was made from lardo and bread crumbs.  The finale was a blood pudding ‘meat ball’ that is gently fried. The delicate crust cracks open to yield up it’s soft, fragrant succulent interior. We are definitely talking sex.


The wine courses are particularly interesting as the vintners explain the why and how of what they do. We spent part of the afternoon in Sicily, and if you ever run across “Occipiniti” wine, grab it immediately. Arianna is a very young winemaker and she’s going to make big waves in the Italian wine world.  Later, Jeff went to Verdicchio land, while I indulged in a blue cheese and sweet red wine tasting. 


Passion is alive and well here in Torino. (Wasn’t passion the Torino Olympic slogan? Well, it’s true.)  Now it’s time to go back for day to. I think I’ll go to the Langhe this morning, I hear they make a bangin’ Nebbiolo.  Stay tuned....

Eataly The Mothership

We rolled into Torino this afternoon and can you imagine our good luck?  The original Eataly is right across the street. Hello!! We dropped our bags (and the kitty) in the hotel  and made a beeline to The Mothership: the original mack daddy Eataly. We were at the far end of lunchtime, full into the danger zone, so lingering in the hotel wasn't an option.

Holy cow.  We got as far as the fish restaurant counter and that was good enough for us. The fish market behind us had swordfish, 10 kinds of European oysters and a bunch of ugly looking fish that I bet taste divine. (Note the small chunk of styrofoam on the tip of the swordfish's sword.)

 

I don't know what goes on in the uber-caldo Eataly in New York, but the beauty of this one is the food that imported.  I know, it's an oxymoron, but I don't care.  We made a snap decision. Let's eat dinner in the hotel room. There were far too many treats available, and after months of nothing but Umbrian goodness it was time to branch out. So we went foraging in Eataly for dinner.  Now we are savoring French foie gras that comes in these nifty little egg shaped portions so you can always have a foie gras snack. Real English Stilton. Oh my, have I missed Stilton. Some other French cheeses, that I don't know the name of, I think we ate the labels. And real bread...crusty, chewy, dense. Incredible.

Tomorrow the Salone del Gusto officially opens. We took a sneak peek tonight as they were setting up and handing out press passes and it is freakin' huge! Miles and miles of food...oh my!