“Verdicchio? Is that a vegetable?” My writing partner Sue Hills was asked this question twice in twenty four hours. While Verdicchio may sound like some sort of green vegetable, it’s actually a green fruit — a grape to be exact, and not surprisingly, a greenish grape. To make it even more complicated, Verdicchio is known by many other names, and combined, it’s one of the most planted grapes in the world — and likely one that you don’t know! Continue reading →
Sangiovese lovingSue shows off her purple teeth: we asked these three after a practice for the US Wine Tasting Team!
“Sassicaia, Sassicaia, all they want is Sassicaia!” wailed the young sommelier from China during a tasting lab of Sangiovese and other Italian indigenous grapes during the VinItaly Wine Ambassador Course in Los Angeles in February 2019.
“How can I get them to try something else?” she asked plaintively. The group of wine professionals gathered weighed in, but none of the suggestions seemed to click. Continue reading →
Chiaretto? What’s that? Sue and I figured we’d just pass up this month’s Italian Food Wine Travel Chiaretto prompt — it’s summer, we’re busy, we’re traveling, we’ve got big projects going at home, and what is Chiaretto anyway?
But we got an offer we couldn’t refuse: samples! So we looked at our calendars, and committed to it — still with NO IDEA what we were in for but figuring it was something red.
That’s because even though Sue’s family is from Italy, we don’t speak a whole lot of Italian. Continue reading →
When we heard that the Italian Wine Food and Travel group was going to focus on Italy’s coastline, Sue and I immediately thought of Sicily! Not only is this an island region of Italy with 900 miles of coastline, it’s home to two of our favorite, affordable finds of 2016, Nero D’Avola, a red wine, and Grillo, white wine.
900 miles is a lot of coastline in a country with a lot of coastline!
Fall is harvest, and that means bountiful, hearty foods and flavors. As the temperatures drop, people are drawn to warm flavors that make you feel good inside. Hearty Italian wines pair wonderfully well with these hearty foods and flavors.
But you don’t need to do a full on complicated meal (like we did here) to take advantage of the plentiful fall foods like squash and tomatoes.
For this month’s “fall” theme for the Italian Food Wine Travel prompt, we decided to take an easy uncomplicated route because our schedule was just too hectic to do anything more! On a recent weeknight, Sue dropped by Trader Joe’s for raviolis and she made a sauce (recipe below) which we paired three wines from August’s #WineStudio that I was too sick to taste (plus a Prosecco!)
Castello di Magione 2013 Monterone Grechetto Colli del Trasimeno DOC
Castello di Magione 2014 Sangiovese Umbria IGT
Castello di Magione 2008 Morcinaia Colli del Trasimeno DOC
wine predator.............. gwendolyn alley 