I’m just back from ten days on the road; a trip split between three Alto Adige wine seminars in Denver, D.C., and New York, and a trip to Germany for the Weinbörse, the big annual spring wine fair. While the likes of such a sojourn may sound glamorous, anyone who travels for a living will tell you that most of it is spent looking at the inside of hotels, cabs, and planes, not to mention the long periods of time in various inert, semi-functioning states. But there was plenty of upside to this trip with the buzz generated by Alto Adige wines (see earlier post) and tasting the outstanding 2012 vintage for German Riesling. More on the latter will follow in my next post. Until then, here are bits of wisdom gained from the road.

Bee Death Smells Like Bananas

This gem offered by Haley Dale from Omaha who was on the Germany segment of the trip. Haley’s restaurant, the Grey Plume, is a farm-to-table concept and her commitment—no, make that obsession--to deliver the freshest local ingredients to her guests includes the likes of keeping bees in her back yard for their prized honey. However, she warns that the worst thing one can do before working with bees is to eat bananas. That’s because the hormone given off by a bee that’s just stung you, as in a bee that has just given up its life by stinging you to protect the rest of the hive, smells like bananas. So those ripe banana slices on the breakfast cereal you’re enjoying as you read the celebrity column right before you amble out to check out the hive will instantly signify serial death to the inhabitants and give the signal to attack. Bee forewarned.

They Have Wine Queens in Germany

On the first morning of our German itinerary we were graced by the presence of one Sabine Wagner who, as it turns out, is the 2013 Rheingau Wine Queen. I’m not sure about the selection process or the requirements for being a wine queen, but I will tell you that Sabine was lovely, charming, and wore a very cute tiara that would surely be the envy of most any nine-year-old girl. She was also accompanied by another woman who was the wine queen from a smaller region. Together, they provided color commentary in English about the drizzly landscape as we sped past in our uber-designed German bus. They also excelled at photo ops which I gather is part of the job description. For the record, I also have to mention that there was a grape queen at the spring wine ball that night pictured below. Her costume was pretty amazing. It probably weighed a ton as well.

It’s Spargel Season 

It’s spring in Germany and that means it’s time for spargel or white asparagus. Spargel is truly a delicacy, far more subtle than its aggressive green cousin. The Germans obsess about spring and Spargel. How do they enjoy it? Simply steamed and served with Hollandaise sauce accompanied by Speck (thinly sliced cured ham) and roasted potatoes. Wine pairing? Silvaner from Franconia is ausgezeichnet (excellent)!  Han Wirsching’s Spätlese Trocken would be a perfect match. Does eating spargel make your pee stink? Yes it does, but not nearly as much as green asparagus. However, eat enough spargel over a period of several days and everything about you, from your clothes to various aspects of your fabulous physique, will indeed have a delightfully pungent vegetal air. That’s not a bad thing. I think it’s called personal terroir.

The Shower Challenge

What’s the greatest road challenge when it comes a hotel room? Remembering your room number? Not quite, although that certainly makes life a bit easier. It’s not figuring out the thermostat either. That’s a close second because some of them are either so arcane or so complicated as to be unworkable. When it doubt, turn it off unless it’s either freezing or boiling in the room. In which case, call the front desk and make them fix it.  


The greatest hotel room challenge of all is the shower, specifically figuring out how the shower works. I’m firmly convinced that there are completely evil and/or monumentally stupid individuals who design hotel bathroom showers; hotel showers so utterly lacking in functionality that it’s almost as if the job of designing them was handed to a herd of goats. Allow me get beyond my rant for just a moment by providing the following bit of sage advice: make sure you know how the shower works before you actually have to use it—as in the following morning. I say that from more than one tragic experience.
 
Unless you’re one of the compulsive types who gets up two hours before they actually have to be anywhere, the last 20 minutes of your morning routine—as in when you shower and actually get ready—are crunch time. There’s absolutely no room for error and that’s exactly when the unsuspecting bather is waylaid by the dark gods of poor hotel bathroom design. That’s when the panic-stricken bather, not unlike the newsprint besmeared victim of Psycho, realizes that it takes ten minutes for tepid—not hot—water to appear from the faucet; that the drain doesn’t work and one is quickly up to their knees with water that looks like toxic waste; that the towels are not in the bathroom as they should be but are, in fact, in another room as in Fiji;  that there are multiple lethal shower heads that will attack with shocking force from all angles with ice cold water if the precise combination of several dials is not applied. Showers, my friends, can be dangerous. Test-drive them the night before needed use. You will be glad you did.

For a country about half the size of Texas, Italy is a land of extremes. In the south, Sicily is closer to Tunisia than Rome with Mediterranean and African influences visible across the cultural spectrum. In the far north, Alto Adige is almost as equally removed from the universally held stereotype of a Tuscan landscape of misty hills lined with Cyprus trees dotted by the occasional terracotta topped villa. The region was part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire until the end of WWI. Bolzano, its major city of some 100,000-plus, is just a leisurely 90 minute drive from Innsbruck Austria, site of the 1976 winter Olympics. It’s no surprise that over 70% of the people in Alto Adige primarily speak German and rarely Italian. 
 
Several times during my recent stay I overheard one of the local winery contacts say that they had gone to school in “Italy” or were about to head south to vacation in “Italy.” I would remind said person that we actually were in Italy only to be met with a shrug and the briefest hint of a smile. Regionality, as it does elsewhere in Italy, runs deep. I can’t blame any of them. One look at Bolzano and its surroundings and you’re definitely not in mainstream Italy, much less Kansas. Take, for instance, the remarkably steep hills encompassing the Santa Magdalena DOC that jut up dramatically from the northwest section of the city you’ll know why. With its black diamond slope terraced vineyard, one could easily be in the Wachau of Austria or the Mittel Rhein of Germany.  
 
In terms of wine production, Alto Adige is one of the Italy’s smallest regions with just over 5,000 growers farming some 13,000 acres. Napa Valley, by comparison, has over 39,000 acres under vine while the Chianti DOCG has over 41,000 acres planted. But quality here is king with over 98% of the wines produced of DOC level. The region’s climate combines alpine influence with warm temperatures during the growing season. That’s because the Dolomites and the Swiss and Austrian Alps in the north act as an enormous rain shadow protecting the area from temperature extremes during the winter. Mediterranean influence from the south makes for some of the hottest temps in Italy during the summer. Together both create wide diurnal shifts with a marked separation between high daytime and low night temperatures. For viticulture, that means the fruit—both apples and grapes--achieves good ripeness levels and yet retains high natural acidity, a magic combination that makes the wines versatile and in some cases lends considerable potential to age. 
 
The Alto Adige region is patchwork of valleys and mountains with vineyards planted between 600 and 3,300 feet. The soils range from calcareous and limestone near the ever-present Dolomites, to volcanic porphyry and moraines, the remains of glaciers that retreated from the region some five to six million years ago. The region is home for over 20 grape varieties with the soil largely determining the variety planted; whites on the chalk and limestone closest to the Dolomites and red grapes thriving in the Moraines and porphyry-based soils.

Geography: the Flux Capacitor

Think Back to the Future movies and the Y-shaped circuit that enabled the stainless steel DeLorean to journey through time (http://backtothefuture.wikia.com/wiki/Flux_capacitor). The comparison works. Alto Adige’s three major valleys form a letter “Y” with Bolzano as its hub. 

To the northeast is Valle d’Issarco, just minutes away from the Austrian border. Chiusa and Bressanone are the most important towns and the historical abbey, Abbazia di Novicella, is one of the leading coops - producers. The abbey dates from the 12th century and the Santa Maria Assunta is one of the most beautiful small basilicas I’ve ever seen—it’s a must see. Here in the Valley d’Issarco the soils are mainly granitic and white grapes predominate with some excellent Schiava produced as well.

The Val Venosta lies to the northwest with Merano the major city. The Venosta is the driest region in Alto Adige and also one of the centers for apple production. It’s the most scarcely planted valley of the three with poryphry and volcanic soils; whites predominate plantings. The region is also known for its mild climate and Merano has long been regarded as an excellent spa town. 
 
The Oltradige valley in the south is the largest of the three valleys and the heart of Alto Adige wine production. Appiano and Caldaro are the most important villages. Limestone and porphyry soils are found as well as moraines. White wines account for 56% of the production with vineyards planted between 1,000 and 2,300 feet. The village of Tramin, a spiritual home to the Gewürztraminer grape, is also located here.

At the center of the flux capacitor is the city of Bolzano, one of the warmest parts of the entire region. Here the vineyards of the Santa Maddalena DOC rise steeply out of the northwest part of the city. The soils are poryphry-based and perfectly suited to Schiava-based reds as well as Lagrein.  
 
Coops: a Reality Check

One belief I had to quickly shed while in Alto Adige was a long-held notion that coops are mere factories cranking out oceans of wine mediocre in quality at best. Over 70% of the wine in Alto Adige is coop-produced and a lot of it is very good to outstanding. In talking to winemakers, I learned that the region’s vineyards are severely fragmented in terms of ownership just like Burgundy. Thus, like Burgundy commercial winemaking on any scale can only exist in a cooperative context. Vineyard owners are generally non-wine professionals and have had the vineyards passed down to them by older generations. The relationships between coop winemakers and vineyard owners were closer to a négociant/owner in terms of the emphasis on quality fruit and lower yields. Terlano is a perfect example of one of the several Alto Adige coops making exceptional wine.  

The Grapes

Here’s a quick survey of the major varieties from the region.

Whites

Pinot Bianco: grown throughout the region. Pinot Bianco isn’t usually a grape that gets everyone dangerously excited but I was surprised, no make that shocked, at how well it can age give the right conditions. To point, Klaus Gasser of Terlano opened bottles of the winery’s Pinot Bianco from 1982 and 1955. The ’55 was deep golden in hue and still very fresh and alive. So much for the belief that whites don’t age well. Old wine aside, Alto Adige Pinot Bianco shows bright citrus fruit with white blossom notes on the nose and steely minerality on the palate. It’s a delicious shellfish wine.

Pinot Grigio: there’s an ocean of Pinot Grigio made all over northern Italy, much of it unremarkable. The best wines from the variety are definitely from Alto Adige and combine bright green pear/pear skin, and juicy citrus fruit with wet stone minerality.  

Gewürztraminer: it’s interesting to note that in Jancis Robinson’s just published and completely brilliant tome “Wine Grapes” (over 1,200 pages and weighing in at 6.7 pounds) a listing for Gewürztraminer is missing in action. Searching the index one is pointed to the Savignin entry with the explanation that what we call Gewürztraminer is actually a genetic mutation of the other Alsace grape. Not sure what that does to the village of Tramin’s claims to be the ancestral if not spiritual home for Gewürztraminer but there you are. In terms of style, Alto Adige Gewürztraminers have all the pungent floral and spicy fruit qualities one expects from the grape without the blowsy quality. At best, the wines are luscious, spicy, and
perfumed. They’re also delectable with soft-ripened cheeses.

Riesling: the few Rieslings I tasted during the week reminded me of scaled down versions of Austrian bottlings with tart citrus fruit and stoney minerality.  

Grüner Veltliner: one comes across Grüner in the north near the Austrian border. Here the style resembles the lighter versions from the Austrian Kamptal region versus the richer Federspiel and Smaragd wines of the Wachau. Still there’s plenty of the peppery and slight vegetal notes that make Grüner so delicious.

Kerner: another grape that usually goes under the radar and for good reason—it’s not exactly riveting. But I did find several wines, most notably the Praepositus from Abbazia di Novacella, to be delicious, with ripe Fuji apple and quince notes and a wonderful floral quality.

Sylvaner: I’ve long thought the Silvaners from Franconia (especially those from Hans Wirsching) to be the best on the planet. Now I’m more than willing to concede that there are several producers making outstanding Sylvaner in Alto Adige with all the smoky succulent apple/pear and tart citrus fruits one could hope for.

Sauvignon Blanc: here is really the only instance I found a bit of identity crisis among all the Alto Adige wines. Not really a surprise given that Sauvignon Blanc suffers the same wicked fate in California as well--not knowing whether to emulate New Zealand or Sancerre, and sometimes heading directly in between with unique, sometimes bizarre results. The best Alto Adige Sauvignons were sharply etched and citrus-dominated while others suffered from either too much sulfur or too much oak. However, there is great promise for the grape here.

Moscato Giallo: thought to have been brought to the region by the ancient Romans. Dry and succulent, fully dessert sweet versions are
made.

White Blends: blends based on Chardonnay, Pinot Bianco, Sauvignon Blanc, and Pinot Grigio are a long-held tradition in Alto Adige, and they can be quite good as well as age worthy. In particular, Manicor’s Reserve della Contessa and Terlano’s Nova Domus Riserva are outstanding. 

Reds

Schiava: I’ll go out on a limb here by saying the next uber geek hipster red wine will be Schiava. It’s a wonderful combination of Pinot-elegance and tart Barbera acidity with unique savory qualities. Light in color, fairly concentrated, and Beaujolais-like, it can be served chilled and goes with any and everything. You might see it also labeled as Vernatsch or Edel Vernatsch (remember the German influence!). The best Schiava-based wines are from the Santa Maddalena DOC where they are blended with a maximum 10% Lagrein. Try one—it’s delicious!

Lagrein: other than ease of pronunciation (it rhymes with wine), Lagrein could also be the next total geek wine. Malbec-purple in color but with Merlot-soft tannins and a tart, savory, and floral character all its own. Another must try.  

Pinot Noir: the Pinots I tasted during the week reminded me of Spätburgunders from Germany with tart cranberry/rhubarb fruit, and beet, tea/herb, and earth notes. Elegance and finesse are common hallmarks.

Merlot: primarily grown in the warmer south closer to Trento; bottled both as a single varietal and blended with Cabernet Sauvignon. The best examples have lush black fruits, herbal notes and minerality.

Cabernet Sauvignon: ditto above, with the best examples showing vibrant blackcurrant and herb notes with clay earth.

Moscato Rosa: my new favorite sticky. Moscato Rosas are luscious, just-right sweet, and spicy. Chocolate wine!

Random Thoughts

Apples! Alto Adige is the center of apple production in Italy and one of the major suppliers to the European continent. The valley floors are filled with apple orchards with vines on hillsides and terraces. However, a high bounty is placed on top orchards grown on steep hillsides.

Foods: when in Bolzano, makes sure to try the local dumplings called knödels, made from cheese, beets, speck (local ham like prosciutto), or spinach. The crunchy unleavened bread called schüttelbrot is also delicious.  

Restaurants: Patscheiderhof is an old farmhouse restaurant outside Bolzano built in 1776 that serves traditional local fare including delicious knödels.

Favorite Wines of the Trip

1. 2012 K. Martini & Sohn Pinot Bianco, “Palladium”
Lots of intensity and ripe fruit for Pinot Bianco with vibrant acidity and a touch of chalky minerality.

2. 2012 Castelfeder Pinot Grigio
Racy citrus and Pippin Apple fruit with notes of bitter almond and mineral.

3. 2012 Erste Neue Pinot Grigio
Sleek, supple texture with tart acidity; flavors suggest green pear, citrus blossom, and chalk.  

4. 2011 Abbazia di Novacella Sylvaner “Praepositus”
Ripe pear, green melon, key lime, and citrus blossoms with mineral underlay; focused, concentrated, and racy with an intense mineral mid-palate. Outstanding.

5. 2006 Cantina Terlano Sauvignon Blanc “Quarz” (from magnum)
Tart citrus, restrained grass/herb notes, and pronounced salty mineral; the palate is racy and seamless; wonderful balance and length.

6. 2010 Cantina Terlano Nova Domus Riserva
A blend of Chardonnay, Sauvignon Blanc, and Pinot Bianco. Vibrant Fuji apple/green pear and white flowers with bright lemon citrus notes.

7. 2011 Cantina Val Isarco Gewürztraminer “Aristos”
Ripe peach, tangerine, and ginger spice flavors with pronounced floral notes.

 8. 2012 Elena Walch Schiava
Tart cherry and cranberry notes with savory herb and a touch of earth.

9. 2011 A. Egger-Ramer Santa Maddalena “Reisegger Classico”
Richer than regular Schiavas with more depth of fruit and earth/mineral notes. Juicy, ripe, and forward with tart finishing acidity.

10. 2011 St. Michele Appiano Pinot Nero
Smoky cranberry and sour cherry fruit with beet root, tea, leather, and spice; lots of mineral on the mid-palate with older wood and tart
acid on the finish

11. 2011 Castel Sallegg Lagrein
Ripe black fruits with violet, anise/herb, green leaf, and earth/mineral notes; more restrained on the palate than expected, but still very juicy and fruity with tart acidity and minerality on the finish.

12. 2009 Kellerei Kaltern Passito Moscato Giallo “Serenade”
Fruit dried for 4-5 months and then aged in wood for two years; 210 grams residual with nine grams total acidity; crystallized pineapple and preserved lemon with honey; luscious fully sweet with honey, dried flower and anise notes; utterly delicious.

One of my core beliefs about wine is that it’s the great connector. Wine connects us in ways that no other thing, substance, or small household appliance does. That for thousands of years, since the time Cro-Magnon man first started decanting young Bordeaux blends for aeration purposes, we humans have shared meals with members of our clan. Nothing could be truer in my life. 

I grew up in a household with six kids in the 1960’s. Dinner time could only be described as barely controlled chaos. With four boys awash in more testosterone “than you could shake a stick at,” as my Mom used to say, it was not uncommon to have a dinner roll ka-tonked off the side of your head when you requested bread from the other end of the table. Asking for butter (which was actually margarine, of course), was likewise completely risky business. In short, dinner was a Darwinian affair requiring sleuth, cunning, and dexterity. Any and everything was passed around the table only once. If you didn’t get enough on that first shot, you weren’t getting more. A gallon of milk barely made it around the table. The oldest three of us quickly figured out that the only way to get more was to pour your glass full, drink half of it, then refill before passing it on, causing an inevitable and immediate firestorm of protest from my younger brothers and sister. It was also imperative that you quickly identify and skewer the biggest-ass pork chop/ham slice/slice of meatloaf on the platter when it came your way, because it was your one and only shot at sustenance for the evening. My school mates, needless to say, were always a bit taken aback by the carnal frenzy that defined our family meals. They soon learned to adapt or went home hungry. It’s also worth noting that my then future brother-in-law did not return to our house for over six months after his first Easter dinner at the Gaiser table. Enough said. 

Eventually, with the patience of a saint and the aid of blunt instruments, my Mom managed to instill some semblance of table manners in the six of us. That in itself is a minor miracle. Beyond that, she also managed in a very sneaky way to instill the dining ritual in us as a family, and not because she and my Dad were raised in the European tradition of fine dining with candle lit extravaganzas and lengthy erudite conversations. That was as remote as the Dog Star. Instead, it was the mere act of gathering the entire herd once a day so we could sit down and share something. That even if all hell had broken loose during the previous 12 hours, we had the certainty of knowing that we as a family would share a meal, for better or worse. 

Years later when Carla and I first moved to the city and were both bartending, the dining ritual continued. On our rare nights off together, we either went out or stayed in and cooked dinner for one another. Explorations into the Byzantine menus of Gourmet magazine often ensued with the kitchen getting completely trashed and us limping to the dinner table like stunned livestock after vigorous and sometimes pyrotechnic experiments in the kitchen. Such is the stuff of magic and memory. 

The dining ritual continued unabated after our lives went from “man on man” to “zone” in terms of having kids. Looking back on those years, I’ve come to believe that one of the greatest things Carla and I have given our kids is our many years of the dining ritual. Maria, literally graduating from UNC Chapel Hill this past week, and Patrick, soon to be 19, have grown up their entire lives with the dining ritual. That means when it’s dinnertime, life comes to a screeching halt; that once dinner is plated and hits the dinner table, everyone gathers regardless of whatever else on the planet is going on. Maria has told me many times that the thing she missed most about home after going back east to school was dinner time, especially the hours of hanging out at the table after dinner was over, chatting about everything under the sun.

Does the dining ritual guarantee a happy family or a long relationship/marriage? No guarantees here as all the conversation in the world may not be able to address your shocking dysfunction. But take heart, because the dining ritual is a primo number one opportunity to learn how to communicate with your partner/significant other/spouse or whatever the term is at the moment. And that’s not a bad thing. It’s worked for me for 40 years. It might work for you.

In the food world there are chefs--and the rest. On one side we have the likes of Food Network personalities. But then there are the real chefs who’ve worked in actual kitchens and can cook. Molly Stevens is the latter and definitely the real deal in every sense of the word. Molly studied and worked in top kitchens in France and the U.S. She now leads classes at major culinary schools in the U.S. and Europe, including the French Culinary Institute in New York, the New England Culinary Institute, and L'Ecole de Cuisine La Varenne in Burgundy. 

I first met Molly in 2002 while writing for Fine Cooking Magazine. She contacted me the following summer about doing wine pairings for her book about braising. I accepted immediately. Within days, a FedEx box showed up at my door with several hundred pages of text. I took my time reading through the draft, making notes about potential pairings in the page columns. What quickly came to mind, was that there are lots of people who write about food and cooking, but precious few who can write as well as Molly. Her writing voice is clear and concise, and her passion and dedication to the craft come through loud and clear. I have rarely come across anyone else who can so deftly and easily explain the do’s and don’ts of technique, the various cuts of beef, or how to shop for poultry and meat. Needless to say, writing the pairings for her book was a dream assignment and all too quickly completed. The finished book, All About Braising, came out in 2004. No surprise that it won a James Beard Award. It’s also easily one of the best winter cookbooks ever written. Carla and I have worked our way through more than a few of the recipes. My favorite among many was for Straccoto, an Italian pot roast that we enjoyed for Christmas dinner two years in a row. 

Molly contacted me again in the summer of 2010, with a manuscript for her follow up book on roasting. Repeat same process as before: great text, wonderful writing voice, and unmatched instructive advice on everything concerning the art of roasting. In short order, I test drove two of her recipes for strip steak and simple roast chicken. I have to confess to being monumentally inconsistent with both in the past, but using Molly’s recipes I was quickly turning out a perfect medium rare steak and oven-roasted chicken every time—easily worth the price of the book. All About Roasting is now out and I recommend it highly. If you’re a rabid home cook or if you collect cook books (or both), All About Braising and All About Roasting are both must-haves. Bon appétit!

http://www.mollystevenscooks.com/