I would like to welcome Gary Chevsky, TorreBarolo’s new guest blogger. Gary is WSET-certified and has been blogging for the past three years. He hails from the San Francisco area so many of his posts are about Californian wines, though lucky for me he has a particular passion for wines from the Langhe and Roero region. His wine reviews are informative without being jargon heavy but more importantly he is a man that gets the big picture……to enjoy life and sees the pleasure of a fine wine as one element that contributes to a memorable occasions with friends and family….or as he puts it “This blog is not about wine, but about life – life made better by wine”.  I am particularly happy to host Gary’s blog posts as being pregnant these past many months has obviously had an impact on my ability to share my wine suggestions so it is nice to leave all the heavy (glass) lifting to Gary.  

“The other day I had dinner with MariaCristina Oddero – the owner of the Oddero winery, one of the top producers of Barolo, well respected for their dependable quality, and notable for being run by a female in traditionally a male-dominated business. MariaCristina took over from her father Giacomo Oddero in the mid 1990’s, making subtle improvements upon his methods, and according to her, coaxing more complexity from the grapes. Now at 82, Giacomo cannot deny her success, but back then he was not at all supportive.

They’ve been making wine for 6 generations. The first ever Oddero Barolo was bottled in 1878. A traditionalist, maintaining age-old techniques as exemplified in the modest use of oak (big Slavonian oak barrels) and long maceration times, combined with modern-day equipment and cleanliness, Oddero’s perfume and fruit manage to shine through strong tannic structure at a relatively young age (5 years+).
At the dinner hosted at Donato Enoteca, we sampled an array in the most perfect setting imaginable, with great food and good company, without being overwhelmed by multitude of wines or time pressure and fatigue of a trade tasting. A flawless custom-crafted Piedmontese 6-course meal by Donato accompanied 6 wines – a Chardonnay/Riesling blend Langhe Bianco Collaretto 2008, Barbera d’Asti Vinchio 2006, basic Barolo 2005, single-vineyard Barolo Rocche di Castiglione 2005, single-vineyard Barolo Bussia Soprana Vigna Mondoca 2004, finishing off with Moscato d’Asti Cascina Fiori 2008. After the official meal was over, Eric the wine director pulled out Barbaresco Gallina 2005 and Oddero Villero 2005. Under the spell of food and company, the wines served at perfect temperature in perfect glassware to a crowd in damn good mood showed very well indeed, reaffirming the appeal of the 2005 vintage (see my notes from Tre Bicchieri tasting earlier this year).

The lowly Barbera and Moscato d’Asti were very very good too. As for the Barolos, the wines were solid. The basic 2005 had a fascinating hint of salami on the nose – on special that night for $34 (6-pack pricing), I thought it was the best value. The Rocche was promising, but quite tannic at this point. The Bussia Soprana Vigna Mondoca was a year older (2004), more intense, more open and dark-fruity, while the impressively deep-flavored Villero displayed hints of coffee. I was told that the 2000 Vigna Rionda available for sale ($110) was amazing – supposedly a significant step up from the mid-tier and worth the high price tag, but alas it was not tasted that night.

The next day as I attended the Wine Warehouse trade event in San Francisco’s Fort Mason focusing on the new (2006) releases of Barolos, I ran into Mariacristina again. This time I drank her array of 2006’s – the basic Barolo, then Rocche di Castiglione, and finally the Villero. I also re-tasted the 2004 Vigna Mondoca. Oddero’s 2006’s were noticeably more open and less bitter-tannic than all other 2006 Barolos I’d tasted all year, including those from Parusso, Canterno Fantino, Einaudi, and Marcarini. Across the board they have been tough for me to judge due to incredible, hard-as-nails, gum-drying tannins in these young Nebbiolos, although talking to a number of experienced tasters and winemakers themselves, the message has been that 2006 is significantly better vintage than 2005 and more classic than 2004 (2004 shows more fruit while 2006 has more acid, earth, spice and tannin for even longer development). Considering how good the 2004 was, it’s a bold statement for 2006, but at this point I will just have to take their word for it – I could not tell, and will stay away from 2006’s for at least another year until they mellow out somewhat.

Interestingly, the 2004 Vigna Mondoca was not as tasty as the day before. Blame it on the setting, on palate fatigue, on the bottle temperature, or lack of decanting, or the glassware…. whatever the reason, this was a telling lesson of how one should be circumspect of the hurried trade tasting impressions. Be mindful of the circumstances in which critics’ scores are given, remember how important the context and setting in which are you consuming wine is, and don’t jump to conclusions too quickly.

A couple of weeks ago, I talked about Alba as a classic regional Piemonte town. One reason I am a big Alba fan is due to the numerous foodie and wine events the city host throughout the year. Given TorreBarolo is just a 15mins car ride to Alba, it is easy to get there and enjoy these events for a few hours. Moreover, given the size of Alba, these events are low-key affairs where you don’t have to worry about queuing to sample a selection of wines or walking endlessly around a huge convention center.

The International White Truffle Fair that commences in October for 2 months is well known and attracts serious foodies given the passion that exists for this mysterious musty smelling fungus. One event that is less well known is Vinum, Langhe and Roreo’s annual wine festival. Vinum’s function is to showcase the mom and pop wineries as well as the regional stars. As many of the smaller wineries don’t export outside the region, I see Vinum as an excellent opportunity to familiarize myself with the vast offerings from the local producers. Also exciting is that the producers use Vinum as the event to release new vintages of Barolo and Barbaresco.

Recently Alba hosted the 34^th edition of Vinum and although I was able to attend, being 7 months pregnant did put a damper on being able to enjoy any of the tastings. The set up this year was different than other years I have attended as this year the organizers decided to contain all the events within three separate marquees/exhibition centers. (I must say I preferred this to walking through the streets of Alba looking for the various kiosks).

This year’s three areas were divided into the following:

Palavinum 1: hosted the “Grand Langhe and Roero wines”. For €12 you would get a ticket book to taste 10 wines, a wine glass, a pouch to carry your wine glass in, a bottle of water and discount vouchers. For an incremental €4, a 2^nd person could join you. Given the quality of wines in this exhibition hall, it looked like a deal to me, especially since I never saw many tickets exchanged and think that as long as you had a pouch and a glass you could go on tasting.

Palavinum 2: hosted both wine and food and was titled “Appetizing Encounters”.  The price for this event was the same as Palavinum 1. The difference with this marquee was that the wines weren’t exclusively from the Langhe/Roero region and were from Piemonte in general, however, most of the placards I saw were of local vintners.  Given I didn’t recognize many of the wineries in this marquee I am going to make the broad statement that this is where the smaller mom and pop wineries exhibit. Also in this marquee there were numerous food producers offering samples of everything from my favourite Castelmagno cheese, to the special Bra salsicca to the delicious local “Torte alla Nocciola” (hazelnut cakes). 

Palavinum 3: hosted the big dogs and instead of kiosks to walk around and sample various wines, there were set times for events and the prices reflected the prestigious wines on offer. For example, there was a retrospective of great Barolo vintages where participates sampled 16 wines for €40. Palavinum 3 events were spread over two days and there were many special events during these days to enhance your knowledge and appreciation of the region’s world famous wines.

Vinum extends over the last weekend in April and first two weekend of May. Mark your calendar for 2011 so you don’t miss out on this excellent wine lover event!