Cafes & Wineries

In the last few weeks I have been mulling over the idea of what it means to be authentic. It seems that, along with terroir and technology, authenticity has a place on the bus. With regards to things Italian, and in my case, being a child of immigrants from Italy in search of the modern American experience, this is a multi-layered area.

Friends like Carlo on the east coast and Roberto on the west coast could probably attest to their version of this experience. When I talk to Italians who have newly come to America, they have a different idea of what it is to be Italian and also what it means to become American. As well when I talk to 3rd generation Italian-Americans, they have some very different ideas about their roots and their current place in the sun.

One size doesn’t fit all.

When you add the focus of my interest, wine and food, there can be a multitude of expressions. I’ve said that about three times now, so everyone who has gotten this far probably get it no. But, what if we were all right? And all wrong?

How do we perceive our place in our culture? In my case, it’s like this. I was born in California and spent half my life there. So I am definitely a Californian, in fact there are few native Californians around anymore. I’ve lived in New York and go back there often. Half a lifetime ago I moved to Texas, and I consider myself also a Texan. And yes both set of grandparents came from Italy and both of my parents are of Italian origin, so I am also an Italian. Not like Italians in Italy. But Italian, according to the way I see it.

Where does my authenticity come from? It comes from anywhere and everywhere, and most likely from the stronger parts of my personality. There is this triumvirate of the Italian-Californian-Texan which directs the movie of Alfonso. These three versions of me running around in my head also have on the bus the ancient Roman, The New Yorker, the Native American, the Egyptian, the Arab, the priest, the gunslinger and the Boy Scout.

We all have some things directing our inner movie. What are yours?
Food: Let’s take this slow. My mom, when I was growing up, made all kinds of food. We had lentils, we had meatballs. We had fish, we had lasagna. We had eggplant Parmigiano, we had burgers. If my dad was in the mood, we’d have tripe in tomato sauce. Or she’d bread up some meat cutlets and fry or bake them off. On Friday’s she’d bake these flat loaves, slice them open, put fresh ricotta and olive oil, salt and pepper, and nobody in our neighborhood ate better that night. We had broccoli, we had the most amazing manicotti that my mom would make. She was good with pasta. And her cannoli were to die for. She still makes a fruit cake (at 93) that she sends to me. I drizzle it with brandy and it can last for years.

My sister Tina has a canister of noodles our grandmother made before she died in 1976. She calls them Nonna’s noodles and they are in her kitchen, her good luck totem that protects the ancient recipes she has learned. She picked up all the great recipes from the grandmothers, the aunts, the mothers and mother in law and she rocks the kitchen. Is it Italian? She makes dolmas to die for. So, now, does my mom. No, it isn’t indigenous, but it is delicious. They’re not overdone with technique, just what was handed down. Maybe a short cut here or there. But this has become part of the experience of being an immigrant in an America where everyone wins.

Wine: The old guys used to slip me a glass of wine, not mixed with water. When I hear that or read it in someone’s memoirs, I want to raise my hand and ask a question. I do not remember it ever happening to me. My grandfather never did it when he gave me a little sip of brandy before I went to sleep. At the table, there was wine. And later on in the 1970’s, somehow, carbonated beverages showed up in the kitchen. But they went with sandwiches, with lunch, as a snack, and rarely. Not for dinner. Coke with my grandma’s roasted lamb? Never. 7-Up with my mom’s spaghetti and meat ball? 7-Up was for when you were sick. It went with her healing chicken soup with acine di pepe. Wine just didn’t taste good when one was puny.

My dad started buying jugs of California wine and putting them in decanters. He was a trickster, liked to impress his business partners. I still remember those wines, mountain red. They remind me of Montepulciano or Cotes du Rhone. White wine? I drink it now and love it. Back then, it wasn’t around. Too bad, my mom’s manicotti would have been pretty good with a Soave or a Gravina. But it was not to be.

Did the wines taste spoofed up? Not at the time. And I think, even though they were probably made in a 1960-ish semi-industrial manner, the wines weren’t doctored with wood dust or deep purple. I can still remember how those wines taste and they tasted, to me, more like country wines from Central and Southern Italy. Big surprise, most of the wines were made by children of Italian immigrants, or the immigrants themselves.

I remember asking my mom’s mom once, how she compensated for the loss of her motherland. She left Italy when she was 30, so she had time to get into being an Italian, even if she was dirt poor (They ate well even then). She had been transplanted and re-grafted onto a new country. That was it in her eyes. She never looked back. She became a Native American.

Now, when I hear the chatter and debate of indigenous vs. international, of natural vs. technology driven, of fruity and alcoholic vs. acidic and restrained, I step off the trolley for a minute. And I take a deep breath. And then get back into the battle zone. My shield has a coat of arms on it that explains to friends and foe alike, what I believe in. And this isn’t the first time I’ve said it on this blog.

Authentic? I want the best you can give me. I want truth and I want beauty. I want meaning and it needs to be deep. And if, for some reason you cannot bring that to my table, flirt with me, compliment me, do your magic. Do your best. Just make sure it is delicious.

Images courtesy of the great photographers from the past

Original post by Alfonso Cevola

Nicaraguan coffee exports in April, the seventh month of the new 2007-08 crop cycle, were up 43% to 174,647 (60-kilogram) bags, the official Nicaraguan Export Center, Cetrex, said Friday.

This compares to total Nicaraguan coffee shipments of 121,803 bags in April last year during the 2006-07 harvest year, Cetrex said in a report, a copy of which was obtained by Dow Jones Newswires.

Total

Original post by Robert

The American wine industry is pretty excited these days. Sales are up, and the demographics are looking good: the youngest generation of alcohol consumers (known as the “Millennials”) are much more interested in wine than any other generation before them, and there are a lot of them — almost as many as the Baby Boomers.

In many ways, the Millennial generation has caused the wine industry to finally realize there’s a market in younger wine drinkers, a group that has long been ignored by both the wine media and most wine producers. While the beer and hard liquor industries learned long ago that marketing to twenty-somethings was a golden goose of an opportunity, the wine industry has been slow to figure out that there was another market for their product besides old white men.

Change is coming though, as events like the upcoming Wine & Spirits Hot Picks tasting clearly demonstrate. Focused on folks under 35, this tasting of some of the magazine’s top wines, hosted by some of Los Angeles’ youngest wine professionals, will likely be a great opportunity for younger wine lovers to taste great wine, at an interesting venue, with lots of cool folks to interact with.

Frankly, I wish I had sought out more events of this sort when I was single. Now that I’m married, I realize that I probably could have gotten a lot more dates hanging out at wine tastings than I did hanging out at the rock climbing gym! Singles take note.

Wine & Spirits knows how to put on a good tasting, and the wines showcased are usually extremely high quality. Their Top 100 tasting is certainly one of the best events of the year in San Francisco, and one I try not to miss under any circumstances. That bodes well for this event, which I haven′t ever attended, but which I certainly recommend as probably worth the $75 entrance fee.

Lots of different wines will be served, along with food from some of LA’s trendiest restaurants, including Osteria Mozza, which I hear is quite the scene these days.

If some of you readers attend, let me know how it goes.

Wine &amp Spirits Hot Picks Tasting
Thursday May 22, 2008
7:00 PM to 10:00 PM
MODAA Gallery
8609 Washington Boulevard
Culver City, CA 90232

Tickets are $75 and should be purchased online in advance.

Don’t forget to wear dark clothes, drink lots of water, eat food along the way, and if you want to actually learn something…. SPIT!

Original post by Alfonso Cevola

Today the United States lost one of its living legends, as Robert Mondavi died today at the age of 94. It’s hard to understate the impact that Robert Mondavi had on the wine world. His name itself was, and still is, one of the most well known brands in America. His family’s (and his own) success in the wine business was a prototypical example of the American dream.

Robert Mondavi moved to Napa in 1930’s to work in the post-prohibition wine industry of the region, having grown up making wine with his father and brothers in Lodi, California, before attending Stanford University in Palo Alto. Mondavi convinced his father to purchase the Charles Krug winery in 1943, a decision that would prove fateful for the entire family. Under the Mondavis, Charles Krug would become one of the most successful Napa wineries of its time.

This success was not without its trials however, as Julia Flynn Siler chronicled in her history of the family last year. In 1966, after essentially being kicked out of the family, Mondavi founded his own winery in Napa. Through a combination of passion, savvy marketing, and sheer force of will, Mondavi built what can only be called an empire. The rising tide of Mondavi’s success, coupled with his own tireless promotion of the place he believed wine should hold in the modern American lifestyle, helped to forge Napa’s identity as one of the world’s great wine regions.

While the Mondavi name has perhaps lost some of its luster, just as the wines that continue to bear his name have diminished in quality and reputation, these should not and cannot detract from the accomplishments of the man himself. Most wine lovers today owe him a debt of gratitude, if only for helping make America a little more friendly to wine and those who care deeply about it.

Cheers, Robert!

Original post by Alfonso Cevola

Your cup of caffeine carries a tonier pedigree these days. Never before have there been more choices for the picky.

By KIM ODE, Star Tribune

The conversations seem out of place. People talk about floral notes, about hints of blueberry and juniper, about finishes and single origins. They′re talking about fermentation and terroir. It’s as if a wine tasting went awry and sent the tipsy wandering

Original post by Robert

By Tina Firesheets
Staff Writer

HIGH POINT — In Ethiopia, people socialize daily over coffee.

But not at artsy coffee houses or the neighborhood Starbucks. They gather at someone’s home in the mornings and evenings to talk and drink coffee, roasted and brewed by a friend.

In High Point, Ethiopian refugees Tigist Tesfa Biruk and Degene Eshete continue the coffee tradition on special occasions

Original post by Robert

by Michael Arndt

Thirty years ago, Janice L. Fields was a brand new McDonald’s crew member in Dayton, Ohio, taking orders on the evening shift while her husband, an enlistee in the U.S. Air Force, took care of their three-year-old daughter. Today, Fields is chief operating officer of McDonald’s USA. Working from the old office of founder Raymond A. Kroc, she is responsible for 13,800 restaurants

Original post by Robert

The Consorzio del Vino Brunello di Montalcino’s quick response to the current debacle has been hailed in the US.

Original post by Arthur Krea

Dunkin’ Donuts Keeps America Running With Second Annual Free Iced Coffee Day On May 15

Free Iced Coffee Day Celebrates Berry Berry Flavor and $80,000 Donation to the National Police Athletic League Youth Leadership Program

CANTON, Mass., May 13 /PRNewswire/ — On May 15, busy people who keep America running can keep cool for free. Dunkin’ Donuts, the world’s largest coffee and baked goods chain

Original post by Robert

I took a walk in a quiet place. In it, there were many quiet souls from ancient times. They were from Greece and Italy, Sumeria and Egypt, Persia and Etruria. The voices were silent but the souls were coming through loud and clear, on a Friday afternoon on the eastern edge of Central Park.

I had just interviewed a gentleman about his life and his book and things Italian. But we didn’t make a connection. How could you do anything in 15 minutes, except perhaps to size each other up like two bulls in a ring? Not that it was that kind of encounter. I left feeling the need to reconnect with my roots, so I hopped on a subway and headed back a couple of thousand years, to interview the ancient ones.

Q. What were the wines like when you were living?

A. They were dark and musky, and warm. They tasted a little like sour water sometimes and at other times sweet like rose petals.

Q. Who made the wine in your community?

A. We had families who passed the trade down from generation to generation. There were families, like in Chaldea, who had been working with the grape for hundreds of years.

Q. Who among you were the first to taste wine?

The fellow in profile speaks

A. When we first tasted it, it came about by accident. One of the servants had left a vase of grapes lying around in a cool dark place and forgot about it. Several weeks later one of the leaders was walking around and smelled this sweet odor. He had it brought up to the dining area and we all took bites out of this fruit we knew, but it tasted very different this time. And the juice in the bottom of the vase we all took sips of. This was something we had never experienced before. So we instructed the porters to pick more grapes and let them sit in the basement in the same manner. That was the first time we had seen it.

Q. How did the news of this travel?

A. Slowly at first, but after 400-500 years pretty much everybody in the known world had an idea of the transformative powers of the grape.

Q. And the merchants, how did they fit in?

A. At first, it was seen as a religious ritual, so the merchants stayed away. A tribe of women eventually wound their way through the empire, setting up trade with the Egyptians.

Q. Many times we hear that the Greeks brought wine culture to Italy. Who knows about that in this room?

An Etruscan princess answers

A. We had already started with the grape before the Greeks arrived. We had been going on for several hundred years. What the Greeks did was to bring some new grape types with them, but non superior to the ones we had been cultivating for 500 years.

Q. It seems Ancient Romans loved wine. Poems were written about it, buildings and temples were erected in honor of the god of the grapes.

A. That all is true, but keep in mind we had very little to eat and drink. We were often sick and food went bad quickly. Wine kept and it kept us well and our bellies full. And it made us happy.

Q. Did the grape have anything to do with the expansion of the Empire(s)?

A. Other than it went where man went? Of course when we conquered Gail or the Huns or the Britons, we would plant vines and keep the local people collected and subdued. Wine had a part to play in the civilizing factor of the wild tribes.

Q. Last Question. If you were around today, what kind of wine would you like to see? What would you make?

An older Roman answers

A. Listen, I would round up some of my soldiers and head to Toscanium and set that land straight. I’d bring them back to the Jovian roots and light a bloody fire under their feet. And by all the power of Jupiter, we’d bring them back to the flame of truth and all that is holy about the miracle the gods have sent down from the heavens in giving us grape with which to make this precious wine. Anyone caught disrespecting the gift of the gods would be crucified and struck down, their family sent into exile. To go against the Divine Immortals is the worst sin one could commit against the pantheon that rules our ancient souls.

Original post by Alfonso Cevola