Sicily’s Fall Harvest—a Bounty for Wine & Food Lovers

Fall's plethora in Palermo's most famous outdoor market

October is idyllic in Sicily.   While summer is Dante’s inferno-hot and mega-crowded---especially in popular tourist spots---October brings cooler temperatures, as well as significantly fewer crowds.  The grape harvest begins in August and the picking continues through September.  In October wineries are in full swing with the new vintage—for an oenophile, it’s the perfect time to visit.  If you’re coming on the 2014 October tour we’ll be staying at one of Sicily’s most revered wine estates and we’ll have ample opportunity to watch up close all of the processes involved in making a wine.  But, wine is just one of the many culinary abundances of Sicily in the fall months.

Sea salt from Sicily is highly-prized.  The harvest begins in August and continues through early October.  Fall also is the season for Sicily’s pistachio and hazelnut harvest...these nuts frequently appear in Sicily’s traditional handed-down-over- generations dessert recipes.   But, perhaps the most famous of all of the Sicilian food products produced during the fall months is its olive oil.  The group visiting Sicily with Wine-Knows next year will be staying on an olive estate, and you will have the option to participate in the harvest and make the oil.

Sicily’s fall vegetables read like a who’s who of its gastronomic world.  Eggplants, onions and an array of peppers in red, oranges and yellow compose the holy trinity of fall dining.  One of the island’s most famous dishes is caponata (the Sicilian version of ratatouille.)   Sicily’s rendition includes capers, another jewel in the island’s culinary crown.  Sicilian capers, preserved in local sea salt, are coveted by Michelin star chefs around the globe.   Last, we can’t discuss Sicilian cooking without discussing tomatoes.  Early fall brings over-flowing market stalls full of vine-ripened heirloom tomatoes.  Late fall ushers in the year’s crop of sun-dried tomatoes that are used throughout the other seasons in many of Sicily’s classical dishes.

Stay tuned for the upcoming blog posting on Sicily’s capers.…once you’ve tasted their salted version, you’ll never return to the brined capers popular in the US.

Viva Sicilia!

Cork v Screwcap---New Zealand Takes the Lead

We’ve all been there:  a special bottle of wine---ceremoniously opened for a special event.  BOOM!  The wine smells horrible with an unmistakable odor of mold.   The culprit is tricholoranisole, more commonly known as TCA.  In short, the wine is “corked.”   TCA is caused by defective corks and it is estimated that somewhere between 5-8% of wine has some degree of this cork taint.  New Zealand winemakers, however, have bucked a huge tradition by switching to screw-caps…even on their premium wines.

Screw-top enclosures have been used on food products since the 19^th century, but they weren’t used for wine bottles until the 1950’s.  A few Australian wineries were among the early adopters, but the adventuresome New Zealand wine industry was the first to adopt screw-caps in masse.  Market-conscious American vintners are still testing the treacherous waters of public opinion.  The tradition-driven French are less receptive, as are most Europeans.

Is this resistance all about tradition?  Some of you might be thinking “No, it’s because the slow passage of oxygen through a porous cork allows the wine to age better!”  Others might be pondering that the metal of the screw-top could react with the wine and create problems.  Neither of these has been proven to be true.

Flying in the face of tradition, for the last 10 years the Kiwi’s have been leading the effort to convert to screw-caps.  Currently, over > 90% of New Zealand’s wines are made with metal enclosures.  The country has been on the cutting edge of debunking the myth that screw-caps are substandard.  There are plenty of studies now that offer ample evidence that spending money to seal wine with anything other than a metal cap is a significant risk.  New Zealand has also discredited the argument that screw-cap use is economically motivated as screw-cap equipment requires a significant financial investment.

As there is a lack of data on the ability of wine to age over decades with a metal cap, no one knows for sure what the long term effect of screw-tops will be.  Personally, I will gladly follow Chubby Checker’s  “Let’s do the twist!”

Croatia---the New Tuscany

                                                       Croatia or Tuscany?  Croatia!

                                                      

First the bad news: Croatia is no longer a best-kept secret.  But, the good news is that it if you’re a lover of Tuscany, you’re going to fall head-over-heels for northern Croatia.  I find Croatia’s Istrian peninsula (which borders Italy) has a Tuscan feel reminiscent of the Tuscany I found during my first visit in the mid-1970’s…before this spectacular countryside became the darling poster-child of all of Italy.  Much of the Tuscany I loved is no longer.  Istria, however, catapults me back to the Tuscan countryside of 40 years ago with its jaw-dropping rolling hills dotted with castles, boutique wineries, artisanal olive oil producers, and a flourishing foodie scene---all with significantly fewer tourists and surrounded by a blow-your-mind coastline of epoch beauty. 

Like Tuscany, Istria has a long tradition of wine-making.  Similarly to Tuscany, it focused for years on quantity rather than quality.   In Italy, the change came in the 1980’s as the Tuscans began experimenting with international grape varieties such as Cabernet Sauvignon, and adopting stringent quality control practices.  In Croatia, the quality initiatives didn’t begin until post-communism in the 1990’s, when a wave of young Croatian winemakers began pushing the envelope.  Applying the latest wine technology, hiring well-known international wine consultants and reducing their yields, the Croats started winning international awards paralleling what the Tuscans had done earlier.

The same can be said for olive oil, another staple of Tuscany. The Istrian peninsula has always depended on olive oil for its cuisine, but, like its Tuscan counterpart following World War II, the quality could have been better.    In the last 20 years, >145 olive oil producers have sprung up in Croatia’s Istria…most of them small-scale, but all focused on the best extra-virgin oil.

Croatia’s breathtaking seaside is not the only added bonus when compared to Tuscany.  The Istrian peninsula has a magic gastronomic bullet that Tuscany does not---the much coveted white truffle.  Referred to as “white diamonds” in the culinary world, white truffles do not grow in Tuscany (black truffles, which are present in Tuscany, are much inferior to the white).

Now that the secret is out, I hope that you can join us on our trip to this special part of Croatia before the hordes of tourists change it like they’ve changed my beloved Tuscany.  Check it out at http://www.wineknowstravel.com/.

One of the World’s Most Expensive Spices

                                                      Green cardomom is the highest quality

I’ve just spent 10 glorious days on a foodie’s trip in Turkey.  While I’ve always been a raving fan of cardomom (also spelled cardomon), I was reminded during this decadent tasting journey of how much I adore the spice.  It was used throughout the country in their cuisine in everything from coffee to desserts, and many dishes in between as a savory component.

Cardomom is an intensely aromatic, complex, and utterly beguiling spice that is indigenous to India.   It is often one of the secret components in India’s most flavorful curries.  The Scandinavians (who were a strong maritime power during the time when Constaninople was the center of the universe and the epicenter of world’s spice market), use cardomom in many of their sweet breakfast breads, cookies and other baked goods.  I first learned to appreciate the spice over 30 years ago in a Middle Eastern cooking class where it was a component of a rice dish, as well as the baklava.

On a recent visit to Istanbul’s fascinating Spice Market I saw an array different types of cardomom.  It was here in speaking with a vendor that I learned that cardomom seeds come from a plant that belongs to the ginger family.  Prices clearly indicated that the green cardamom was the most valuable---when I smelled it I knew why as the green seeds were much more pungent.  Black seeds, although aromatic, didn’t deliver the complex profile of the green.   Ground cardamom could be purchased, however, it quickly looses its flavor so it was not recommended by the spice merchants. 

Looking for cardomom in the US?  If you live in a large metropolitan area, I suggest a Middle Eastern market where the seeds are likely to be fresher since the spice is frequently purchased for their cooking.  Do keep in mind that cardomom  is surpassed in cost only by saffron and vanilla---but a little goes a long way so the cost is really negligible considering the  flavor it provides.  

If you’re wondering what to do with  cardamom, just substitute it in lieu of cinnamon.  With the upcoming Thanksgiving holiday, for example, it could easily be used in a pumpkin pie, or for that matter in a home-made cranberry sauce or chutney.   Once you’ve smelled cardamom and tasted it, there will be no turning back.

A Donkey Changed Wine?

  

Pruning for lower yields is one of the hallmarks of quality

As legend has it, it all began in 345 A.D. with Saint Martin (one of the Catholic Church’s three patron Saints of grape growers and winemakers) who lived in the Loire Valley of France.  Saint Martin wasn’t just a Saint.  He was a winemaker involved in the trenches making wine.  A mistake made on Saint Martin’s watch, however, altered the path of making quality wines.

Saint Martin rode on his donkey to the fields located not far from his monastery where he and his brothern monks grew grapes for wine.  As was common during this period all over Europe, monks were the winemakers and the monasteries counted on sales of their wines to fill the church’s coffers.   It was early September and the grapes were almost ready for picking.   He tied up his donkey securely and then proceeded to inspect the rows of vines and the readiness of the grapes. 

Hours later when Saint Martin returned, he found much to his horror that his tethered donkey not only had eaten all the fruit off of every vine that the animal could reach, but he had chewed several vines right down to their trunks.  Saint Martin rode back to the monastery and shared the unfortunate news with his brothers.  Many thought the vines would die.  None of them dreamed what would transpire the following year.

As the monastery’s vineyards began to bud with new growth, a strange phenomena happened to the rows that had been devastated by the donkey.  These vines were growing far better than any others in the vineyard!  By the end of summer, the fruit on these once desecrated vines was not only the largest, but the best tasting in the vineyard. From this point on, the monastery began “pruning” their vines after the harvest.  The lesson was not lost on the monks---as centuries passed, pruning has become a mandated part of every grape grower’s routine.

Pruning grape vines follows the philosophy of quality over quantity, similar to that of thinning a fruit tree. The idea is that if one reduces the number of fruit that a plant must grow, the plant will put more energy into developing each remaining fruit into higher quality.  In contrast, unpruned wild vines typically produce smaller grapes that are sour in flavor.

As in many things in life, mistakes have created some of the biggest opportunities. Wine, itself, is thought to have been created by grapes that were mistakingly left for weeks unattended.  So was Roquefort cheese which was supposedly invented when a shepherd in France left his uneaten lunch in a cave and returned a month later to find it filled with blue mold.  As a wine lover, I want to go on record to say “merci beaucoup” to that donkey of Saint Martin’s.  Bravo!

Chateauneuf du Pape: Like a Rolling Stone

                                             

The Wine-Knows group is in the Southern Rhone where we’ve leased a wine-making chateau near Chateauneuf du Pape from which to explore this world-class wine district. Our group recently visited two of the area’s crème de la crème properties:  Chateau Le Nerthe and Chateau Beaucastel.  At both venues we were taken into the vineyards to view “the stones.”  Called in French ‘galets,’ these are an important part of the famous wine appellation’s terroir.

Galets are remnants of Alpine glaciers that have been carried down over milleniums by the nearby Rhone River which has often over-flowed it banks.  The constant churning by the Rhone is responsible for the rocks’ rounded, almost polished characteristics.  As the river has receded, it’s left in its wake land that is sometimes yards deep with these tumbled stones.  These galets have several important effects on making the appellation’s world renown wines. 

First, the  galets are extremely hard and dense which means that they retain the daytime heat and then release it back to the vines during the colder nights.  This natural system of “incubation” hastens the ripening of the grapes, and protects the vines from the extreme cold during the winter.  Second, this top layer of rock debris from ancient mammoth ice fields serves as a protective cover to help retain moisture in the soil during the dry, hot summer months.  Last, the upper stratum of tumbled stones means that the vines must send their roots far down to seek water and nutrients retained in the lower levels of earth.  In the deeper layers of terrain, the vines not only find water but come in contact with several different minerals that add immensely to the wine’s complexity.

Chateauneuf du Pape is legendary for its world-class wines.  While there are numerous factors that contribute to the making of these special wines, none, perhaps, is more influential than the galets.  In some ways, it’s all about the stones.  

Sante!

Croatia’s 90 Point Parker Wines

   
Croatia has been producing wines as far back as the fifth century B.C.  My first visit was in 2009.  In preparation for this inaugural trip, I did a sweeping analysis of their current wine scene.  In this assessment I discovered that Robert Parker had dubbed Croatia as the next up-and-coming wine country.  Shortly thereafter, Parker published his first-ever review of Croatian wines.  His team scored  3 Croatian wines in the 90’s.  Below are the comments:

• 2007 Tomac Amfora – 90.   From North Croatia, this Chardonnay (50%) sweetie is blended with local varieties from the Plesivica region. It has a fine minerally nose with limestone, orange-blossom, lychee and gooseberry. Good definition. Ripe on the entry with touches of butterscotch, vanilla pod and frangipane.  Intriguing.

• 2006 Kabola Amfora – 90.   This Malvasia from Istria has a light nose of honey, melted butter and nutmeg, succinct and well defined. A touch of dried honey on the entry, waxy texture, hints of lanolin and hazelnut, leading to weighty, dried fruit, nectarine and smoke tinged finish. Excellent.

• 2008 Trapan Winery Uroboros – 90.    Another excellent wine from this Istrian producer, light and floral on the well-defined nose: green apple, white flowers, watermelon and a touch of apricot. The palate has a ripe entry, lovely balanced and poise with well-judged acidity on the finish. This is a sophisticated, very well-crafted Croatian wine from Bruno Trapan.   One to watch!

Since that time, Croatian wines have won numerous international awards and have received accolades from other top wine writers such as Jancis Robinson of the U.K.  In 2014 Wine-Knows is heading to Croatia where we’ll be visiting the crème de la crème producers.    The trip is perfectly timed for the grape harvest as well as the white and black truffle season.