2010
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Before venturing off on a bit of a day trip today, my boss Giorgio and I had to stop off at the winery first. As instructed I was dressed nicely with my little red Dorothy-like shoes. When we arrived at the winery in Bolgheri, Giorgio decides to inform me that I will need to transfer the heating ‘banana-looking’ device from tank 21 to 20. Normally a job accomplished in pairs, it turns out that someone arrived and I ended up doing it on my own instead (safety first, I changed into my gumboots!). Then I got some water and sulfur and back in my little red shoes I scaled some barrels that were going through malolactic fermentation and cleaned one of them that had bubbled over and had vinegar flies around it. Finally we were ready and Francesca, Giorgio, Stefano & Fabio from Michele Satta winery and myself drove off in the sleek and silver Mercedes Benz to Grosseto, eventually crossing into the hills to at last visit Colle Massari – the winery business that acquired Grattamacco a few years ago from Piermario Meletti-Cavallari.
For lunch they have a chef and waitress on duty so we had six sitting down for a deliciously, exquisite full-course meal of a small appetiser with some fresh white beans and barley, porcini mushrooms, and some liver pate’ artfully arranged on a white china plate. This was followed by the primo of a small amount of perfectly al-dente penne pasta with a chingiale (wild boar) and funghi sauce which I added a little pepperoncino to to really set it off. For secondo it was meat that melted in your mouth, and dolce was a little bowl of macedonia (fruit salad). Afterwards Luca took us to the other properties that this very rich owner behind the Colle Massari project has invested in, including a castle, more vineyards, and an agriturismo. I noted that the roads to these destinations have been recently asphalted to accommodate his Ferrari…typical.
Beppe Rinaldi
28 Oct2010
© All Rights Reserved. By [scara] Andrea, May 12, 2010
Sentenzioso, il vino scende nel bicchiere. In quasi tutti i salotti la bottiglie è coricata, stappata, pronta. Lo si assaggia mentalmente dandogli del “lei”, perché il rito non contempla un’obbrobriosa fraternità.
Dagli Abbona ai Rinaldi, dai Borgogno ai Mascarello, dai Pira ai Veglia, i “signori” del vino regale giocano a differenziarsi ma è un confronto di specchi, l’uno rimanda all’altro vertiginosamente.
(G. Arpino)
Arriverderci Bolgheri
20 Jan2010
Casa dolce casa (home sweet home) 20th Gennaio 2010
Having spent the best part of January travelling around south-western Europe it was nice to come back to my old home Bolgheri in Tuscany for three days to just relax, eat fantastic food, and hang out with my friends and take the time to show mum around the countryside by bike and foot. We had a great time here and I got to show mum just how wonderful the Meletti-Cavallari’s really are at Grattamacco. Below are some of the last photos of our trip. Enjoy. The next instalments for La Donna Del Vino will be when I am in South Australia. I move there on Saturday to begin work on Monday at Henschke Winery in the Barossa Valley.
La macchina bella di Claudio (il meccanico di Piermario)
Claudio’s beautiful car (Piermario’s mechanic)
L’albero famoso di Toscana (the famous Tuscan tree)
Facendo una passeggiata nella città di Bolgheri (strolling through the town of Bolgheri)
Portando la Zaira per una passeggiata a Castagneto Carducci (Taking Zaira for a walk in Castagneto Carducci)
Il modo vecchio per asciugare i vestiti in Toscana (the old way of drying your clothes in Tuscany)
Back with the La Spinetta gang and the Pilates experience
22 Dec2009
This afternoon I finally made my way to the Castagnole delle Lanze winery where the La Spinetta gang are based to catch up with everyone else that I missed on Saturday evening. I took the train over from Alba and Pinuccio the agronomist picked me up in his beasty Fiat 4×4 and we had a brief but lovely chat on the ascent up the hill before he dropped me off.
On entrance into the winery I gradually ran into, hugged, kissed and talked with Gianni (only a little because he’s always quiet in general!), Salvatore (sono stata attacato a lui per un po’ parlando delle cose – a me lui e’ molto simpatico), Stefano (non ha detto tanto purtroppo, neanche all’inizio piu’ di ‘ciao’ e un bacio), Zwonko (con chi si parla delle cose piu’ vere e giuste nella vita, mi sembra comunque)m e Natalia (a lei ho detto sinceramente, ‘ma non hai cambiato per niente, sei ancora bella!’ e mi ha dato un bacio e un sorriso e ha detto ‘tu mi manchi’ con gli occhi blu (finto). Manuela came down and we all eventually went into the tasting room and had a bollicino to drink. Andrea finally arrived and we had some more. He doesn’t talk that much but Andrea has such a lovely presence it’s difficult not to smile when you look at him in all his lankiness!
Natalia wanted me to stay instead of going off with Manuela to Alba to do Pilates, but I informed them that Manuela is my passagio(ride) back to Alba so I have to go, despite Natalia’s suggestion that we do Pilates here at the winery all together! She wants me to work for them, they’d all heard I was going to be hired, then wasn’t, but still got work in Toscana. So they’re up with it!
Too soon it was time for me to go and I left with a kiss to them all wishing them all the best for the new year and festive season! Manuela and I did pilates for an hour. Manuela explained to the instructor that I’m keen to try out the class before committing in January, so it turned out to be free! Score!
It was only the two of us in this peaceful room and I followed the lady’s movements considerably well, taking into account it was my first time – the ol’ Pilates virgin hey! It was calming to focus on breathing for so long and working on all the core muscles starting from the legs to the trunk to the arms then stretching yourself out. There was only one time where I was struggling to do a certain pose on my knees and stomach so the lady came and sat behind me and was repeating what I had to do and I was concentrating so hard,finally I clicked that she wanted me to open my knees, raise my feet with my toes pointed outwards while holding my core…then I had to crush her hand she’d placed in-between my thighs (don’t get excited boys) as I breathed out and lowered my legs. Believe me, it wasn’t easy! I did it though in the end and overall she was impressed!
After farewelling Manuela I returned to Ornella’s place and she’d prepared a lovely salad with tuna and eggs. Back upstairs I prepared my bags for the train tomorrow as I am finally off to Sauze d’Oulx to see Lisa and Liana in the mountains after so long!
Mangia Krystina, mangia!
20 Dec2009
Whilst the ex-boss and wife and child were still sleeping I got up and had breakfast on my own in the kitchen and dressed for lunch as they informed me we were going to the ristorante Bovio in Ceretto Langhe with Ornella also in attendance. Together we rugged ourselves up and braved the chilly winter air and sat down to a wonderful lunch. We ordered and pretty much were all having an antipasto and a secondo but then the restaurant chef who knows Giorgio well ended up bringing us an antipasto on top of our other orders which consisted of carne crudo di vitello in small balls on bread, a spoon of insalata russa and grissini…the child of Anja and Giorgio, Lidia, is two years old and eats like an adult. In fact she ate more of the antipasti than everybody else. On top of that she also ended up eating an adult sized primo of agnolotti, then a smaller sized steak. Hungry kid.
My choices were coniglio then polpo caramellata. I brought Giorgio Meletti-Cavallari’s 2006 Impronte red wine for lunch. First we had a Spumante that was lovely, followed by a Vermentino done by Antinori which was terribly simple and bland. Then we had the Bolgheri rosso, which Giorgio said he liked but Anja wasn’t so keen on. We talked a little about the wine and how La Spinetta’s going etc. The coniglio was delicious in an involtini-style dish cut into slices with an orange-coloured sauce alongside. They followed up with a surprise primo of beetroot-coloured gnocchi with lobster sauce. Again delicious but rich and thankfully portioned well. Giorgio ordered another red wine blind as he wanted to be surprised and it tasted really good and ended up being the 2005 Sezzana (La Spinetta’s reserve Tuscan label) that he would like to put down for another 10 years even. I was really impressed with that one. I also came to learn that the reason for him drinking so much Vermentino of late is because La Spinetta Toscana are doing a Vermentino, 2009 being the first vintage from bought grapes.
My secondo of caramelized polpo (octupus tentacle) was ordered by Ornella and Giorgio also, and was too sweet and the balsamic darkness of the sauce overpowered the freshness or any polpo taste you were hoping to get! It was on a lovely bed of polenta but the sweetness dominated and ruined the dish overall. I mean, it wasn’t horrible, it just could could have been much fresher for fish, y’know?
Afterwards we had said no to dessert and they still brought us coffee cups of tiramisu, probably the best tiramisu I’ve tasted with a yellow-creamy topping, not white, so I wasn’t disappointed they brought us this, but we were trying to eat light! Che ridere! Amazing dessert.
Anja, Ornella and I went for over an hours walk after lunch up the hills to attempt to work it off and chatted about everything. I mentioned how I am going to start studying again and how I’m interested to learn the business side of things also. Anja was interested in that and I think in the new year we will see what we can work out, whether there can be some sort of arrangement. Can’t really say anything just yet.
Later on I went back to Alba with Ornella to her place and we reheated her pipes with a hairdryer to get water as it had frozen. The joys of living where there falls snow. It worked anyway, no matter how funny it looked blowdrying a box. We then went for a walk together and got an espresso in the centre of town before heading back. At 7pm Manuela Rivetti and her boyfriend Simone passed by the house and picked me up and together we had an aperativo first at Piazza Duomo in Alba with rockclimbing friends of Simone, then had dinner at ‘Il Corsiero’ in Cinzano with his group of rock-climbing buddies. The night was spent chatting away with Manuela about old times. Good times, good times.
Oh how I missed you, Piemonte!
19 Dec2009
This morning I grabbed my bags (plus 6 bottles of wine of Giorgio’s to pass on) and we drove to Cecina and had breakfast at the Principe Cafe. They took me to the station and I asked for a train ticket from here to Alba…the man behind the counter laughed and gave me the most doubtful look. Why? Perchè ha riso?
It’s snowing here still a little but they have had a surprise dump last night so trains that were leaving this morning from Firenze, or from the north have been delayed an hour, or two, or three. He suggests I leave tomorrow or try my luck anyway but anticipates I will run into problems in Genova. I call Anja (I am headed to Piemonte fyi to stay with the La Spinetta gang for whom I worked last year) and tell her I am going to try my luck! I will just buy my ticket to Pisa Centrale for now then we will see what they say there. Giorgio tells me if there is no trains, to use the same ticket to come back and try tomorrow. Anyway! With all this negativity about my subsequent journey I decide to give it a go nevertheless. Also because Anja informed me that tonight there will be a surprise birthday party for my old boss Andrea which means it will be a great opportunity to see everyone again.
Arriving into Pisa it’s a bit of a brothel. People everywhere in the main foyer, a queue a mile long to buy tickets from the teller, and the main screen is blacked out because perhaps there’s no point with so many delays. The smaller screens in the station list only those trains from this morning that are hours behind so there is no space to write the new trains on arrival. All one can do is wait! I decide to buy my ticket from the machine – stuff having human contact – and wait patiently at platform 4 in the bitter cold with others for our IC510 train to Torino Porta Nuova. We’re all hoping there’s no delay, it seems that only trains from this morning are really late. Otherwise, others have arrived a maximum of 20minutes late. Finally at 12:30pm the screen lights up to indicate our train exists! Woohoo! But will it arrive punctually? That is the question my friends! Everytime the screen goes black for some changeover we all expect to read that it has been cancelled or to read how many minutes ‘in ritardo’ it will be. Fortuunately my stars were well-aligned and the train arrived and we departed a measly 10minutes behind. Che fortuna!
The coastal landscape we took was beautiful and interesting as it was like winter in Pisa, spring in La Spezia, and winter again with snow in Genova. Overall, no problems and we arrived on time! My next train at Asti I took to Castagnole delle Lanze. Ahh…memories! Here at 17:30pm Anja with Giorgio and Lidia in the back picked me up and whisked me away from this cold, bitter chill in the Piemontese air. -1C outside it said. Brilliant.
I learn that Giorgio has lost his licence for drink-driving, and Lidia has grown and says my name and sings ‘Tanti aduuuri Andrea’ the whole way as we drive up Via Annunziata to the Castagnole delle Lanze winery of La Spinetta. I haven’t told any of the gang here that I am coming – only Clara knows as it was her organising the surprise party for her 30-year old son Andrea. When I get out of the car my old Italian mamma Emiliana was there and trying to see who it was so I said, ‘Ciaooo Emiliannaaaa’, and she got a shock and after a bit of ,’O Dio‘ (Oh God) I passed cautiously over the icy pacement and gave her a big hug and recollected what I am doing here, etc. Then I saw Clara and France, the other mums who live above the winery, and did the same. They haven’t changed, though France cut her hair short so she’s cute!
I grabbed a bottle of Impronte to give to Andrea as a birthday gift then went inside to the new degustation area they’ve finished. Impressive room! Eventually the parents of Andrea’s partner Noemi arrived and I chatted with the mum for awhile, she remember me from the Tuscany party last year. I went into the bathroom and when I came out I gave a surprise to Ele and Manuela, the girls I lived with for three months. Manu has cut her hair short and is a little pixie! We were speaking in Italian and she congratulated me on how well I speak. But then it was strange for her to be speaking Italian with me as last year all we spoke was English. I also met her boyfriend Simone who is very handsome and lovely and on meeting me said, ‘Ah, si si, Krystina Menegazzo, ma non sei in Turchia?’ Strange that he knew my last name and they’ve all seen my Turkey photos from Facebook!
Andrea finally arrived and was a little surprised, he also had his new baby boy Giulio with him too. Andrea had a big smile when he saw me. Stefano wouldnt be coming tonight which is a shame, I would have liked to see him too! Clara had made everything herself so we ate delicious Piemontese food. I tried a morsel of most things, insalata russa, carne crude di vitello, etc, everything bar the cheese and salami. Giorgio was doing the right thing and made sure I always had something in my glass as did his son Andrea, showing me the next vintage of La Spinetta Campe’ Barolo 2006…just like old times…vini vini vini! Turned out to be a superb evening seeing most of the crew, but I will try come back on the weekday to see everybody else properly too.
I sogni dei ragazzi di Bolgheri
17 Dec2009
Giorgio, Francesca and Greta have given me a new notebook as a christmas gift. Totally lovely of them! I just so happened to finish my other diary too so it is perfect timing. Plus the fact that they filled the first few pages with memories and notes makes it all the more special. The first page of the notebook reads: I have a dream and underneath it leaves you lines to write your dreams…this is what they wrote for themselves:
Sogno di Giorgio:
- avere almeno lo porsche
- fare sesso con m…f…
- fare il vino più buono nel mondo
Sogno di Franceseca:
- girare il mondo
- imparare l’inglese come Krystina
- fare tante vacanze
- imparare surf con il fratello di Krystina (cioe Davide)
- conoscere tanta gente carina
Sogno di Greta:
- vedere NYC
- fare passito
- avere una mia cantina
- imparare l’inglese
- imparare il portoghese
- comprare un paio di Jimmy Choo
- venire a trovarti in Australia
- sposare il cantante dei Green Day
E poi ho scritto il nel spazio vuoto:
Sogno di Krystina:
- avere una cantina piccola come Sorrenberg
- girare il mondo, avere tante esperienze
- assaggiare i vini più buoni con il cibo più buono
- avere una enoteca buonissima e figa con la Amanda
- fare il mio Masters in Wine Business
- avere una casa mia con tutte le mie cose
- avere una macchina dell’epoca – Fiat 500!
Nice thoughts, no?
Ti disturbo?
23 Nov2009
This is one of those things that I wasn’t sure if I should write about, purely for the fact that my mother reads this blog…or is at least my most avid reader (perhaps my only reader)…and to whom this will be the most disturbing. Nevertheless, I believe it is worthwhile to not only recount on the events that were exciting and interesting…but also those that are a little more disturbing. This, I am afraid, is definitely the latter.
I was up at 6:30am for my usual walk down the hill and along the quiet road that runs parallel to Via Bolgherese. Everything was fine and totally normal during my walk up until about 7:30am when I was on my way back towards the house and heard a car through the music of my iPod coming up behind me so I moved over to the right to let it pass. Turns out it was one of those ‘Api’ utes, I think they call them, the tiny one-seater utes with only three wheels that old men seem to use to carry stuff from A to B and not much else as they don’t have too much potential.
Anyway I immediately recognised the driver as the nice old man I’d met two weeks ago out the front of a private Olive Oil factory. That time he had been out the front with his car and as I was passing by he stopped to ask me if I knew the German people who lived up the hill as they’d closed the gate on him or something. After a bit of conversation I obviously slipped up and he realised I wasn’t Italian but we had a quick chat nevertheless and then I continued on my merry way. After then, a few times a week he would pass by on his truck and we would give a wave and I always thought, ‘Such a nice old man’ … can you tell where this is going already?
Back to the present, and the old Italian man in his car drove by slowly and I waved, smiled, and he opened his window and paused his car and apologised for disturbing my walk.
Figurati. (No problem), I’d said.
So we had a casual chat, why I’m walking (the Italians don’t fully understand the concept of purposeful exercise), what I do for work, how my Italian is going, do I like it here, sei fidanzata? (am I single)…?
Si, non ho un ragazzo. (Yes, I don’t have a boyfriend).
Ma ti garba i uomini in Italia? (But do you like Italian men?) (OK so I thought we were kidding around here, it seemed like he was).
Si, non sono male, sono simpatici. (They’re not so bad, they’re nice), I had said.
Ti do un passagio su? (Do you want a lift up the hill?)
Ah no grazie, devo fare la mia passeggiata. (No thanks, I have to do my walk).
Sto lavorando nel oliveto, sai dove? Si passa….ti aspetto li? (I am working in the olive grove past such and such, I will wait for you?) followed by a rude gesture with his lingua.
Ah…no…., I said, stepping away further from the vehicle.
Ma dai, si deve divertirsi nella vita! Sei veramente bella! (But you need to enjoy life! You are really beautiful!)
No grazie, sto bene, buona giornata! (No thanks, I’m OK, good day!) and I slammed the car door and he drove off.
That’s the end of the story thank god…but suffice to say I will be taking a completely different route from now on. My boss Giorgio and the girls have said they will be my bodyguards from now on anyway! Or perhaps I’ll just carry a golf club around with me to knock these vecchi on the head the next time they try something!
Colle Massari winery visit
18 Nov2009
Before venturing off on a bit of a day trip today, my boss Giorgio and I had to stop off at the winery first. As instructed I was dressed nicely with my little red Dorothy-like shoes. When we arrived at the winery in Bolgheri, Giorgio decides to inform me that I will need to transfer the heating ‘banana-looking’ device from tank 21 to 20. Normally a job accomplished in pairs, it turns out that someone arrived and I ended up doing it on my own instead (safety first, I changed into my gumboots!). Then I got some water and sulfur and back in my little red shoes I scaled some barrels that were going through malolactic fermentation and cleaned one of them that had bubbled over and had vinegar flies around it. Finally we were ready and Francesca, Giorgio, Stefano & Fabio from Michele Satta winery and myself drove off in the sleek and silver Mercedes Benz to Grosseto, eventually crossing into the hills to at last visit Colle Massari – the winery business that acquired Grattamacco a few years ago from Piermario Meletti-Cavallari.
The guy who owns the business now is obviously rolling in moolah and has not overlooked any expense to create a magnificent winery of the utmost materials. The barrel hall is roofed and walled in the material that one uses for the interior of sauna’s… is that pine or spruce? Of notable cellar geek importance was that the winery has the Bucher Vaslin Flavy FX 5 cross flow, which can go through their standard-sized 100hL tanks in under an hour. Very impressive!
Luca, the director of Colle Massari and Grattamacco, gave us le grand tour and a taste of their current Vermentino in tank from one vineyard, and another in the huge barrels that was undergoing malo. In the barrel hall we tasted 2008 and current Sangiovese wines. Some that were quite powerful and others that were not so interesting.
For lunch they have a chef and waitress on duty so we had six sitting down for a deliciously, exquisite full-course meal of a small appetiser with some fresh white beans and barley, porcini mushrooms, and some liver pate’ artfully arranged on a white china plate. This was followed by the primo of a small amount of perfectly al-dente penne pasta with a chingiale (wild boar) and funghi sauce which I added a little pepperoncino to to really set it off. For secondo it was meat that melted in your mouth, and dolce was a little bowl of macedonia (fruit salad). Afterwards Luca took us to the other properties that this very rich owner behind the Colle Massari project has invested in, including a castle, more vineyards, and an agriturismo. I noted that the roads to these destinations have been recently asphalted to accommodate his Ferrari…typical.A feast to remember
15 Nov2009
http://www.ristorantelaconchiglia.eu/
Ristorante La Conchiglia in Viareggio, Provincia di Lucca, Toscana.
Where one goes to understand the meaning of fine dining in the true sense of the word…with a price tag to match.
Being a restaurant that resides by sea side, what would one expect other than the very best in seafood produce?! We were a group of 7 in total, including Giorgio & Francesca, Luca & Helena, Alessandro & Claudia and myself. On entering we handed the waiter our coats then sat down in the private dining room surrounded by artwork and the kitchen in the background. We were then greeted by the chef, Patrizio, who ran us through the program he’d created for us today. We would only have to select the wine, the rest we would leave up to him.
We were left in fine hands. Giorgio chose a Franciacorta from winery Alice to start with with our tartare and pane appetiser. We followed on from that with an assortment of dishes, all with some form of seafood and drank Trebbiano from Abruzzo 2007 then Pinot Noir from France.
…
Two hours later we arrived at dessert which began with Castagnaccio (a delicious local cake using flour from chestnuts, pinenuts and not much else then you put some olive oil and rosemary on top once it’s finished). Followed on by three offerings on a long plate of semifreddo with a fresh concoction of chocolate sauce, creme custard with rasperries, and panacotta…which Giorgio later recollected was like a woman’s boobies, soft with movement but not too hard…that’s Giorgio for you. Caffe’ was drunk by all and then we took our well-feasted selves our for a walk. The portions and the lightness of the food meant we didn’t feel so stuffed that you felt sick, but more the fact that you knew you weren’t going to be eating dinner that night for sure!
Afterwards us girls took off in the big Land Rover and drove along the backstreets towards the gorgeous town of Petrasanta in the province of Lucca also, swiping off a mirror of a blue Renault parked a little wider than normal. The mirror of the Land Rover was in the same condition…decapitated. We didn’t stop…though I suggested we should. Typical Italians for you.
At Petrasanta we arrived to find some sort of festival taking place involving lots of food, cheese and other produce…we didn’t touch a thing. Instead we took a look around the town then stopped for a drink at a bar which played music that reminded me of bars in Melbourne. In other words, modern.
After a long hard day of nothing we all drove back to Grattamacco, this time taking care to drive a little wider when passing parked cars, then watched ‘Italians’ on the big screen at home. It’s like ‘Manual of Love’ for those of you into Italian movies, entertaining, and always unpredictable. That’s one thing I can say about Italian movies in comparison to typical American ones. You can generally guess where the story line is headed with other movies, but with this one we were taking stabs during the film and of course nothing ever eventuated like we thought it would! Great movie though.
Il giorno perfetto!
13 Nov2009
Whoever said Friday the 13th was an unlucky day?!?! Today being Friday I would normally be dressed in my shabby manly man work clothes but instead I got to put on a dark blue dress I bought in Firenze and my new boots with my hair au naturale for a tasting that was being held at San Guido. I hopped in the ute with Giorgio and Francesca, excited to hopefully get to sample some wines! For those of you who don’t know what San Guido are, here is what Wikipedia says:
Tenuta San Guido is an Italian winery in the DOC Bolgheri in Toscana, known as a producer of “Super Tuscan” wine. Its wine ‘Sassicaia’ is considered one of Italy’s top Bordeaux-style red wines.
Here at Tenuta San Guido there were 7 journalists tasting the wines under blind conditions. There was a spot up the front on the panel where my bosses father, Piermario Meletti-Cavallari (founder of Grattamacco winery) had just completed the tasting and had since stepped outside to chat with the ladies so it was now free. Lucky Francesca got in first and went in and got to taste the wines at the head table.
After ten minutes of waiting outside with Giorgio, the Chairman of the tasting exited after having also finished and walked over to where Giorgio and I were standing. After some chatter between the two men, Giorgio asked him if Krystina could take his spot.
‘Krystina? Chi e’ Krystina?‘ (Krystina? Who is Krystina?), he queried.
I gracefully interjected, ‘Sono Krystina!’ (I’m Krystina!)
Thankfully due to my attire they must have noted I’m not a complete bogan and I got to waltz past all the journalists and sit up front next to Francesca and try the 20 wines from the 1999 vintage that were set in front of us.
There were photographers there who were taking photos for the Association Grand Cru delle Costa di Toscana and I must admit, considering the journalists were all male, the photographer took the opportunity to take an ample amount of snaps of the two young ladies in dresses seated up the front…spitting…hehehe it has to be done I’m afraid. Work hazard!
Article by Claudia Orlandi - il 1999 dei Grandi cru della costa Toscana
The wines were all from either the Pisa, Lucca, Livorno or Grosseto provinces, and some of the outstanding ones were that of Tenuta di Valgiano, Sassicaia and Grattamacco. It’s hard to do a tasting like this because you’re not just looking at wines of one variety, like I did a tasting last year in Piemonte of wines that were solely of the grape variety Nebbiolo. No, instead here in the ‘Bordeaux-inspired Bolgheri wine region, you have wines that may contain Sangiovese, Syrah, Merlot, Cabernet Sauvignon, Alicante, Colorino, Cabernet Franc, or most likely a mixture of some of these. Hence there are a lot of variables. But it was interesting nevertheless and afterwards they discussed the results and it’s always full of debate when there’s talk amongst journalists.
Photo by Francesco Tenuta. All Rights Reserved milodiscorpio74
After the privilege of being at that tasting we then got the privilege of going to Bolgheri, to Enoteca Tognoni (one of the places you can guarantee will be busy even on a weekday at lunch) and as a group of say 20 people we sat down and were treated to delicious offerings of prosciutto, lentil and pumpkin soup, tagliatelle pasta with pigeon, scotch fillet cooked to perfection and caffe. Did I mention that at Tognoni we ran into the proprietor or San Guido, the grand Mario Incisa della Rochetta who voluntarily joined our gang of people and put his magnum of 2006 Sassicaia on the table. GRAZIE! Along with that there were magnums of Michele Satta 2005 i Castagni (which is sitting on our dining table right now half-full still), 2006 and 2005 Tenuta di Valgiano, 2001 Grattamacco Bolgheri Rosso Superiore and many many more. Lunch was finished off with a Vin Santo di Sorelle Palazzi. Che buonooooo!
After lunch Giorgio and Francesca had to go pick up something so I suggested I would drop off the caffe’ to our friend Francesco in the work pick-up. So the elegant young lady in her dress hopped into the dirty work pick-up and chugged on down Via Bolgherese, thankfully no Carabinieri around, stopping at Villa Vallone to drop off the goods where Francesco and Roberto noticed I was awfully happy and rosy-cheeked for someone who had just finished a lunch at the enoteca. Thankfully no problems were had and I drove back to the winery after that with a 10 metre ladder hanging off the back of the ute without any dramas again. Don’t worry ma, I’m not bad at driving manual on the wrong side of the road now!
Chitty chitty bang bang!
8 Nov2009
6:15am BOOM!…….BOOM BOOM BOOM!!!
6:17am BOOM BOOM….BOOM BOOM BOOM!!!
…
6:30am Krystina wakes up and heads outside to begin her walk
6:32am and on the road…
6:33am BOOM BOOM BOOM!!!
The hunters are out and a firin’!
So I’m in Bolgheri, living at Podere Grattamacco with the Meletti-Cavallari family in their villa and it’s a little weird at times, because this is cacciatore (hunter) season, and especially when the gunfire going off sounds like they’re only 50metres away from where you are and you begin to wonder if they just shoot anything that moves or if they actually wait to see if it’s a wild boar…or me…. :-S
There was a death a few years back they tell me when two men were out hunting individually, one went to the toilet and was there…crouching…doing his thing….when the other heard a noise or a struggling animal low to the ground and shot off a whack of bullets before realising he’d just shot a man who was having a bit of trouble letting one go….disgusting…and disturbing.
I think when I hear the successive shots it’s hunters who are going for birds as they’re more difficult to aim at I imagine instead of the wild boars…the season must be finishing soon though, or at least I hope so. They tend to wake you up pretty early and here in the mountains there are heaps of prime hunting spots so it can’t really be avoided. The only thing that stops them I suppose is the rain…which I can hear outside my window right now…hey I might get a good nights sleep!
Olives Olives Olives
29 Oct2009
The olives are being harvested for oil. How does one know? You walk past a tree and there’s a carpet surrounding it and you hear a compressor working it’s little butt off in the distance whilst a person stands under a tree with a stick and a strange thing at the end that moves and shakes off the olives. After which, the olives are gathered up and put into a case. Cool stuff, just wouldn’t want to be shaking a tree when spiders and whatever other insects that live in trees fall on your face too whilst doing the work! Glad it’s not me. I’ll just have the end-product thanks very much!
Vintage Festa!
27 Oct2009
Ieri sera e’ passata la festa della vendemmia! We ate at Federico’s pizza restaurant and we were about 18-20 of us all up. We had a lovely meal set up for us with seafood salad, prosciutto crudo and crostini to start with, then I chose matriciana penne pasta which was delicious, and finally porcini atop scallopini. For dessert my end of the stick was a bit of a disaster. I’d made pavlova and:
1) I didn’t beat the eggs for long enough before adding the sugar so when mounted on the plate it was soft, and
2) it stuck to the aluminium foil I’d put underneath because in this house they don’t seem to understand the concept of baking paper! So when I attempted to pull the pavlova off I eventually had four individual pieces of meringue. But instead of making a mountain out of a molehill I said to myself, “ma chi se ne frega”, we’ll assemble it as per normal, pile on the cream and the fruit and we’ll see how we go!
Then, Federico, who prepared the final assemblage for me, chucked the mixed berries and their juices with the bananas and kiwis and mixed it all together…so basically in the end we had a purple mound of fruit atop my shitty meringue! Lucky I have no photos to post!
Isole d’Elba
23 Oct2009
Today is Friday and after work and moving furniture around at Villa Vallone where they’re going to be commencing restorative work on Monday, we left for Isole d’Elba from Piombino to spend the weekend at the resort where Giorgio’s father, Piermario, manages the winery Tenute di Ripalte. We were a group of seven: Giorgio, Francesca, Camila, Greta, Helena, Francesca and myself.
We missed the 9pm boat by only a few minutes so grabbed a caffe’ and bought the tickets for the 10pm boat. On arrival an hour later at Portoferraio we took off with the ute and grabbed the green Fiat panda left in the carpark that belongs to Piermario and drove off into the buio (darkness), passing most of the time along dirt roads that curved their way dangerously along the coast’s cliff edge. We arrived at the hotel before midnight and found our gorgeous rooms awaiting us: Greta and I crashed together on the matrimonial bed and slept in as the hotel is closed in this less busier period.
The itinerary for the following day was to check out the winery which is in the process of being built and is humungous and amazing. There’s like only 15 small tanks in it at the moment but clearly they have some spanners in the works for accommodating the amount of space they’re creating the winery for!
We all hopped onto the hotels 12-seater bus and drove along the southern coast of the island eventually reaching Campo nell’Elba. Its a coastal town but due to the fresh wind there weren’t that many people around and the chance of swimming was clearly rejected.
Afterwards, traversing along the countryside we made our way to Marciana where the girls found a marmelata shop that made weird but delicious combinations like Pear and Ciocolato, plum and rhum spreads! Onwards from here we made our way past more towns stopping at Villa San Martino – the residence of Napolean on this Elba Island. There wasn’t much to see there, just killing time before we were heading back to Capoliveri for dinner. Here Giorgio and I grabbed an aperativo whilst the other ladies checked out the rest of the main street. We eventually made our way down an old cobbled street to a restaurant that seats less than 20 people called Lo Sgarbo. Luca, the winemaker of Tenute di Ripalte was eating with us and once he joined the gang we ordered away! I chose well and for antipasto had fresh tuna with a light soy sauce on a bed of salad, eaten with an 08 Greco di Tufo white wine from Campania. Poi, for primo I got the tagliatelle white sauce pasta with black tartufo shavings on top. Bloody hell my nose was going crazy, the smell in that restaurant was unbelievable! For dolce, Greta and I went halvies and shared the chocolate and chilli cake, and castagnaccio – a thin cake made from Castagna flour, then you put pinenuts and rosemary on top…weird but delicious.
Back at the ranch we all climbed into bed after a long day of sightseeing and just as I was about to knock off to dreamland the door burst open and two people jumped into the bed between Greta and I! I heard the voice of one and realised it was my boss Giorgio and started laughing then called out for his daughter Camila as I thought it’d be her, but it was Francesca! We had a giggle then they jumped off, Giorgio in his undies…a very funny sight indeed!
We all took the extra hour that the loss of daylight savings gave us and slept in! After I awoke I prepared pancake batter for like the first time in my life thanks to the recipe mum sent me and whipped up a banana concoction too that worked a treat on top of some nutella spread.
Today we checked out all the villa’s as part of the Costa dei Gabbiani resort then drove along the more isolated part of the southern coast to a part where there were some private boats anchored in the bright blue sea with perfect rocky shores.
We stopped by one in particular and I wadded my feet in the water. The weather today could not have been more perfect. Really warm, not windy. Just right…Kellogs just right. If I had my bathers with me I would have swam for sure! After a cruisy day of sightseeing again we caught the 3pm boat just in time again back to Piombino. It’d been a good weekend away and great to see a part of Italy that is normally reserved for Italian’s on holiday or Germans.
Volterra
18 Oct2009
Today Greta and I went to have breakfast in town so after saying farewell to her mum and Zio who have been down for at least a week, we took the bicycles out from the hut (they’ve all been recently fixed thankfully) and pedalled on down to Donoratico.
We chose our local caffe’ haunt and had a pasta con crema and a caffe’ latte. Then we strolled up the street with our bikes and browsed through shops, ran into Alessio down the street, ran into friends at a homeware store, etc then pedalled on back home.
We decided to make the journey over to Volterra for the day as it would take just under an hour to get there. The road we needed to take wound round and round and round as you made your way up the large hill to the top of the town. They’re working a lot of the land down below at the moment so it was less green and more browny in some parts as you’re driving up. Once you reach the top though, park the car and get out it has breathtaking mountainous views, and you can see the blue sea beyond.
We made our way through the streets and browsed in some shops, watched a kids potato sack race in the main piazza, strolled around some more and took some photos.
One shop we went into had lots of paper things which I’m a sucker for and I found two gorgeous postcards in the Old Pubblicita’ format that I adore so bought those: only 0,50 E each.
Then they had some larger posters for which I found a cool wine one with Greve, Chianti on it for only 5 E, a real bargain so got that. The old lady behind the counter was so lovely and cute and wrapped it up for me so it wouldn’t get damaged. She reminded me of our old cousin Anna in Asiago.
Another lovely story was when Greta and I walked into an artists shop that had the best music playing. It was like you were in a musical film from the 1920’s. To the right were some stairs where you looked up and saw the mad artist at work. He saw us, and we walked on into the shop space to browse around and he came singing down the stairs, grabbed two little things and presented us each with one saying in Italian ‘one for you, and one for you’ and gave us this tiny ceramic man head!
Then he walked back up the stairs singing his sweet little tune. We thanked him and said goodbye and went on our merry way too.
Finally on our way back through the streets we’d just been along the side of the town that faces the sea beyond the mountains and an older woman walking past us spoke out (it seemed to no one in particular) about how one can see Corsica today because it’s so clear. Greta and I had seen the land mass of la Cipria (i think it’s called), a small island off the coast from Tuscany. But thought that the large mass further in the background couldn’t possibly be Corsica because it is very rare that one can see it from Tuscany. Well, in fact it was and this woman who obviously lived in the town was clearly very excited by that fact!
Fish – Pesce
17 Oct2009
The good thing about living in a coastal town is that they like to eat fish frequently. I remember mum telling me you can never say no to fish as it’s so good for you, so I take her advice and make sure I sample each morsel that is offered my way. Most of the time I’m not sure of the exact translation of what sort of fish I am eating, but I’ll take a stab at listing some of the things I’ve eaten so far whilst here:
Shark
Fresh Calamari
Sardines
Octopus
Shrimp
Prawns
Mussels
Dried salted cod (baccalà)
Salmon
Swordfish
…and the list goes on my friend
Cinghiale!
7 Oct2009
Sai cos’abbiamo mangiato sta sera alla casa di Alessio? Cinghiale! Or for those of you who don’t know what I’m on about…’we ate wild boar!’
Alessio’s mum cooked it perfectly using olive oil, onion, a little garlic, carrot and celery, sage and thyme and cooking the meat in small 2-3cm cubes with some sugo di pomodori e olivi for about 4 hours. The meat was tender (hunted only a couple of days ago by Alessio’s dad Michele in the hills nearby) and we ate it with a little polenta. Michele had also found like 100 porcini mushrooms the other day which the mum cooked some up in a spicier sauce. One of the best meals I have had here so far.
A roam a Roma – il giorno numero tre
4 Oct2009
Ma che bella e’ stato il mercato! Gosh I’m so glad I skimped on sleep to go. There were so many great things to look at. They had a section for clothes, then part where shoes were sold, house stuff, moroccan things, books, antiques, weeeee! In the end within an hour and a half I’d bought a fabulous pair of Antica Fiorentina black leather boots at a bargain price from the normal retail. Also three wooden small pictures of the alcoholic beverages Campari, Aperol and Cinzano in the poster design I like, and an old Babushka to add to my collection.
After the successful outing at the market we packed our things into the Subaru and said farewell to Zia Chrstina and made our way to the area of Monto Porzio Catone for the wine tsating/show of San Pellegrini’s wines. We arrived and made our way to the table which only had room for one person behind the line so really, Greta and I were not going to required today. On our table was also Mariagrazia of Icardi wines in Piemonte. I’d recognised her face from my Piemonte book I got last year and throughout the day we had a good chat about the Rivetti’s (whom I worked for last year) as she knows them all quite well.
The area here is rather nice and looks over Rome in the distance. Again the weather was immaculate. I also spoke to Silvia from Elio Altare (his daughter) and she had funnily enough worked in Australia once so was happy to chat with me. There was an area outside dedicated to tasting some formaggio, cured meats and beer which were delicious.
For most of the day I think I helped Giorgio out once whilst he went to get a coffee, but instead I went around and tasted the wines that took my fancy and chatted with some people then ultimately crashed under a tree with Greta and Francesca and read and chatted to pass the time. It was a long day! 10am-7pm. At one stage I met the director of the event and he thought I was French so when I passed him he called out, “Escusemoi mademoiselle” haha. He beckoned me over and I played a wine guessing game where it’s in a black glass. You had to guess everything right down to the name of the vineyard. Bit of a joke really, but all you knew was that it was a wine that you could try at any one table today. Big help. I could tell by the nose it was a white wine and thought it was a blend of Chard and Sauv so wrote it was one of Icardi’s. I was wrong. In the end it was a white blend but had Malvasia in it instead. Whoops.
After the event we all headed off to this restaurant ‘Il Monticello’ for a feast of Romany goodness. It’s difficult for me to recall it all as there were a plethora of dishes all in small quantities. So I’ll be really general: there was lamb, tripe in a tomato sauce that I actually liked, pasta with porcini, chickpea nibblies. Mamma mia thank goodness the food was well-portioned! Wines to drink were from the event and we had some delicious ones from Sicily too. I had the ‘tall-version of Richard Gere’ director from before sitting opposite me and around us we had good conversations and I was understanding most of what was going on. It’s when the men start talking dirty that I can’t make out all the slang words, but you get the gist really…men are all the same it seems!
By 11pm the last meal arrived, the dessert, zabaglione with a plum sauce on top…mmmm!
Francesca and I got in the back of the car and slept whilst Greta stayed up with Giorgio to keep him company. What a great weekend though, busy and not much time to relax on Saturday, nevertheless it was time well spent and nice to have a break from work for a bit!
A roam a Roma – il giorno numero due
3 Oct2009
Saturday:
Allora, where to begin on such a busy day when so much got done!
We slept in a little, I got up and had breaky then when Greta awoke soon after I accompanied her to the nearby bar across the road. The weather was gorgeous, not a cloud in the sky (“got the sun in my eye” I hear mum sing), bright blue and all, so I matched the sentiments of mother nature by wearing my cute Alannah Hill pink dress I’d bought with mum in Melbourne and hadn’t yet worn.
At 9am the others awoke and we girls spread the map out and began planning the day. In the end we decided to spend the morning with Zia Christina and have her take us around, then the afternoon in the centro part of Roma. And so the day began…
We got into Zia Christina’s BMW and headed across and up the Tevere river where we stopped nearby Isola Tiberina. Before we crossed the bridge to the isole Zia Christina explained to us how the bridge was built by her ancestors and her last name is derived from the person whose name is imprinted on that bridge that still stands. He did fine work!
At Isole Tiberina we passed San Bartolomeo chiesa where there was a weddin going on but we were able to go inside and take a look at the stunning paintings on the roof and the spectacular white marble they love to use! Just outside the church was the Israel Ospedale – Isole Tiberina is apparently famous for being a haven for hiding hundreds of Jews back during WWII time.
From here we walked onwards to the area where back in the day all the dirty water from Rome arrived at Cloaca Massima. I had a bit of dejavu and knew I’d walked in this area before near Circo Massimo, turns out it was when I was looking for La Bocca di Verita’ last year. Well I finally saw it, big woop.
Walking towards the end of Circo Massimo where there used to be the chariots and horse racing we came across a cute little Pasticceria where we stopped for a caffe’ and the girls had something sugary sweet to eat.
Us ladies walked up the hill which takes one in the region called Colle Aventino – an area of very large houses, some of the most gorgeous churches (each which had a wedding going on today) and the Ambassador’s house protected by female soldiers with large black guns. Reminded me of playing 007 with Lucas on the Nintendo 64 haha. On arrival into the area we stopped and took photos and admired the view of Rome in the Giardino degli Aranci. Passing some houses Christina showed us a large green door which when one looks through the keyhole can see San Pietro at the end of a tree-lined corridor…amazing. They call it La Porta Della Casa Dei Guerieri Di Malta….long name huh.
We finally met up with Giorgio at a typical Roman Trattoria ‘Il Maschino’ in the Zona Della Citta’ Quartiere Garbatella. It’s a homely place where we each had a plate of pasta, mine with a simple pomodoro sauce…not very Roman…sorry. Then we checked out the homes in the area which were designed in WWI times to be houses clustered together and facing into a courtyard with only one entrance for example. This was a technique used by Mussolini to spy on the people within and keep an eye on who comes and who goes.
Christina left us at this point and we drove off with Giorgio, left the car at the house and took Tram no.8 to Piazza Argentine up from Trastevere, walked past Piazza Venezia and towards the Colosseo. Walking around the Colosseo a guy stopped me to take his photo which I did, then wanted one with me and my arms around him. We laughed afterwards that he got a photo with a ‘typical Italian girl’…not.
A protest was taking place nearby protesting against Berlusconi (Italian PM) and his grasp on Italian newspapers. We headed towards Via Urbane but first by Via Serpenti and as we traversed the streets I came across a vintage store and bought some fabulous red sunnies. Boinggggg, first purchase in Roma…more to come.
Us girls left Giorgio to go lose himself on the Metro (poor country lads) as he was meeting a friend in Piazza di Spagna, whilst we headed up to the Fontana di Trevi and because Greta and I wanted gelato we took the recommendation from Giorgio’s friends from dinner last night that we find San Crispino-the best gelatteria in Italy. We found it alright, had a 10minute line to get served but it was worth it! I ate susine (plum) with chocolate rum…mmmmmm mmmmmm!
By this stage of gluttoning ourselves we decided we should head up towards Piazza di Spagna too so walked up Via Condotti, going past and into Louis Vuitton, Prada and Yves Saint Laurent. Finally we made it to the busy piazza which was crowded with people by the steps…al solito. We found Giorgio who had organised with another friend to meet at a new hip bar up from Piazza Popolo on Via Flavina called Tri Re – about 15min walk away. Our feet were so tired after walking all day so we sat back and enjoyed the cocktails (mine a Bellini – peach juice with prosecco). OK so while the drinks were nice, it wasn’t worth the aching feet. What was worth it was seeing Giorgio climb into the boot of Diego’s car who kindly dropped us off near the heart of Trastevere where we had dinner at Taverna Trilussa. I had the Ossobucco and a spicy rocket salad with pomodorini followed by a mixed strawberry and wild berry plate for dessert. Prices in restaurants are pretty outrageous, charging for meat between 20-30Euro as a standard. Thankfully, the lovely Giorgio paid for it all 🙂
By this stage it was almost midnight so we headed to the tram stop and got home. Tomorrow (or today if we’re being technical), we’re getting up early to go to the Portaportese market across the road from us in Trastevere getting there by 7:30am. Hopefully find some nice leather boots too!
La Donna del Vino
"'Just living is not enough,' said the butterfly. 'One must have sunshine, freedom, and a little flower.'" - Hans Christian Andersen
La Donna del Vino 