Last night our wine group met again for a blind tasting of wines from Piedmont in northwest Italy (to read about our Spanish wine tasting click here). M. played host and between sips we enjoyed breathtaking views from her pad in Sausalito. I decided I'd happily abandon The City for a view like hers - until, that is, I heard that the ratio of great restaurants to people is fairly low. Hmmm...
While I pondered the trade-off, M. was busy setting out our wines. I'm not accusing anyone of being anal retentive - I have always preferred the term "extremely organized" myself - but M. came pretty close. She set out enough glasses for us each to try the 8 wines in separate glasses. She also provided colored sticky flags so we could track our pours by choosing a color and then writing the bottle number on the tag. The wines were disguised, first wrapped in aluminum foil and then in paper bags. No cheating allowed! (Not that any of us are competitive. Especially not me. I mean, I would never scream something like, "I want to WIN!" while sipping on a glass of M.'s favorite prosecco, a Carpene Malvolti. Not me.)
A bit about the grapes of Piedmont, all drawn from M.'s helpful tasting guide. The three grapes we focused on were Barbera, Dolcetto and Nebbiolo, which goes into Barolo (which we tasted) and Barbaresco (which we did not). Typically Barbera wines are rich purple in color with lots of fruit. Dolcetto wines (which are not sweet, despite the name) are also purple-hued, dry and fruity with hints of almond, chocolate and spices. Barolos are known to be tannic and austere, yet also full-flavored. The Barolos we chose were the most expensive wines of the tasting, varying from $29-48 per bottle and 2-3x the price of the less expensive Barberas and Dolcettos.
While we drank, we munched on an assortment of Italian edibles: artichoke spread with a hint of hot pepper, a paté with chicken liver and black truffle, roasted red pepper spread, prosciutto, salami, olives, walnut bread, seeded crackers, and cheese (a stinky oozing Taleggio and dry Parmagiano were my favorites).
Here's the list of wines we tasted along with some observations. As you can see, we're all Barolo fans.
Paitin di Pasquero-Elia Sori' Paitin, 2001 (Dolcetto d'Alba) $14 - a structured Dolcetto with slightly rustic grapey character. I gave it a B.
Bera, 2002 (Dolcetto d'Alba) $10 - this one was corked. M. and J. found notes of home perm chemicals swirling in the bouquet. Blech! If it had been a good bottle, research suggests it would be a typical Dolcetto, nothing fancy, the kind you'd get at a casual Italian restaurant.
Paitin di Pasquero Sera Boella, 2003 (Barbera d'Alba) $14 - this was a stunning bright pink berry color with hints of bing cherry. It got a B.
Cascina Val del Prete Serra de' Gatti, 2003 (Barbera d'Alba) $16 - One of my favorites and the one I reached for when the tasting was over. Also pinky-purple, this is considered more structured and oaky than the typical Barbera.
Famiglia Anselma, 1993 (Barolo) $48 - when we poured this it was thin and brownish red in color, a big hint that it's an older wine. Everyone but me guessed the 1993 Barolo correctly. Duh. Not my favorite but a decent wine after 30 minutes or so in the glass.
Guido Porro Vigna S. Caterina, 1998 (Barolo) $29 - we all liked this, in part because we kept referring to it as "the GWEE-doh." (Sophisticated bunch, eh?) Ripe plum, a bit hot, full-bodied. An A from everyone and all-around favorite.
Vietti Castiglione, 1999 (Barolo) $43 - Another favorite (though as the night wore on J. noticed a steady improvement in approval ratings. An interesting trend. It would be easy to surmise that the more we drank the more agreeable we became, but I reject that oversimplified analysis.) More plum and mushroom.
Stefano Farina, 1999 (Barolo) $30 - another good one. Lots of berry in the bouquet and more mushroom.
If you want to read a great book on Italian wines, pick up Vino Italiano by Babbo co-owner Joe Bastianich and wine director David Lynch. Unlike most wine writing, this is fun and anecdotal, a joy to read. There are recipes from Monsignor Batali himself, as well as Lidia Bastianich, Joe's mom (who helped pave the way from the red-and-white checked tablecloth restaurants of yore and platters of spaghetti and meatballs, to the beef cheek ravioli that grace contemporary Italian menus today).
Absorbed in the wine, we missed the sunset. Here's what we would have seen, had we raised our noses from the wine glasses. 
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