The Great Pig-Out

In article , snipped-for-privacy@aol.com (Bill Spohn) writes a nice tale of wine, pork, and the dreaded accordion including:

More and more I find these similarities between Piemontese wines and Burgundies. This sounds nice. I think of Elio Grasso as one of the in-between producers- not the full-throttle oak of the real new-wavers, but more accessible (shorter maceration?) than the old-style when young.

acid and tannin,

I don't know this wine, but think San Felice's regular CC offers good value (their superTuscan I dislike). Sounds promising - the problem I have with many

Doesn't sound so great, maybe I need to try one of mine (think I only have two). I thought at release it offered good value (at about $22 it's one of the least expensive Barbarescos one might see)- another of those "in-between" producers, at time I thought it would be at its best maybe 2005-2008.

Ah, the accordion. In North America it's usually a bad joke, but I know some European musicians who are fond of it (once in Colorado a violinist friend of Betsy dragged us to a restaurant because it had the only acceptable accordionist he had heard in this country- but he was off that night, we left rather than listen to his hammy replacement, so I don't know if I would have appreciated). I actually have a CD of accordion music. Some friends spent some time in Poland, wanted to bring me back something. Knowing I liked Erik Satie, picked up a Satie CD. Only on the plane did they managed to decipher enough to realize to their horror it was Satie on the accordion (actually, kind of interesting).

Old viola joke: If you drop an accordion, a set of bagpipes and a viola off a 20-story building, which one lands first? .... Who cares?

thanks for the notes Bill.

Dale

Dale Williams Drop "damnspam" to reply

Another viola joke (ny daughter's):

Why are violists always standing out in the rain? ... Because they don't know when to come in and can't find the key.

Regards, Dean

Its curious how you, Dale, put together Piedmonteses wines and Burgundy. In the early 1990's I had a nice talk with Elio Altare who said he used Burgundy as his template in constucting his wine. We had a nice chat about DRC and Bize-Leroy. His English was good and I could understand winespeak Italian, although if I recall Chiara Boschis of E. Pira and Borgogno was with me at the time.. For a time, BTW, Angelo Gaja was importer in Italy of DRC wines.

I thought I'd start a new thread heading, in case the viola jokes had drowned interest (my fault for starting, of course, my sister-in-law is a violist at Met and I can nver resist).

Bill , what did you think worked best with the roast pork? I'd like your (and others') opinions. With basic roast pork (or suckling pig) I tend to look towards lighter reds, though I've had success with richer whites too (especially if there's a fruity accompaniment). Let's get comments from the pork fanciers out there. Dale

Dale Williams Drop "damnspam" to reply

I don't eat a lot of pork and tend to lean toward red wine with any food if I can get away with it.

About a weekor so ago we had a few friends over on a sunny afternoon for potluck. There were many kinds of food and wine. One of the groups favorites was a Jamiesons Run 2000 SA Sauvignon Blanc. I had a glass. It was OK. Nice for a hot afrernoon, (cool, crisp, lime)

At the end there was a partial bottle left. About 300ml? I poured it in a 375ml bottle and stuck it in the fridge.

On Sunday past we had a pork roast with almost too much savoury. I was the only one wanting wine so I popped the cork out of the partial bottle of Jamiesons. I was immediately hit in the nose with lychee! Lots of lychee. Tasted it - lychee again. Couldn't believe this was the same wine from a week ago.

I found it to be delicious with the roast pork.

Myron

I'm a little surprised at that, Joe, as I think of Altare (on scant evidence, mind you) as a very New School producer. Maybe on the template of Dominique Laurent and Dugat? :)

Seriously, he probably means vineyard techniques, shorter maceration, etc. as opposed to barrique use.

Dale

Dale Williams Drop "damnspam" to reply

snipped-for-privacy@aol.comdamnspam (Dale Williams) wrote in news: snipped-for-privacy@mb-m13.aol.com:

For me it really depneds upon how it is prepared, seasoned and what else is on the plate. But then you probably get tired of hearing that from me. It's always hard for me to ignore those details.

I think it's commonly percevied that Riesling and pork are on very friendly terms and this can work very well. I think other minerally whites with acidity will work, such as Gruner Veltliner, Pinot Gris, Loire Chenin or even an Alsatian Gewurztraminer. With the right dish, I also like a Rose Champagne.

But for most braised or roast pork where the dish is richer I tend to like a Tempranillo based wine or a Sangiovese based wine. If the dish is grilled or has a little smokiness to it, I tend to like riper styled Pinots. But I have also had some Nebbiolo based wines that worked well with smoke influenced pork dishes.

John

Well we were talking about his inspiration, Altare is older and more mature than Giorgio Rivetti or Domenico Clerico and the other Barolo boyz of DeGrazia; I think he was talking conceptually, a thing(whets better Burgundy, Bordeaux or the Rhone) he and Enrico Scavino were discussing in Italian later that day at a dinner on my behalf. This dinner was used to organise some of the younger producers into a sort of loose consortium, so besides me and the Barolo boys, Valentino Migliorini was there as well as Aldo Conterno's nephew and the Currados of Vietti's son in law. It was like the greatest hits of the Langhe at one table, we were tasting DeGrazia's latest releases from Tuscany given to me in Firenze earlier in the trip. If I recall Parusso was there too also as well as a Grasso and a guy who used to be honcho of Produttori di Barbaresco who was trying to organise this consorzio who basically bogarted the dinner set up for me for his own and fascinating agenda. Too bad I couldn't understand too much even with Chiara translating.

There's a gossip part of this recollection which I will save for a private conversation but suffice it to say Chiara was the unmarried bella figura for many of these lusty married Italians.

I was thinking about whites to start with - Viognier, Semillons and such.

Talked to my buddy who set it up - he's Portuguese and told me that in Portugal they drink quite hearty reds with roast pork.

We went through many different styles of wine and I'd have to agree that reds suited it best, and something with a bit of acidity, like the Italian wines that have been suggested, work well.

I think Tempranillo based wines, South African reds, some Chileans....the list goes on.

^^^^^^^^

May I kindly ask for an explanation of this phrase?

My words ... ;-)

M.

Hi Joe:

Made famous by Lowell George and Little Feat!

So the co-op kind was interesting in modernizing? Maybe that's why you said he used to be head of Produttori di Barbaresco - pretty diehard traditionalists, they would proably have dumped him quick.

Keeping the gossip to yourself, tsk tsk. :)

Dale

Dale Williams Drop "damnspam" to reply

snipped-for-privacy@aol.comdamnspam (Dale Williams) wrote in news: snipped-for-privacy@mb-m24.aol.com:

snip

Ahh. So I saw the fine print and missed the large titles.

Then let me re-craft a response.

I think we should be looking for a rustic style of red with some substance to it (to help manage the fat content of the pork), but not one that is too fruit driven. The ones that come to mind are a Cornas or good Gigondas. This may also be a place to try a Spanish Tempranillo.

John

Man's name was Giancarlo Montaldo if I recall, he left or was pushed out as winemaker/manager of Produttori shortly after I met him in 1985, his 82s were not as good as his processors 78s. He was working on enlisting the modernists as part of his organisation that evening and barely acknowledged my existence. It was a three ring circus kind of evening, with several agendas barely co-existing with each other. Chiara's suitor did his best to belittle me and my weight(think he thought I was the competition), the rest of the DeGrazia guys were trying to talk to me and Montaldo was pitching......

That's as candid as I guess.

traditionalists,

Don't do much by way of suckling pig here in New Zealand - but are spoiled (if you know a hearty hunter) by being able to get wild pork, as well as farm raised.

The gamier wild meat is certainly robust enough for a red wine - either a fruity, mid weight Aussie shiraz or a Rioja.

I eat farm raised pork twice a week - usually bar-b-qued loin chops - or a roasted shoulder - both with apple sauce!

And with this, I am rather staid in my ways - a Trimbach Cuvee de ribeaupierre with a few years age (if I can find it) if I chose to splurge - or any full bodied NZ Gewurztraminer - with a hint of RS.

st.helier

... mah friend, pass it over to me ..."

Thank you.

M.