"The Wine Doesn't Know"

Our tour leader laughed when I said, 

"I thought this was a wine tasting not a wine drinking?"

Welcome to Italy!

Cheers on the bus go rounds and rounds...

Our first two wine tastings have set the bar pretty high for all the inevitable ones down the road. I remember cracking a joke months ago - near the start of this crazy process - that Brian was going to have to trade in his whisky collecting habit for wine bottles. Since then I've learned of a nifty term called the "wine shipment." Apparently, the DoD is keenly aware of the impulse to try, and then buy, local wines. When we come home in a few years, part of our allowance will be a "wine shipment" - a tax and duty free, shipping included, pallet of up to 300 bottles of wine. So the collecting has begun 🤷‍♀️

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Antonia's humble home which she welcomed all of us into 

We spent an afternoon at CorteCorbo Winery in Avellino after I saw an ad for a tour on one of the many Facebook groups we joined. It was advertised as a "wine tasting with a light lunch" which turned in to a "wine drinking with more food than we could eat." The organizer of our tour use to work for MWR here on base (how quickly I'm emerged in military alphabet soup and lingo. MWR is "Morale Wellness & Recreation), so he knows a ton of ins and outs, and then recently started his own business. I was literally taking notes on my phone during our drive out to CorteCorbo because Aldo was just spewing relevant and interesting facts! As we drove by a huge rock quarry he asked for us to guess how old the quarry was. I went for a Second World War ish guess and was WAY wrong. We just casually drove by a rock quarry that was being mined by the Roman Republic and whose limestone was used in both the Appian Way, connecting Rome to the south of the Italian peninsula, and the Colosseum! So the answer to the question was 200B.C.!

We stopped at a "Spring of Water" which we thought was like a hot springs but is actually a supply place for the region's water! It was so clean and clear and still used some of the systems of the Roman Republic! 

Incredible tasting water!

To prep us for the gastronomical adventure we were about to experience, Aldo told us that whatever we were expecting for this "wine tasting" was probably not accurate. When thinking of wine tastings you think of stuffy experts swirling their glasses, that have the whisky equivalent of a one finger pour, and eventually spitting it out so as not to dirty their pallet for the next offering. He spoke about people's expectations for fancy glasses and horrified gasps if the wrong type of wine is poured into the wrong type of glass. He quoted a tour he had been on about how the wine prefers specific materials and specific shapes of glass. This was NOT that kind of tasting as he told us, "What?! No! The wine doesn't know! It was made to be drank - to be enjoyed - and that's what we are going to do!" And drink and enjoy we did!

This day was precisely what my heart yearned for in order to feel like we are in Italy! We arrived at Antonia's small family farm house where we were immediately treated like family - she literally hugged each person as we walked into her living room where the 12 person table was set beautifully! She spoke no English but smiled away in Italian and somehow we all communicated that way. We started with mulled wine because it was COLD out. I get it, how cold could it actually be, when it was -40 at home, but it was windy and how quickly your body forgets the previous hell you put it through! And wind, Fairbanks, you all know how much that changes things! We've heard about mulled wine at Christmas markets but the idea of warm spices and boiled wine didn't sound super appetizing to me but, like many things, I was WRONG! We will be trying our hand at making mulled wine come next fall and winter. During our tasting we learned that in this unique valley they grow white grapes on one side of the river and red grapes on the other because of the way the volcanic ash gets carried down the mountain side over the centuries, has created entirely different soil on either side of the river!

(For those of you wanting to experiment, we didn't get any measurements but you need red wine, orange peel, chopped apples, lemon peel, cinnamon, clove, and sugar. We suspect a few other ingredients as well. They of course recommend a Taurasi wine from this region but said a merlot at home will do!)

Mulled wine for warmth and wine tasting prep

Antonia's son, Antonio, is the sommelier for their property and after mulled wine he poured another type while his mom made pizzas right in front of us. We indulged and assumed this was lunch but turns out pizza was an appetizer. As the different bottles kept getting poured we had a full table of wild boar salami, local meats, fresh ricotta, mozzarella, asiago, and pecorino cheeses. There were homemade fried doughs, fresh meatballs, breads...I'm kicking myself for not getting a shot of the table that looked just like you'd expect a family dinner table to look like from a traditional Italiana nonna. We "sampled," with full glasses, seven different wines after our mulled mugs. Half way through "lunch" we learned that if you finish your glass then Antonia or Antonio would refill it with whatever wine we were currently sampling. Usually this would be an easy way to squeeze a couple extra sips out of an establishment but there was literally no room. We were told this is pretty normal here, so pro tip, if you're not ready for another glass of wine, always leave a little in our glass! 🍷 

On the way home, Aldo told us about a devastating earthquake in 1980 in Antonio's valley. It was a 6.9 which killed 2500, injured 7700, and left the region of 250,000, homeless. I was in awe listening to his narration of the event. Earthquakes have been a part of my life since we moved to Alaska and since the first terrifying experience at the age of 9 I've learned to respect, and almost enjoy, the sheer power of mother nature. But I've also felt earthquakes more powerful than a 6.9 which resulted in little more damage than a wave of social media posts. I was struggling to fathom the destruction. Prior to the 1980 Irpinia Earthquake there were few building codes in the area and definitely no requirements for seismic activity. People in small villages were still living in some structures from the middle ages and those that were modern were made with inexpensive material not on bedrock but on liquifyable soil, sediment, and volcanic ash. After the earthquake there were massive reforms in all of Italy leading to similar building codes that we enjoy in Alaska. A 6.9 would not demolish entire towns, collapse churches, or destroy an orphanage with children inside, like it did in 1980. The world was quick to send financial aid to Italy but little government oversight, and an active mafia presence, lead to less than quarter of the world's contributions being spent on actual earthquake relief. Afterward, the Camorra, one of the largest criminal enterprises here, entered the construction industry "helping" communities rebuilt while continuing to cut corners and extort locals. Aldo pointed out that this has had lasting consequences into today. Not lost on us, the day we were in the Avellino area learning about their earthquake, was the same day that a 7.8 hit Türkiye killing more than 40,000. (side note, that's the offical spelling of what we call Turkey with a pronunciation similar to "turk-eee-eh")

One of the many villages near Antonia's that had to rebuild after 1980

I kept thinking about being in Anchorage in 2016 for a teacher conference with Brendy Hollett when a 7.1 earthquake hit. I was on the 9th floor of the hotel and Brendy on the 12th and it shook like no other earthquake experience I've had. I jumped for the bathroom doorway and got emotional. The next day there were downed ceiling tiles and cracks in the stairwell. That's it. I found this old article about that earthquake as we drove through this incredibly lush and vibrant region that suffered so much from a slightly less dominate shaker 43 years earlier. 

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Another "wine day" we ventured out to Tenuta Cavalier Pepe for one of their regular Truffle Dinners. It was organized by a local teacher and did not disappoint, as our day started with the popping of several bottles of champagne on the bus! We are amazed that it seems that renting an entire tour bus for a day is way cheaper , and easier, than it is at home. Our group of 23 only paid €18 each for the bus that was ours from 9a-7p and that's with a driver that can navigate the incredibly narrow, crowded, and windy streets of this area! 

We learned about the mystic of truffles and that in the Middle Ages they were left on the tables, untouched, and were often given as bad omens. A truffle doesn't have any roots, so it seems as if they just immaculately grow, which was very much considered witchcraft and heresy in the Middle Ages. (Please take a minute to relish in the irony of an incredibly religious society finding the idea of the immaculate conception of a fungus to be a step too far...) It was really interesting to hear that we really don't know much about how truffles grow, they JUST DO! We know that animals are attracted to their smells and eat them and then their feces help spread the spores to grow more. They're supposedly impossible to farm, which seemed unlikely to me, but I didn't know how to ask questions in Italian so I figured I'd be a good participant and enjoy the tale. There are 100 different types of truffles worldwide and 9 that come from Italy including the rare white truffle. 

 Truffle unearthed by a mutt to be sniffed by a...😛

A podcast that I enjoy called Gastropod had an episode on truffles the same week we went on this excursion! If interested, you can listen to it here. Here I learned that the sweet french truffles we often think of, was actually a marketing ploy to get onboard with the popularity of the fungus truffle! So the delicious hunk of chocolatey goodness came after the popularity of the hunk of earthy savory goodness! And because I like rabbit holes when I find a new topic, this was an interesting read about the history of truffles!

We weren't able to go on an actual truffle hunt. That takes a more complex tour and logistics as the wild boar in this region also love truffles and can be quite dangerous. We will leave that for another day. Today we got to see some staged truffle digging by adorable mutt doggos and then we had the most scrumptious meal that featured truffles in every dish! In the Italian tradition, our meal was hours long and we sat with folks that welcomed our many curiosities and questions about their time in Italy and working for the DoD. During a walk between courses we could hear the bells of a church of a tiny town on a neighbouring hill. During the Middle Ages these two towns would have been rivals but today they share vineyards and tourists!

These made me think of Cat Tails and Pussy Willows which were favourites of my mom's

Just as we did previously, we returned home with a wine buzz, full tummies, and additional new acquaintances. I hesitate to call any of our new encounters "friends" because that implies long established relationships. I'm still reeling too much from missing mine to have an exchange of WhatsApp numbers be considered friendship. 

Each delicious course featured truffles! The raviolis in the lower left and the middle chocolate spoon were my favourites!

In preparation for visitors, and our wine shipment, (and honestly just any day that ends in Y) we added to our new wine collection at each location. We don't plan on being snobs about glasses and pairings but we are excited to learn more, ultimately "the wine doesn't know" and is meant to be enjoyed!

🇮🇹 Italian Morsels to Share🇮🇹

1. This is a great representation of how my Italian acquisition is coming!

2. "Ching Ching" is a traditional Italian way of saying "cheers" with drinks. I felt odd doing it the first time as it had undertones, or overtly ones, of racism to me. Turns out it does have Asian roots but is in no way meant to be offensive.

Welcome to another rabbit hole on those origins. 

A much longer cheers than "ching ching" but we couldn't repeat it today! To be fair we could barely repeat it after our practice one! 

3. When something just "wows" you and you want to express that amazement, the Italian word is "Caspita!" (K-ass-pete-ah). I tried this phrase after trying a wine and got a smile of approval! 

One of our truffle doggos! 

  

We used a cherry liquor from Cavalier to make our first Spritz in the hotel. Spritz (hard spirit, prosecco, splash of soda water, and a dash of citrus) are very common here.  

I was amused by this and took it as a reminder to eat slow and not 
like the starving marvin that I felt like. The multi hour meals are hard to get use to!