Craig Camp

A 'Heretic' Ruffles Feathers in France

There are loads of great wines from this region. Priorat (Priorato in Spanish) is the hotshot of Catalonia and maybe of all of Spain. Here are some suggestions: Penedes Cavas Josep Masachs (sparkling) Jaume Serra - Opera Prima white and Cabernet Sauvignon Jean Leon - Chardonnay Reserva and Tinto Reserva Juve y Camps Cava (sparking) Gran Caus The big gun here is of course Torres who still makes some good wines despite size: Fransola (Sauvignon Blanc), Coronas and Gran Coronas Reserva are outstanding red wine values Priorat - big powerhouse red wines: Scala Dei Clos Martinet Fond de la Figuera Clos Mogador Cims de Porrera Laurona (made just outside the Priorat DO - one of the great values in Spain)

In the current issue of The Wine Spectator (April 30, 2003) the reviewer refers to Valentino in L.A. (Santa Monica) as continuing its, "reign as one of the best Italian restaurants in the United States." As Valentino is now thirty years old it is reasonable to assume that other restaurants have passed Valentino by in quality and in innovation. Some claim Spiaggia in Chicago owns the throne. So the question remains - what is the most innovative Italian restaurant in the United States.

DECANTER MAN OF THE YEAR 2003: Jean-Michel Cazes

The major difference is between acid and tannin is that acid can be tasted (sour) and felt while tannins are only felt. Try tasting a cup of strong tea without sugar and you can feel the drying sensations of tannin on the roof of your mouth. Acids cause salivation while tannin has a drying effect. That being said, when tasting very young red wines from barrel your palate is intensely assaulted by both tannins and acids. Often both are higher than they will be in the finished wine. At this level there is a much greater potential for confusion than when the wines are in bottle. It seems to me that many American wine critics are willing to accept wines that are high in tannin but reject wines that are high in acidity. The 1988 vintage in Burgundy certainly suffered from this in the American press. No FG they have not recanted nor are the likely to. There is no reason for them to change their position because their readers only care about the current vintage in release. They have nothing to gain by reassessing older vintages.

You have my vote.

You have to start drinking better cheap champagne.

For me Brie with red wine is terrible. Try this experiment. Take a good red wine (I don't want you to punish yourself) and enjoy in through the meal. When you have the taste firmly in your mind re-taste the wine one one more time then take a bite of Brie than return to the wine. I believe it will taste thinner and more tannic than before. If the Brie is over-ripe this can be disgusting. Now repeat with Parmigiano and watch the wine change in the other direction. Now repeat the process with a white at the next meal. The stronger the taste of the cheese the more damage it does to the wine.

Always glad to hear I am being fashionable. The reality is that the cheese tends to arrive just at the point in the meal when there is red wine to finish. I believe that much of the tradition comes from this and the fact that a lot of people over the centuries that ate cheese and drank wine on a daily basis didn't care about the issue - they just drank the local wine with the local cheese - often they ended up matching well. Now we are drinking wines from all over the world with cheeses from all over the world and some pretty nasty matches can be created. I admit as a wine geek I can get obsessed about the cheese screwing up my last glass of wine. As I cheese geek I admit I go ahead and eat the cheese and drink the wine anyway. If the match is bad that's what the bread is there for.

I would take the opposite position. I think failed matches between wine and cheese are the norm. First of all most cheese makes dry and/or tannic red wines taste thin and bitter. Nothing like a Brie or a chevre to destroy a nice dry red. Blue cheeses demolish tannic dry red wines. White wines and sweet wines are the easiest to match with cheeses. I think the only really great match with dry reds are the dry, aged cheeses like Parmigiano Reggiano - the ultimate in dry red wine cheese matches. In the cheese and wine matching struggle the cheese always wins and a bad match ruins the taste of the wine - not the cheese.

Both - they both like sun and ripen later. How good is a good question. There have been many so-so vintages of Tignanello. They must really be bad to not make it at all. They have loads of technology to make up for all sorts of problems and if even that can't save them they must not have much to work with.

You can find the Osterie guide and many other good guides on the Slow Food web site: Link to Slow Food books The Faith Willinger book is available through Amazon. I'll let you know when I find where you can get the Gambero Rosso Guide in the USA. Their website stinks. Here is a link to the Veronelli ratings: I Soli di Veronelli

Sancerre and goat cheese - the Crottin from that area Crottin de Chavignol

Over the years he has had to change to bigger boxes because the bushel crates won't hold it anymore.

Perhaps the interesting part of the Lettuce Entertain story is not Lettuce itself, but what it is doing to other creative restaurants. Lettuce takes such a big chunk out of the available customers that it does damage to the independent market in Chicago.

So I was right. No one cares. Still it is hard to ignore a company so completely dominating the Chicago dining scene. For better or worse Lettuce defines the fine dining scene and most of the other dining scenes in Chicago and Lettuce Entertain You represents a gigantic slice of what the outside world thinks of Chicago fine dining. While we may be above them they cannot be ignored and are worthy of discussion. Lettuce Entertain You's marketing machine has driven more than one fine Chicago restaurant into extinction. So while it may not be cool to discuss them, it is a relevant issue to any serious Chicago diner - no matter how jaded. Like it or not Lettuce Entertain You is dining in Chicago to most people - both in and out of town.

You can keep these guys (from a good vintage) as long as your cellar conditions will handle. I am currently drinking some 78 Marcarini Brunate that is great now, but will continue to improve. I tasted the 96 Cavallotto this week and it is a great wine - it will age as long as any nebbiolo produced.

I think that was a couple of decades ago. No, it was two years ago. My father in law cut it out of Men's Journal or some other crappy magazine. It did suck because then he always had Stroh's at his house, instead of Pilsner Urquell or Heinekin. Bad luck. You can't believe everything you read. Do they still make Stroh's? We used to buy huge volumes very very cheap when we were in college. We were doing serious comparative tastings of mass produced lager beers.

Well said. The way the trade handles wines in the USA continues to be a disaster. If the importer temperature controls the distributor doesn't. Even if the distributor has a temperature controlled warehouse they will deliver the wine in a baking hot truck. A lot of lip service is giving to this but very few wines get to the consumer without being exposed to temperature extreme during at least one stage of the shipping process.

Speaking of that, what traditionally styled Barolos do you like outside of the big boys? Cavallotto Bricco Boschis Francesco Rinaldi Poderi Colla Marcarini Brunate and La Serra Giuseppe Rinaldi Barolo Brunate

This is just not true. Collectors played a huge part in contributing to cooked and low ullage wines. Few people had good storage until the last ten years. Many many wine collectors used to keep their wines stored in their "cool" basement in their suburban homes. I am sure there were many days when the temperature got near 70 and people didn't realize it. In fact I have friends who still do that. They won't spring for temperature/humidity control because they claim their passive cellar is good enough. Of course, this doesn't negate the fact that the importers and retailers were slow to adapt to a temperature controlled standard and that many wines were ruined. But this is why I buy my older wines almost exclusively in Europe. That is just not true. Do you have any idea how many wines are actually aged? How do you know these wines were not damaged before the found their way to the suburban cellars you mention. You're right - few people had good storage until 10 years ago. Fewer still collected wine. If you are buying older wines from auctions in the USA that you cannot trace the storage conditions of - you deserve what you get. Here you are focusing on a tiny percentage of wines - old wines of auction caliber. Let's assume anyone dropping big bucks on old wines at auction is clever to know they need to store the wines in proper conditions. While this may be what you think of when it comes to wine it is only a curiosity to most. Most people buy wines to drink - not to end up in an auction. They also do not buy their wines at auctions but at stores. There are generally two types of collectors: 1. THE COLLECTOR: collecting wine is their passion and they acquire far more wine than they can ever hope to drink in their lives (must to the pleasure of the auction houses). Part of their pleasure is in the ownership itself. Perfect cellar conditions for them are an absolute must as because of the shear number of wines in the collection they must last as LONG as possible. They never acquire enough because the acquisition is part of the thrill. These people are very important because their ability to stage unique tastings (50 years of Latour etc.) make them the curators of a museum holding treasures that most could never own but are able to touch through such events. They preserve the history of wine. 2. THE DRINKER: Wine is their passion but they are buying for consumption. Often they buy wines by the case because they run into a great bargain. They buy a wide range of wines ranging from 'house wine' to great estates. Most of the wines in their cellar need require less than 20 years of aging to reach maturity. They reach a point where they start to think they own too much wine. These people need very good cellar conditions, but can survive and enjoy their wines to the fullest without dead on perfect storage. Their biggest thrill is opening a complex and mature wine they aged themselves. So it not only depends on what wines you are going to store but why you are storing them.

Robert - thank you for bringing up the Veronelli guides- I think they are all excellent. I Vini di Veronelli Guida d'Oro is the finest and most complete guide to Italian wine in print. The Gambero Rosso wine guide is just rediscovering traditional styled wines while Veronelli has always been able to understand and effectively review both styles. I have found the Critica & Guida Golosa somewhat useful, if less serious than other guides. His cute little icons are certainly easy to follow if you don't read Italian.

Most of the differences that occur between wines in the UK and wines in the USA comes from poor shipping, warehousing and retail storage in the USA - not from poor storage in personal wine cellars. Cellar damage is the least of a wine's worries when coming to the USA as the damage is already done by the time you get your wine home. Most ullage problems in the USA come from (as you correctly note) from exposure to excessive temperature. Ullage from low humidity takes many, many years to occur.

Buying low ullage bottles is at best a risky proposition. This is why ullage is always an issue mentioned in auction catalogs. You were lucky. I believe that's what I said, "55 F. is usually listed as the perfect storage temperature, but this is necessary only for very long aging periods. The lower the temperature the slower the maturation." First of all the question was if a cellar with a constant 18 C. is acceptable - it is. Will the wines mature faster than at 13 C.? Obviously yes. Your assumption is that a the wine will taste better simply because it takes longer to reach the maturation point. So yes, an individual wine may reach maturity at 15 years old instead of 18 years old - but what does this matter as long as the quality is the same?

I think that was a couple of decades ago. No, it was two years ago. My father in law cut it out of Men's Journal or some other crappy magazine. It did suck because then he always had Stroh's at his house, instead of Pilsner Urquell or Heinekin. IMHO Pilsner Urquell is the finest mass produced beer in the world.