tunina

What can I say - we hard core wine geeks are hard to deal with. We force you to drink all that old stuff in our cellars. Yeh, I guess you guys have to get rid of all that wine somehow!

Before you think about wine as a gift to a party with food, I believe you must think about your host and the other guests first. For a party at Craig's house, I would not bring wine as a gift, based on the above quote, however there have plenty of times that I have been invited to a party where the host and the guests were very happy I brought wine. I also ask if I can assist the host of such parties in serving the wine or answering questions about the wine if possible. I find this makes the host feel more comfortable about a wine being served to his/her guests that they may know nothing about. This also helps the guests learn alittle more about what they are drinking. Often enough I've noticed it helps break the ice between unfamilar guests and inspires some good conversation.

To that Craig I suggest: take it while you can still get it!

Gentlemen, I agree that Italians never add cheese to seafood pasta dishes, however it is true, Americans seem to love grated cheese with seafood pasta. And even with using a smaller amount of sauce with pasta, and with or without cheese, I still prefer not to salt the water. I find that cooking the pasta in the water to a very "al dente" stage, straining it and cooking the pasta with the sauce, i.e., marrying the two together, the pasta absorbes the sauce and is flavored and brought alive, as you say, by the sauce and the bit of starch left in the pasta as it cooks further. I also find that I use less sauce with this method. Honestly, to the people I know who cook and love to eat pasta, it is really a matter of personal taste. The "do salts" certainly have the decision, but you might want to try it without and see what you like best. After all, isn't that the most important thing?

Craig, Your Italian wine law articles are very helpful. I imagine the wine designations started out as a good idea perhaps in regards to protecting indigenous grape types and geographical production zones. Unfortunately, it seems that all they really have become are marketing tools. Do you agree?

Oh, I forgot, but I also believe that salting the pasta water is an old peasant trick in order to flavor a inexpensive pasta product. I rarely saw salt added to the pasta water when I worked in restaurant kitchens in Italy, especially when they cooked fresh pasta.

My mother (and many others obviously) believe one must salt the water when cooking pasta. However, (sorry Mom) I rather adjust for salt in my sauce. In addition, grating cheese, especially pecorino romano adds a pleasant briny, salty edge that our household enjoys.