Brasato al Barolo

I am no stranger to using a fine bottle of wine for cooking. As some of you may know, I have been known to use a Châteauneuf-du-Pape when making lamb stew, not that I would do that every time, mind you. So when I found this recipe for a Brasato al Barolo, I was excited about giving it a try. Having said that, I was not prepared to use an entire bottle of Barolo to prepare it. Even with the lamb stew I only used about half a bottle of the Châteauneuf. Perhaps someday I will follow the recipe more closely.

But I did pull out from the closet a 2005 Barolo by Silvio Grasso to serve with this dish. If you find any 2005 Barolos still out there, you should grab them, for the year was an outstanding vintage for that region. This one still has a lot of cellar time left, even in my closet. Lucky for me I still have a few bottles left. The tannin remains firm, but it is rich with dark cherry and even a hint of tobacco. It was an excellent wine, but I am dreaming of the day in maybe another year or two when this wine will be heavenly.

For the Brasato, I used a bottle of Damilano Marghe, a 2009 Nebbiolo D'Alba. I figured it would be a suitable substitute for the Barolo in the dish considering the grape was the same. It wasn't badly priced and I was familiar with the house of Damilano. The dish is relatively easy to prepare, but does take a long time because the meat is braised at a low temperature of just 250 degrees. It was served with Brussels sprouts roasted with dried cherries and walnuts, and roasted parsnips (which, sadly, were overcooked).

I'll rate the Barolo a 9 for now, but it wouldn't surprise me if this reaches 10 status in another year or so.

Nebbiolo grown in Arizona?

I hadn’t visited the former ghost town of Jerome, Ariz., for 30 years, so I was anxious to return to see what had happened to this arty enclave clinging to the side of a mountain determined to slide into oblivion. When last I visited, the hippie and art crowd were just beginning to squat, turning old, crumbling buildings into new shows, restaurants and even apartments and condos. I in no way expected to find so many wine tasting shops when I returned, and one I visited had some very interesting wines produced from grapes grown in Arizona.

Yes, in Arizona, and among them was a rosé crafted from Nebbiolo grown in the hills north of Wilcox, Ariz., which is in the southeast corner of the state. But I’m getting ahead of myself.

Caduceus Cellars & Merkin Vineyards Tasting Room in Jerome offers a wide variety of wines and tasting flights, including some that match cheese and other appetizers with their wines. The $10 flight I tried included four wines: a white, a rosé, and two reds.

The first wine was called Dos Ladrones, a 2010 vintage made with Malvasia Bianca and Chardonnay grown in Arizona. It had a bright, fragrant nose, but was a bit creamy on the first taste. Happily this creaminess disappeared on the finish, which was fresh and had just the right combination of orchard fruit and citrus. There seemed to be a little bit of herb and maybe even some white pepper? It was a very nice start.

Then came the wine that intrigued me the most: a rosé made from Nebbiolo, but not just any Nebbiolo, but Nebbiolo grown in Arizona! What was this? To me, Nebbiolo is a truly noble grape used to craft outstanding Barolo. And like Pinot Noir, Nebbiolo can be a delicate and finicky grape. Certainly, I was familiar with the beautifully elegant and even muscular Barolos, but a rosé?

Called Lei Li Rosé, this 2010 vintage had an almost amber pink color. The nose was fresh with lovely but so ephemeral fruit that had just a bit of zing to it. Tasting, this wine was very delicate, the flavors very subtle but really quite good followed by a lingering finish. Seriously, the flavors were so delicate that I could see someone easily missing them. This was a wine that demanded your attention, but was a delight to drink. So delicate, I wondered how to pair it with cheese. They had an answer for me at the shop, but unfortunately I can’t remember the name of the cheese; it was a creamy French cheese with a mild flavor unless you got piece next to the rind.

calvinwazoo

Number 3 was a 2009 vintage blend of Syrah and Malvasia Bianca, also grown in Arizona, called Primer Paso. It had a very oaky nose, so overpowering that I couldn’t smell any fruit no matter how I swirled and sniffed. The oak was so strong it was almost like sniffing a cedar box. It was juicy, not jammy, on the taste, but there was nothing left for the finish. Not my favorite at all, but surprisingly it was the favorite wine of one of the pourers in the shop.

The final wine was made with grapes from California, a 2008 vintage blend of Sangiovese and Cabernet Sauvignon. Called Nagual de la Naga, I half expected something robust and even muscular, not just because it was the last wine in the flight, but also because one of the pourers described it as a “super Tuscan” style wine. Powerful it was not, but it was a nice wine. There was a light nose of cherry and cassis with a bit of herb and earth; very rustic. It was juicy and bright, the Cabernet nicely tempered, I thought, by the Sangiovese. It had nice tannin as well, suggesting that it might cellar for a few more years.

So there you have it. Even in a town like Jerome, Ariz., you can find wine tasting rooms with interesting offerings and even some surprises, like that Nebbiolo rosé.

A very noble grape

My experience with Barolo is very limited, but I vowed that I would learn more about this wine and its key grape – Nebbiolo. I wrote one time before about a delightful Barolo I picked up on a whim, and recently I did the same with a Nebbiolo from the Langhe region of Italy.

The 2009 Marchesi di Grésy Nebbiolo Langhe Martinenga may not have much age to it, but this was a really nice experience all around. As I wrote before, Nebbiolo is a delicate grape much like Pinot Noir that when crafted well delivers beautiful results. And also like Pinot Noir, when Nebbiolo is done not-so-carefully, it can be a major disappointment. This is why Burgundy and Barolo can be so iffy at times, as these wines tend to be expensive, and no one wants to spend $50 on a bottle that doesn’t deliver.

This bottle, however, was very nice, particularly for the price of just $19. It had a beautiful light color that was transparent, a brilliant garnet. The nose was very rich with cinnamon mixed in with delicate fruit. There was a slight astringent quality on the taste, but it was pleasing, and the finish was soft and subtle, very clean. It was a wine experience unlike any other I have had.

While the 2009 vintage was not rated by Wine Spectator, the wine has a track record of moderately impressive scores with the magazine over the past decade, most in the mid 80s. For me, this was a very positive experience and I will be trying others.

If you have some interest in Barolos and other wines made from Nebbiolo, I encourage you to visit the blog La Cave de Fang, where you will find several posts on a number of Barolos and other wines made from Nebbiolo, as well as some other Italian wines.

I rate this wine with an 8.5 using my 10-point scale at the left. I will certainly pick this one up again.

Behold the lamb of Halloween

I got the itch to cook an opulent meal again, as I had a few wines that were likely ready to drink. I also wanted to prepare a pumpkin soup fit for the season. The main course was to be a boneless leg of lamb prepared with goat cheese, spinach and pine nuts. I also had fresh beets to make a delicious beet greens dish, but alas, I forgot about the beets themselves and they stayed in the refrigerator. And there were also some simple skillet potatoes cooked with rosemary.

The wine selected was the 2004 Damilano Barolo Lecinquevigne, something that Wine Spectator described as a full-bodied wine with round, chewy tannins, “but turns slightly hollow on the finish.” I’ve only drank a Barolo once before, several years ago at an Italian restaurant in Chicago’s Loop with my sister, Roberta, and her husband Jack. Barolo has been called the “king of wines,” however by 2007 the king’s thrown was being usurped.

Lettie Teague writes in Food and Wine that, “the Barolos of only two decades ago bear little resemblance to the wines of today.” A new breed of winemakers had decided that Barolo needed a new look and feel with some Cabernet added to the traditional Nebbiolo grape, then aged in French oak rather than the Solvenian casks used by traditionalists. Interestingly, it was the Frenchman Louis Oudart who, back in the mid-19th century, left his mark on this Piedmont wine after being solicited by the Marchesa of Barolo. The modernists also wanted a wine that could be drank young, whereas the traditionalists required barrel aging for a minimum of two years, followed by further aging in the bottle.

Interestingly, Barolo has earned the moniker of being the Burgundy of Italy. As Teague writes: “First, Nebbiolo is a lot like Pinot Noir, the great red grape of Burgundy, in that it is also thin-skinned, difficult to grow and possessed of beguiling aromas. Second, Barolo, like Burgundy, requires its followers to memorize many names—not only dozens of producers (traditional and otherwise) but also names of communes and vineyards. And finally, like Burgundy, Barolo can be quite inconsistent. The highs are high and the lows, very low. And it doesn’t come cheap.”

The Damilano follows the traditionalists’ style using Nebbiolo only, selected from five different estates. Like a Pinot Noir, the wine’s color in the glass is a deep cranberry that is easily seen through. It was very subtle and friendly, working well with the strong flavors in the lamb. As the meal went on, there was a period when the tannins burst forward, giving this wine some real muscle, but by the time the meal was ending, those tannins had softened again and the wine finished delicate and smooth. Wine Spectator, I thought, gave it an undeserved 88 points; I thought it was a 90-pointer. And it was definitely a good find at $34, as its normal retail price is pegged at $50.

I rate this with a 9 on my 10-point scale on the left.

Here’s the recipe for the stuffed leg of lamb.

Take a 5-pound boneless leg of lamb, untie it and spread it out on a cutting board. Cut slits into the meat at about 2-inch intervals to help the meat lay flat. Cut away any excess fat. Cover the meat with plastic and pound the hell out of it until it’s about three-quarters of an inch thick. Salt and pepper it, then place a layer of freshly washed spinach greens on the meat. On top of that, crumble goat cheese, about 6 ounces-worth. Sprinkle pine nuts on top of that. Then roll the meat back up tightly and tie it with kitchen twine.

In a dish, mix a cup of flour with 1 tablespoon each of salt and pepper, and 1 teaspoon each of thyme and fennel seeds. Roll the lamb in this mixture until it is evenly coated. Then in a cast iron skillet, heat sesame oil until hot. Sear the lamb on all sides, including the ends, in the hot oil. When finished, leave the lamb in the skillet and place it into a 400-degree preheated oven. Cook about 40 minutes until the internal temperature is 140 degrees for medium rare. Let it rest outside of the over before slicing and serving.