Category Archives: Uncorked

Chilly? Nestle into this old school, old world red, here sitting pretty on our Design District back office balcony.

It’s wintertime. Dean’s suited up, probably a crisp Jack Taylor in shades of grey, crowing this tune. What is he drinking?  According to wine director Eric Larkee, it should be nebbiolo.  Silvio Giamello, Vicenziana, Barbaresco 2006 to be exact (BTB/74.)

“It’s a wine I want to curl up with a nice roast,” he says.  ”Something from our wood burning oven.

With today’s 15 degree slide into what we hope will be a long, brisk South Florida winter, you may opt for our patio and reach for this DOCG Piedmontese red, coddled by the Alps of northwest Italy, an opening act to whole wood roasted Poulet Rouge with rosemary-plumped raisins and toasted pine nuts and a side of sweet, creamy squash from that same hearth, splashed with Meyer lemon salsa verde.

Of this bottle, the New York Times’ Eric Asimov last year proclaimed it number one.  ”Clearly an old-school wine,” he wrote. “Its pale red color, rimmed with orange at the edge, was a giveaway, as was the delicate, nuanced fragrance of flowers, tar and minerals. On the palate, its structure was evident, yet so was its delicacy. That combination is the soul of great nebbiolo. … The Giamello was also our best value.”

The last time I borrowed bottles to shoot, they turned up in a cookbook.  The fate of Vicenziana? Oh, trusting Eric…