A Coffele Wedding...a little preview

Unfortunately all of the photos from the wedding of Alberto Coffele and Giulia Pastori have not been fully assembled from the 3-4 unofficial wedding photographers (all friends or relatives of the bride or the groom).

But here is a sneak peak...

Alberto & Chiara pre-wedding...and just a tad bit nervous.











Beppino Coffele (Chiara's Dad)...looking very wise and dashing, as always.














Me and Davide, Alberto's best man. The best man duties for an Italian boy basically include...well, showing up to the wedding and buying a slightly more expensive present for the newlyweds. Ta Da!












The view of Lake Orta (or Lago D'Orta) from the church. Lake Orta is a little bit north of Milan, absolutely spectacular and apparently quite a popular spot for weddings.










More photos to come...and the reasons why they also, shockingly enough, do weddings better in Italy!

- Zucca

A White Trash BBQ in Castelcerino...

Now this is what I call a bbq.

Shirtless men manning the largest grill I have ever seen...and cooking up an obscene amount of tasty pork products.

To be exact, enough of the following pork products to feed roughly 30 people:
- Costine di maiale (pork ribs)
- Salsicce (sausage)
- Bistecca di prosciutto (basically Italian ham steak)
- Pancetta (Italian bacon)

The bbq took place at the Coffele Agriturismo, or "bed and breakfast."

Well, more accurately...the Coffele "bed & breakfast to be served sometime in the near future."

The bbq was in celebration of my Dad and his lady's visit to Soave (the lovely Linda)...as well as the upcoming birthday of my Dad and that of Giovanna, Chiara's mom.



A friend from Boston, Paul Christophersen, was also in attendance..and I would be fooling myself to think that the driving force behind his postponing his flight to England to stay for the bbq was to spend more time with me and not the lure of the Fred Flintstone sized hunks of meat.

The menu also included guacamole, fresh tomatoes and basil and a cold rice dish.

And of course, Coffele wine was served in abundance.


Luckily the weather held up and we were able to end this fabulous day with an excursion through the Coffele vineyards to pick some fresh cherries...led by the fearless Giovanna (pictured with me below).


It was a real treat introducing my Dad and Linda to all of the wonderful people that I have met during my stay in Italy. All of whom have made my experience here truly unbelievable...and even better, more entertaining and definitely significantly crazier than I could have ever imagined.

All of whom have also contributed to the re-enforcing of my belief that they do everything just a little bit better in Italy.

- Zucca

Soave wines getting some press in the US...

Eric Asimov, chief wine critic of The New York Times, recently wrote an article about Soave wines after conducting a tasting of 25 different Soaves.

In addition to himself, the wine panel consisted of Florence Fabricant, Fred Plotkin (author of a number of books on Italian food, wine and music) and David Lynch (co-author of “Vino Italiano: The Regional Wines of Italy”).

I wanted to pass along the link to the article to anyone who may be interested in learning a bit more about Soave wines...and the different POVs from the tasting panel.

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/05/14/dining/14wine.html?ex=1211428800&en=3fc210dba0c1f2e8&ei=5070&emc=eta1

I have also added the link under "HMM...INTERESTING" on the left.

And am very happy to report that the Coffele Soave Classico Ca'Visco 2006 was #5 on their list...and described as:

"Fresh, tangy and refreshing; cries out for seafood."

Just like the producers!!

- Zucca

Gambe d'oro...

This is a new addition to the list of nicknames that I have been given over the years (some previous ones include stretch, skinny bones, red and carrot top.)

The translation...here's a little clue.

"The Golden Compass", the first novel in Philip Pullman's trilogy "His Dark Materials," translates to "La Bussola D'Oro" in Italian (which was actually the first movie I saw in an Italian cinema).

D'oro = of gold

Gambe = legs

So I am now referred to as "Legs of Gold" or "Golden Legs" by one of the regulars at Enoteca Drago.

and I am just fine with that.

- Zucca

From Russia With Love...

Ok...think I received my first ever proposition for sex from a Russian businessman last week.

I have had a number of interesting exchanges/experiences over the past 6 months in Italy...but this definitely rates at the top of the list.

I was at Matley's (a local bar outside the walls of Soave) with Laura, a close girlfriend of Chiara and I.

I was approached by this Russian man dressed in a suit...He kept repeating the same line over and over again in Russian but noone in the bar could understand a word he was saying. Hand gestures were then utilized, which unfortunately did not help very much.

Having realized the hand gestures weren't working, he then started to pull out a good amount of euros from his wallet (to the utter shock of basically everyone in the bar, who of course had all been watching this exchange with complete amusement). It was pretty obvious based on the amount of cash he pulled out that my Russian was not just offering to pay for drinks.

Now, I am not a smoker but have been known to take a drag or two off of someone else's cigarette after a few drinks.

It was at this point that I decided a drag or two would not do and that I needed at least one whole cigarette all to myself...so Laura and I exited the bar.

We re-entered the bar briefly to pay for our drinks. It appeared that my new Russian friend wanted to escort us home, but Fabio (the bartender) put his foot down...and let's just say that the Russian may not have understood Italian, but he understood Fabio completely and remained inside the bar.

Of course upon arriving at home I attempted to find the Russian translation for "What is your hourly rate?," "How much for the entire night?" and "How do you feel about bondage?" online.

Anyone by any chance familiar with the Cyrillic alphabet?

- Zucca

The Coffele Dinner at Enoteca Drago...

The annual Coffele dinner during Vinitaly at Enoteca Drago in Soave was...well. Perfect.

A truly wonderful evening with great food, splendid company and of course, lots of Coffele wine.

The attendees included a number of Coffele wine distributors, clients, friends of the family, 2 Masters of Wine, Giovanna and Giuseppe Coffele (Chiara and Alberto's parents), the founder of a new wine search engine and journalists in the industry...The amount of wine knowledge at Enoteca Drago this particular Saturday night was overwhelming and just a bit intimidating for someone who considers themselves still quite the novice when it comes to wine.

The night started off with a buffet of freshly sliced prosciutto, oysters, mussels and clams served on the patio at Enoteca Drago...and a tasting of older vintages of some of the Coffele wines, such as Alzari and their Soave Classico.

We then moved inside and were treated first to a plate of risotto with asparagus served with Ca' Visco...and then came one of my favorite dishes at Enoteca Drago...Filetto di Manzo, which you cook at the table with something like a hibachi grill. Buonissima!!

So simple, but so tasty. The meat arrives at the table perfectly sliced and ready to be placed on the grill for as short/long a period as you would like. Add a little olive oil, salt and pepper after the meat has been cooked and your tastebuds are in for a treat. This dish was served with Nuj, one of 2 red wines that the Coffele estate produces (75% merlot and the remaining 25% being a combination of cabernet sauvignon and cabernet franc).

Dessert was next...served with the sweet nectar the Coffele family calls "Le Sponde," their Recioto di Soave.

It was then time for some amaros (Italian herbal liqueurs, drank mainly after-dinner as a digestif to settle the stomach a bit) and some limoncello and grappa. My preferred amaro is Montenegro...but there are a number of others, such as Jagermeister (who knew) and Braulio.

Finally at around 1:30am...it was off to Cavo, a bar located in San Bonifacio and the 2nd locale where my bartender preferito works.

The crew did dwindle a bit in size after dinner.

The long-haulers included myself, Chiara, Pete and Franz, Doug Cook (friend of Chiara's from California and founder of the new wine search engine called Able Grape - www.ablegrape.com), Danny Boucher (don't know quite how to describe Danny...thinking a password protected separate section may be required) and Filippo Pistone (Chiara's distributor from NY and the man wearing my scarf in the group photo).

I lost my scarf in a guessing game of what combination of flavors/ingredients were in a particular drink...The correct answer was liquirizia (a fairly dense, licorice flavored liquor). Doh!!!

- Zucca

How do you compete...

not only with 2 girls in skin tight unitards (gold as opposed to silver this year) with uncanningly natural-seeming golden wigs, but in addition...a topless chick with gold body paint?

And I must admit, Chiara and I looked pretty damn cute in our new Custo Barcelona dresses.

Yes. Astoria, the stand always directly right in front of the Coffele stand at Vinitaly, outdid themselves and busted out with some new tricks this year. The topless girl posing and lounging around the stand on the last day of Vinitaly being one of them.

Have a feeling most people will not remember what Astoria actually produces...but, will not be able to forget the golden girls. Heck, it took me until day #3 to realize they produced prosecco.

Chiara already has some ideas for pushing the envelope next year at the Coffele stand for Vinitaly...one involving she and I and a bathtub filled with her fabulous Recioto di Soave, "Le Sponde" (a beautiful dessert wine produced with 100% garganega grapes).

I think we should keep it simple and have the theme for the 2009 Coffele stand be "Tutti nudi."

Don't think a translation is required. Hopefully.

- Zucca