Confessions of a Wino

Lightly sparkling, fresh and with bright acidity, this is a veritable Bellini in a bottle even without the peach!

I first tasted this at a Wine Society tasting in sunny (ok it was a few weeks ago!) Manchester. I immediately placed a bulk order for, erm, quarter of a case.  As the dregs of the third bottle slip smoothly down my throat like a porn star’s underwear down her ample thighs, I now regret my meanness…..

La Riva dei Frati Prosecco di Valdobbiadene came from the Wine Society at £8.95.

Italian wines are often accused of being over-tannic.  I guess that is a matter of opinion but I woke up with a headache this morning.

Last night I had the pleasure of attending my first Wine Society event, an informal tasting within the impressive architecture of the Freemason’s Hall on Bridge Street.  Such things clearly need a theme and this one was “Italy from top to toe”.  Given the country in question one might equally have dreamt up “heel to sole” or “thirst to last”.  But that’s enough cobblers.

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In the classic comedy series, Fawlty Towers, Basil plans a gourmet night to attract a higher class of clientele to the infamous Torquay hotel.  Kurt, the excellent new chef who fancies Manuel the Spanish waiter played by Andrew Sachs, until recently one of Jonathan Ross’ closest acquaintances, manages to get totally pie-eyed and passes out just before the dinner is supposed to be cooked.  With guests already arriving, local restaurateur, André, comes to the rescue with a three choice menu of duck with orange, duck with cherry or duck surprise (duck with neither orange nor cherry), that never makes it to the table.  The culmination of this disaster scenario is Basil thrashing his Austin 1100 with a branch in one of the funniest, well known and most repeated scenes of the comedy solar system.

So when Alan and Heidi invited us to Casa Mia Grande, a well known Italian restaurant in Chapel Allerton, for a “gourmet evening”, I quivered, took the car for a service, wore my stain proof pants and a shirt that could tolerate red wine spills.

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I’ve been pretty unkind to Stresa.  It is a fabulous location for a quiet holiday and I spent just a few Autumn days there.  Plenty of boating, walking, cycling, even snow skiing a brisk 4 hour walk uphill away.  But I ate out at a few places in the town and mostly found it poor reward for my day’s exercise.

One notable exception was Caffé Torino where a superb meal for two with a bottle of wine cost only £1,340,056, or €54.30 at today’s exchange rate.  The antipasto (below) at €8 is one of the best value plates I have ever seen.

The Italian menu said Tagliere di Salumei di Mottarone which I translated as Viande Sechée or Succulent wind dried mountain pork and cheese from a nearby ski resort.  However the local linguist settled for the dreadfully American Cold cuts which turns this simply beautiful display into a CSI murder victim found in the cellar of a lonely spinster.

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Stresa, majestically overlooking Lago Maggiore, in the foothills of the Italian Alps, should be a gourmand’s dream.  But sadly it caters to every tourist-trapping, pension-grabbing, fruit-juice-slurping, pie-eating, over-eating, day-trip-loving, coach-travelling, lip-smacking, tongue-slavering, downbeat, yester-year tourists from all of England and sometimes Italy.  The Germans are too sensible, or too time constrained to visit, and the Americans are all credit-crunched.

Although a beautiful town, unfortunately one of the best things to come out of Stresa is the regular boat to the islands and in less than an hour, Pallanza, where there is a single restaurant with something worth eating.

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In the interests of fairness, as there are other ristoranti at the top of Mottarone, and because Italian bureaucracy once again trumped my plan to visit Locarno today, we decided to try route M3 from Baveno up to Mottarone, where we found Albergo Ristorante Eden.

Yesterday we took route L1 from nearby Stresa to the same summit, a 1300m climb.  Today was the same altitude ascent but via an up and down ridge that followed a bracing 700m rise to Mt Camoscio where we were rewarded with a view of heaven, well clouds to be precise.

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I am in Stresa where the scenery is incredible, Lago Maggiore is awesome and much bigger than I expected, but it’s damn near impossible to hire a mountain bike.  Rather than rough mountain terrain, Italian bureaucracy is the obstacle.

So, with only Shanks’ pony available, we headed up the hill to Mottarone, a majestic 1491m above sea level making this a near 1300m climb – a decent half day walk.  Mottarone turns out to be a small ski resort with 7 lifts and about 28km of ski runs – they look mostly blue and red, although on 1 October they are all green.

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I’m always on the lookout for a bargain but I have had my fingers burnt a few times when trying to shave a few pennies off my sparkling wine budget.  The closest I have come to success is Freixenet Cava (although some maintain that this is only good for washing the dog).  Freixenet retails at less than £6 at places like Costco and Tesco which I think is a bargain….until I spotted an Italian mare at less than a fiver on Tesco’s sparkling shelves!

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When dining out, one well known restaurant critic makes a point of asking how the tips are distributed, always leaving cash, and encourages readers to do the same.  So I dutifully asked the MO of one waiter at the Cornerhouse Grill and was stunned by his response.

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This week I am off to see a cricket match (US readers start snoring now).  However this bottle looks more like a baseball bat (RoW readers look on in awe and dismay).

This late harvest (November 2007) from Gavi certainly has a striking bottle.  What about the wine though?

It is the colour of healthy pee and has a sort of pungent sweetness, but I expected it to be sweeter.  In fact it had good acidity and the overall balance of Michael Vaughan combined with the aggression and flair of Kevin Pietersen.  The taste is of Tropicana grapefruit juice and pear juice with some lemon zest and a bit of sherbet dip. Very refreshing as an aperitif but as a food match it went superbly well with pitta bread and hummus.

I picked it up at Majestic for £8.69