The Boss Abroad: Vin Santo, Holy Wine of Tuscany

In the fall of 2013, Siciliano's Market owners Steve and Barb Siciliano spent two weeks in Italy. What follows is an account of one tremendous meal made all the more memorable because of one tremendous wine: Vin Santo (now available at Siciliano's).

Italian T-bone

By Steve Siciliano

One evening Barb and I were the only diners in a small restorante in the Tuscan hill town of Loro Ciuffenna. We had just finished sharing a massive, perfectly cooked T-bone. Before the steak came, there was an antipasti of olives, cured meats and three crispy crostini topped respectively with beans and olive oil, chicken liver pate and paper-thin sheets of cured fatback.

I was feeling a bit guilty about downing crostini slathered with lardo, but reasoned that the two bottles of red wine we drank with the meal—a Chianti Classico Reserva and a vino nobile di Montepulciano—would help offset the inevitable uptick in bad cholesterol. The restaurant owner walked up to the table. Si, I assured him, the bistecca alla Fiorentina was molto bueno. Si, we would have an after dinner drink. “Due vin santo, per favore.”

Drying grapes

That afternoon we had visited a small, family run winery on the crest of a high hill on the outskirts of Montepulciano. We watched while the owner’s son pumped sangiovese grape must from a stainless steel fermentation tank into a pneumatic wine press. We were told that the pressed grape skins that a worker was shoveling onto the bed of a pickup would be sold to a local grappa producer. We followed the owner’s daughter into an old stone building where vino nobile di Montepulciano was aging in huge oak barrels and then into another old but smaller building where bunches of recently harvested malvasia and trebbianno grapes were drying on wooden racks. The daughter, in almost a reverential whisper, informed us that the grapes would be used to make holy wine.

Tuscan vineyard

“Holy wine?” I asked.

“Si, holy wine. Vin santo.”

Vin santo is virtually unknown outside of Italy. It has been produced almost exclusively in Tuscany for centuries and probably obtained its “holy” moniker because it was the wine that Tuscan priests traditionally used during the celebration of the Mass. Undoubtedly, winemakers in other regions of the world haven’t tried to replicate the style because the process of making true vin santo is so labor intensive. It is also very unpredictable.

During the drying process, which can last for up to six months, the grapes that are used in the production of vin santo lose most of their moisture and their sugars become intensely concentrated. Winemakers gently crush the shriveled grapes then combine the sweet juice with a madre, a slurry of yeast and sediment from past vintages. The must is racked into small oak barrels which are then sealed and left alone, sometimes for as long as five years. While the fermentation is progressing, the barrels are never opened and never topped up; and as the slowly fermenting wine evaporates it acquires a lovely amber color and a sherry-like oxidation. When everything goes right, the result is a wine that is truly extraordinary. If something somewhere in the process goes wrong, the winemaker gets a barrel full of vinegar. 

The vin santo we tasted at the winery that afternoon was certainly not vinegar. It was nicely sweet but not cloying, with aromas of dried fruit and intense flavors of honey, raisins and spices. 

The vin santo we drank at the restorante that evening might have been even better, although I’m willing to concede that the antipasti, the steak and the two bottles of wine might have sharpened my oenophilic senses. After finishing the last drops of the amber liquid Barb and I agreed that we were hopelessly infatuated with Tuscany. Since we were also more than a little tipsy. I motioned to the waiter for the bill. He brought it a few minutes later, along with two more half-filled tumblers of vin santo.

“But I didn’t order these.” I protested in slurred English.

“Gratuito,” he said and smiled.

It’s a good thing our hotel was just a short, wobbly walk away. It would, of course, had been rude to refuse such graciousness.

Castello di Brolio Vin Santo, 2005 Vintage, $66.69/500ml
Now available at Siciliano's Market

Torrontés Wine, Commercial & Homemade: Varietal Review

By Steve Siciliano

Because I am a wine merchant, I’m slightly embarrassed to admit that I had never heard of Torrontés until last fall when wine-kit maker Winexpert announced that the varietal was being offered as one of their 2013 Limited Edition releases. The company’s product description sounded intriguing—hints of peach pit, flowers, and orange citrus fruit, a lush structure and a vibrant acidity. But it wasn’t until Barb and I were in Philadelphia a few weeks ago that I actually drank, and enjoyed, a bottle of Argentina’s signature white wine at a downtown bistro.

I probably shouldn’t be too hard on myself because most oenophiles, wine merchants or not, are not familiar with Torrontés either. The grape is grown virtually nowhere but Argentina, a country best known for producing outstanding malbecs. But over the past few years Argentine winemakers have begun looking for new markets and have increased exports of their country’s best white.

The Torrontés grape thrives in Argentina’s unique microclimate. The vineyards that produce the best fruit lie in the shadows of the Andes and are some of the highest in the world. The high altitudes coupled with scarce rainfall stress the vines, but those conditions also translate into wines that are refreshingly acidic and highly aromatic.

I love white wines with distinctive citrus flavors, spicy aromas and backbones of mouth puckering acidity. A good Torrontés displays all three characteristics—sort of like a cross between a floral, spicy gewürztraminer and a zesty, citrusy New Zealand sauvignon blanc.

We currently have two brands of Torrontés on the shelves at Siciliano’s, and they are good ones:

• Zuccardi Torrontés 2010, $13.39/750ml – “Intense yellow greenish color. Delicate and unique nose, full of white flowers such as roses and citrus blossom. Also notes of mature white fruits and citrus zest. The wine is well structured with a lively acidity but remains centered around the aromatic intensity and delicate finish. This wine is great as aperitif and a perfect match for Asian food, fish dishes and fresh salads” (source).
• Padrillos Torrantes 2011, $13.49/750ml – “Exotic lychee and mangosteen notes greet the nose and carry through into the mouth, which is extremely delicate in the manner of a fine dessert wine. Not that the wine is too sweet – it has just enough sugar to balance its lightness. A good match for mildly flavored dishes like seafood bisques” (source). 

These wines pair wonderfully with grilled fish or a spicy Indian dish. They are also nice to simply sip by themselves while watching fire flies on a warm summer evening on the backyard deck.

Winemakers might be interested to know that we have a few of the Limited Edition Torrontés wine kits available for $134.00.

Stop and Smell the Rosés: French Rosé Wine at Siciliano's

Siciliano's wine buyer Sarah Derylo

By Steve Siciliano

I have to admit that I did a little grumbling a few weeks ago when our wine buyer Sarah Derylo advised me that she was planning on adding some French rosés to our inventory. I’ve always been rather standoffish towards rosés simply because I assumed that they were cut from the same cloth as white zinfandels.

Not that there’s anything wrong with white zinfandels. They’re a little sweet for my tastes and some of them are a little one dimensional, but as a wine merchant I appreciate them because they can serve as a gateway for folks taking their tentative first steps into the world of wine.

Sarah, however, assured me that good French rosés can be bone dry and deliciously complex, and after trying a few of them at our in-store tasting a few weeks back I have to agree. I guess this proves that it’s never too late for a young oenophile to teach even a dogged old wine merchant something new.

The following are some of Sarah’s hand-picked French rosés that are currently on the shelves at Siciliano’s Market.

• Sainte Victoire 2012 Cuvée Rosalie, $16.99/750ml – “A wine with a scent of spring in a pretty pink dress. A delicate nose that is still unusually complex. Notes of orange blossoms and citrus.” A blend of syrah, cinsault, grenache and rolle (source).
• Chateau de Calavon 2012 Rosé, $17.99/750ml – “Pale salmon color with aromas of fresh strawberries and raspberries. Enjoy as an aperitif or as an accompaniment to your favorite summer dishes.” A blend of cinsault, grenache and syrah (source).
• Moulin de Gassac Guilhem 2012 Rosé, $9.99/750ml – “Lively and bright pink. Pleasant nose with notes of strawberries and aromas of crushed red fruits.” A blend of grenache, carignan and syrah (source).
• Chateau la Tour de Beraud 2012 Rosé, $9.79/750ml – “A soft pink color and an excellent aromatic length and depth. Displays fresh, elegant and floral notes overlying aromas of pear and light red fruits. Enjoy as an aperitif or with a meal.” A blend of mourvedre, carignan, syrah and grenache (source).

Recollections in Wine: A Short Course in Chianti

2007 San Leonino Castellina
Chianti Classico, $14.39/750ml

By Steve Siciliano

Sometimes I can’t remember where I put my car keys, but when it comes to a few select experiences from my distant past involving wine, I have wonderful recall. After thirty years I can still remember exactly where I was when I first tasted a Napa Valley Cabernet Sauvignon. It’s been ten years since Barb and I had a wonderful dinner at Hattie’s Restaurant in Suttons Bay (now closed), yet I distinctly recollect the flavors and aromas of the velvety smooth Beaulieu Vineyards pinot noir that we drank with grilled pork chops smothered in a cherry barbecue sauce.

I can also vividly recall my first experience with Chianti. It was in the mid 1970s in a quaint Italian restaurant in the Bronx. Pictures of the Coliseum, the Leaning Tower of Pisa and Michelangelo’s David were on the walls, Dean Martin was crooning on a cassette player and there were red and white checkered tablecloths. In the middle of our table sat an empty, straw-covered wine bottle holding a candle. I asked the old, broken-English-speaking waiter to bring out a full one. While the restaurant’s veal parmesan was magnificent, the wine that came in that whicker basket bottle was atrocious.

Twenty years later in an Italian restaurant on Rush Street in Chicago, another old waiter persuaded me to give Chianti another try. I remember being surprised that the bottle he brought to the table wasn’t one of those whicker fiascos. The gnocchi in that restaurant rivaled my grandmother’s, and that bottle of Ruffino Chianti Classico Reserva Ducale, with its flavors of dried orange, earth and dark chocolate, was so good that I ordered another.

For a wine to be legally called Chianti it must be produced in one of seven demarcated regions in Tuscany and consist of a blend that strictly adheres to Italian wine laws. The blend was once comprised solely of grapes indigenous to the Tuscan region—sangiovese and canailo for the reds, malvasi and/or trebianno for the whites. As Chianti became more popular after World War II, vineyards were planted in areas that produced inferior fruit and winemakers began using the maximum percentage allowed of the less expensive white grapes in the blend. As a result, the quality of Chianti gradually declined. By the late 1960s, it had become thin, unbalanced and acidic, and was probably purchased more for the quaint fiasco than for the wine inside.

Faced with tarnished reputations and declining sales, Tuscan winemakers began taking steps in the mid 1970s to improve the quality of Chianti—less white wine was used in the blend and inferior vineyards were torn up. A few of the more innovative makers even began experimenting with non-indigenous varietals such as cabernet sauvignon, merlot and cabernet franc with impressive results. But since these new wines didn’t follow the traditional Chianti formula, they couldn’t legally be called Chianti. Wine writers nicknamed them the Super Tuscans, a moniker that is still used today. Prompted by the international success of the Super Tuscans, the Italian government revised the traditional formula and winemakers are now allowed to use non-indigenous grapes to produce Chianti.

Today Chianti has reclaimed its position as one of Italy’s most important wines. While it will probably always be associated with quaint Italian restaurants and traditional Italian cuisine, thankfully those once ubiquitous, straw-covered bottles, and the inferior wine they contained, no longer are producing unpleasant memories.

To start making your own memories with Chianti, try San Leonino Castellina Chianti Classico, pictured above and currently available at Siciliano's Market.

Siciliano's Recommends - Gewurztraminer

By Steve Siciliano

What's Gewurz that could happen?

Like most Americans I look forward to a traditional Thanksgiving Day roast turkey and its accompaniment of tasty side dishes. When choosing the wine for this annual feast, the star of the show should, of course, be given the primary focus, but the supporting cast—the wine, for example—also warrants some consideration.

I like Thanksgiving wines that not only compliment the subtle flavors of the fowl but also pair well with the smorgasbord of flavors that are presented by the sauces, spuds, and veggies. A nice pinot noir, with its balanced acidity, bright fruit and low tannins is always my first choice. But when I'm in the mood for a white vino on Turkey Day, I'll always opt for a gewurztraminer.

While certainly not as popular as chardonnays, sauvignon blancs and rieslings, I feel that gewurztraminers, with their spicy flavors and floral aromas, are like side dishes in a glass. The following offerings from Siciliano's wine room both have a trace of sweetness and would make nice additions to Thursday's tummy-busting feast.

• 2011 Lone Birch Gewurztraminer, $9.99/750ml - "A delicate fruit-forward bouquet pear and melon. Light-bodied and crisp with lingering flavors of pear and citrus fruit" (source).
• 2008 Firestone Gewurztraminer, $13.59/750ml - "This is an ideal sipping wine, with alluring notes of lychee, mandarin orange and nutmeg on the nose. Citrus flavors of grapefruit and bergamot emerge on the mouth, which is enlivened by a compelling acid note. Quenching citrus notes balance nicely with hint of sweetness on a clean, refreshing finish" (source). 

Happy Thanksgiving!

Deal of the Week - Don Manuel Villafañe Keltehue Malbec

By Chris Siciliano

Good things come in small packages—that old saying is never more accurate than when the package is a bottle and the good thing is wine.

Sicilliano's featured deal this week is a half or "split" bottle of a delicious Malbec from the Mendoza region of Argentina. It's called Don Manuel Villafañe Keltehue Malbec 2009 ($4.49/375ml) and while clearly not the best choice for dinner parties, the smallish size makes perfect sense for picnics or your favorite outdoor summer concert series (providing the park rules permit alcohol, that is).

What's the one drawback of a half-sized bottle? This wine is so tasty it'll be gone before you know it. That's why we recommend buying two. Or three. Or, well, you get the idea. At $4.49 per bottle, you can afford to buy in bulk. Here's the full description from the label.

Our talented ancestor Don Manuel de Villafañe began making wine in Argentina in the year 1611. It is in his honor that we have created a superb line of wines representing the finest varietal grapes of Maipú, Mendoza. We think he would be very proud.

Malbec is the backbone of the Argentine wine industry for a good reason, it is fantastic. The grape that came from Cahors near Bordeaux has found its perfect home in Argentina, and more specifically in Mendoza. This is an absolutely superb example of how good this wine can be at an affordable level. The wine's dense red color gives a full and rich fruit nose of wild berries and black currant. The mouth is lush and full leading to a very well-balanced and long finish...the true mark of a great Malbec.

This is the red that can be enjoyed with everything or nothing. Any meat dish will love to be paired with this wine. Also has a great acidity for tomato based pasta dishes. Truly a fit-all read.

Limited quantities. Get yours today!

A short history of sherry

To compliment his short course in port, the bossman offers up this study on the Iberian Peninsula's other fortified wine. 

By Steve Siciliano

I find it intriguing that serendipity often played a major role in the development of certain wine styles. The accidental “discovery” of Champagne arose from the exasperating tendency for wine bottled in northern France’s cold winters to re-ferment and pop corks when the weather warmed in the spring. Winemakers in the Bordeaux region were pleasantly surprised when the wine produced from grapes infected with an unsightly mold turned out to be incredibly luscious and ultra-sweet. Today Sauternes, the fortuitous result of that sugar concentrating “noble rot,” are considered to be some of the finest dessert wines in the world. Port developed into its unique style because Portuguese wine merchants found that if they fortified wine with brandy, it wouldn’t spoil during the sea voyage to England.

Perhaps no style of wine more than sherry owes its development to happenstance. Sherry is the anglicized version of Jerez, a city in southern Spain’s Andalusia province where an indigenous strain of wild yeast called flor thrives in the distinctively cool yet humid maritime climate. Before Jerez winemakers understood the beneficial effects of flor they were horrified whenever a thick layer of white film appeared on the surface of wine aging in some of their barrels. They discovered, however, that the wine produced from those “sick” barrels was lighter, fresher and had a distinctive bouquet and flavor. Eventually they learned that if they left empty the space of “two fists” in the barrels the flor always magically appeared and the wines were consistently good. The style of sherry known as fino or “fine wine” had been born.

Flor is so dependent on Andalusia’s unique climate that if removed from the region it doesn’t survive and, in fact, it behaves differently from one section of Andalusia to another. A fino produced around the port city of Sanlucar de Barrameda has a thicker layer of flor which produces crisper wines that have the flavors and aromas of apples. This subset of fino is called manzanilla, the Spanish word for little apple. Sanlucar de Barrameda, it is worth noting, was the port from which Columbus and Magellan set sail on their exploratory voyages. Before leaving they filled their ships’ holds with fino which gave sherry the distinction of being the first European wine drunk in the new world.

When England went to war with France in the late fourteenth century the English lost their access to French wines and Jerez wine merchants filled the void with sherry. Sack, the English term for sherry, became England’s preferred wine and for a while Jerez winemakers prospered. But when the English began to acquire a taste for fortified, port-style wines the demand for sherry was drastically reduced; and when Spain went to war with England that once lucrative market disappeared entirely. Those events had a major impact on the development of sherry’s distinctive styles.

In an effort to compete with the higher alcohol wines being produced in Portugal, the Jerez winemakers began fortifying their wines with brandy. They soon found, however, that the amount of brandy that was added to individual barrels either resulted in thinner layers of flor or prevented it from forming at all. Those wines with thinner layers oxidized slightly, turned darker, developed rich nutty flavors and eventually developed into the style of sherry known today as amontillado. The higher fortified wines oxidized even more, turned a deeper brown and developed even richer flavors. They became the styles of sherry known as olorosos.

When the Jerez winemakers lost the English market they had no recourse but to let their wines sit for extended periods in the barrels. As the few orders for sherry trickled in, merchants bottled small quantities then topped up the barrels with newer wine. This gradually led to the system of fractional blending known as solera. Today soleras are comprised of 600-liter oak barrels that are stacked one row on top of the other with each stack four or five rows high. As wine from the bottom row is bottled each barrel is replenished with an equal quantity from the barrel above it, with the top barrel receiving wine from the current year. Because the barrels are never completely emptied they may contain wine made two hundred years ago.

Cream sherry is a relatively new style that was developed for the English market. Like finos, amontillados and olorosos, cream sherries are made from the palomino grape; they are olorosos sweetened with wine made from a grape called pedro ximenez. At their best cream sherries are lush and complex. At their worst they are syrupy and cloying—the domestically produced imitations. The rarest of all styles of sherry is the ultra-sweet, eponymous Pedro Ximenez. Drinking an aged PX is like drinking dessert.

Because of its unique historical development and its array of distinctive styles, sherry is one of the world’s most fascinating and complex wines. Siciliano’s stocks the entire gamut of styles—from the crisp, pale finos and monzanillas to a 1984 Pedro Ximenez that is as dark as blackstrap molasses. What better time than the holidays to enjoy this truly distinctive and intriguing wine.

A short course in port

Port, the perfect way to mark any special occasion, the perfect way to make any occasion special.

By Steve Siciliano

A bottle of Dow’s 1997 Vintage Port has been aging in our home wine cellar for about twelve years now. Every so often I’ll pick that bottle up and think about opening it but I always place it back on the rack. I know the wine is ready to drink now and if I was to succumb to temptation we would be entranced by its dark purple color, the aromas of licorice, chocolate and roasted coffee, and by flavors of maple syrup, blackberry and plum. But I also know that it has the potential to age gracefully for at least twelve more years and a wine like that is best enjoyed when marking a special occasion. Maybe I’ll open it when my son Chris and his fiancée Gena get married, or when Barb and I celebrate our twenty-fifth wedding anniversary, or when the Lions win the Super Bowl.

While there are many fine port style wines made throughout the world, the wines that can legally be called Porto are produced only in Portugal. The grapes are grown in the upper Duoro Valley in the north where the blazing hot summer temperatures allow them to attain high levels of sugar. Winemakers add neutral grape spirits at a certain point during the fermentation. This stops the yeast from working and results in a sweet, fortified wine. Which part of the Duoro the grapes are from and the quality of the harvest determine the style of port that’s produced—a ruby, an aged tawny, a late bottle vintage or, like that bottle aging in our cellar, a vintage porto. Vintage ports are wines of extraordinary depth and complexity that are produced only in exceptional years.

Ruby ports are the least complex and the least expensive. They are blends of young wines that are aged in oak for two to three years and are made from grapes that come from the less prestigious vineyards. While a good ruby port is a simple, straightforward wine that will not benefit from extended aging, it will entice you with it fresh berry aromas and nice red fruit flavors. Siciliano's recommends: Taylor Fladgate Fine Ruby Porto, $16.89.

Aged tawny ports are blends of wine from several, non-vintage years that are aged in barrels until they develop nutty, brown sugar and vanilla flavors and a soft, silky texture. The extended barrel aging transforms the wine from bright ruby red to the light brown, tawny color from which it gets its name. An aged tawny will usually have a ten, twenty, thirty or forty year designation on the label. This does not necessarily mean that the wine has been barrel-aged for the specified time but rather is an indication of the target age profile. In other words a forty-year-old tawny tastes like it is made from wines that are forty years old. Siciliano's recommends: Graham's 20 Year Tawny, $58.39 or Taylor Fladgate 10 Year Tawny, $32.89.

Late bottle vintage ports (LBVs) are unblended wines from a single vintage that was a good but not great year. They are aged in oak barrels four to six years and then filtered and bottled. Thanks to the barrel-aging the wine matures more quickly, giving it to some extent the nuances of a vintage port. But LBVs lack the depth and complexity of vintage port and because they are filtered they will not benefit from extended aging in the bottle. Siciliano's recommends: Smith Woodhouse 1984 Late Bottled Vintage, $40.99.

On average, about three times a decade the Duoro will experience perfect growing conditions resulting in young wines that are almost perfectly balanced. Samples of these wines are sent to the Port Wine Institute and, if approval is given, the year is declared a “Vintage.” Vintage ports are only made from grapes grown in the best vineyards. They are aged in oak barrels for two years and are then bottled unfiltered. As the wine matures the flavors and aromas become deeper, more refined and more complex. Siciliano's recommends: Warre's 1994 Vintage Porto, $117.99.

Vintage ports are extraordinary wines that should be saved for those most special of occasions (providing you have the will power). It doesn’t look like the Lions will win the big one anytime soon, and since our twenty-fifth wedding anniversary is a still silver speck on the horizon, I guess the date Barb and I crack the '97 Dows depends on Chris and Gena.