While I normally try to focus my writing for our website on Santa Barbara County wine experiences, events, news, etc., I feel compelled to share notes from one of the best wine dinners I have ever attended last night at Osteria Mozza in Los Angeles, featuring Elisa Scavino of Piedmont’s Paolo Scavino Winery. My inclination to share my experience comes mostly from my impression on the way that personal experiences can shape your impressions of a wine and winery. A label is no longer just a label, or a brand, but it represents a memory. These most memorable wine dinners and experiences create lasting impressions that become a part of your personal wine experience rolodex. March 25 2010 receives a notecard in my rolodex.
Elisa Scavino, granddaughter of Paolo Scavino, is absolutely charming, and speaks of her family’s winery with the most intimate of details. Her knowledge and presence is impressive, as well as her ability to communicate the winery philosophy in such detail through a language that is not her first. The Scavino estate is located in the “terroir” crossroads of the Barolo DOCG, in Catiglione Falleto. The family also has holdings across the DOCG with vineyards in the village of Barolo, La Morra and Roddi. Weston Hoard, a 28 year old employee of the winery from Minnesota with an extremely commanding demeanor, has been traveling around the world with Elisa for a month, spreading their knowledge and passion for the winery.
Here is the Mozza menu from last night (Thursday, March 25 2010):
Market Lettuces with Crostini di Anatra with 2008 Langhe Bianco (70% Sauv Blanc / 30% Chard)
Impressions: The wine had the structure of Chardonnay, fermented in steel tanks and then ML takes place in oak barrels. Also had striking acidity / grapefruit characteristics of a very fresh Sauvignon Blanc. The Crostini was about the size of a deck of cards, topped with a creamy duck pate-like meatiness that melted like soft butter. Served alongside the Crostini was a salad that was more than just the sum of its parts, and a prime example of what fresh produce does for a simple green salad. The market lettuces were crisp, earthy, and tasted as if they had been picked from the fields that morning, delivered to Mozza in a basket with a note that said “please serve tonight” (that’s how fresh it tasted). Crisp spears of Mandarin Orange-hued carrots were tossed with the vibrant green of the lettuce. A demonstration of how simplicity can yield extraordinary flavors.
Agnolotti, Burro e Salvia with 2008 Dolcetto d’Alba and 2008 Barbera d’Alba
Impressions: These pillows of tiny veal wrapped pastas were served like a medallion on a perfectly sized plate. They were about the size of dimes, and I’d say about 20 pillows of explosive flavors decorated the plate. Now, I’m no pasta expert, but I did live in Rome for a few months, where I ate pasta plate after pasta plate, wondering with each bite, why doesn’t it taste like this at home even at the best of restaurants? Last night’s meat agnolotti with an earthy, rich sage butter sauce was the best pasta dish I have had outside of Italy, and rivals my best plates from Rome. Though each bite was so small that it barely took up space on a single spear of my fork, the flavor was explosive, leaving a lasting impression that paired beautifully, and differently, with the Dolcetto and Barbera. Weston talked about the beauty of the Scavino wines being inherent in the purity of fruit captured in each bottling. He discussed the place that Barbera holds in Italian culture, as a wine perfect with their food and the wine that winemakers and their guests grab to accompany lunch. It has high levels of acidity that command food. He also talked about how overproduction caused Barbera to take on a bad wrap, and how it really needs to be treated the right way to produce a wine that is pure, and not dirtied by large yields. Old vines naturally have lower production, key to high quality Barbera and Dolcetto.
Veal Breast Stracotto with Carrots with 1998 Bric del Fiasc Barolo (Magnum), 2004 Bric del Fiasc Barolo, and 2005 Bric del Fiasc Barolo
Impressions: Our main course was veal, which fell apart when the fork met the meat as if it has been cooked for days on end at an extremely low temperature. Again, flavors pounced forth with aggression that only the best of chefs and ingredients can capture. Elegant and powerful were the Barolos - one of the most magnificent, challenging, mysterious, and magical of wines made from the Nebbiolo grape. Weston spoke of the romantic nature of the geography and climate in Barolo, describing the dense wet fog that floats on top of the villages, with the steep peaks and hillsides popping out of the top. The wine is fermented in temperature controlled rotary fermenters and then aged in French barrique (oak barrels) for 12 months. It is then aged an additional 12 months in cask, then in bottle prior to release. The most ready to drink of the three wines was, not surprisingly, the ‘98 Magnum. One of only a very limited amount of bottles produced, this wine captured the power and elegance that Nebbiolo is known to produce when done right and with care. There was talk of vintages, and what they mean for a wine in terms of quality. Probably the most memorable information that I took from this discussion was the way in which to go about learning about a specific region. Say you want to learn about Barolo, sure you can read books, buy the “best vintages,” go with the high scorers, but the way that you will really learn the ins and outs of the region is to choose maybe three or four producers that you will follow year in and year out. The best producers make good wine every year, and if they don’t, they don’t release it. At Scavino, they keep “off” vintages around, and go back to them regularly to really appreciate the magical aspects of what happens in the best of vintages. Also, Nebbiolo is such a tricky grape, that even their winemakers can taste a wine, dismiss it as not the best expression of the grape, and then have it years later and be blown away by what it has turned into.
Twice Baked Almond Cornette, Yogurt Gelato, Sauteed Blood Oranges and Clementines with 2009 Moscato d’Asti, Col dei Venti
Impressions: This twice baked Almond croissant was perfection. The ideal amount of sweetness after such an impactful meal was counted by the acidity of the yogurt gelato and beautifully colored citrus fruits. Flaky, filled with crystalized sugars of almond paste, and warmly steaming, the dessert was complemented by the fresh delicacy of a lightly sparkling and crisp Moscato.
Thank you to the Scavino family and staff for creating wines and stories that shape the wine world and cause me to fall more in love with wine with every experience. And thank to Osteria Mozza’s Jeff Porter for putting together these sorts of dinners.
Joanie Hudson, Director of National and International Marketing, Santa Barbara Winery / Lafond Winery & Vineyards
Next week I will be traveling throughout California attending The Henry Wine Group Trade Tastings. Our wine is distributed in California by The Henry Wine Group, and these tastings provide the opportunity to visit and engage three different markets: San Francisco (March 22), San Diego (March 24), and Los Angeles (March 25). 
I find myself thinking a lot lately about the whole concept of social media (which has become a staple in modern day marketing). As companies build up their reputations in the virtual world, branding is more important than ever. But what I am drawn to is the way that personalities become more and more what are being built up as brands, in the process promoting whatever company or larger umbrella that they write about or for. At a time when there is much fuss about the impersonalization of the virtual world, I find that in some ways it is quite the opposite (speaking on a larger scale than communicating with the people that you see and interact with on a regular basis, Facebook anyone?). I would argue that social media has the effect of bringing people closer together, instead of further apart, and with this in mind also make a case of the importance of strong virtual personalities at any given company to build an audience for the brand through the branding of individuals (ah the beauty of blogging, where run on sentences are OK).
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