When I was
younger, we would have Thanksgiving dinner at my grandmother's house. My
grandmother was from Palermo
and would make the same meal every Thanksgiving. We would start with
antipasti and then go to her baked maccheroni. This
was baked in a pan like lasagne with the addition
of peas. Afterward, we would have Turkey with all the trimmings and
finish the meal with dessert, usually cannoli.
After that, we would all sit around the table and eat nuts and raw fennel and
play Italian card games. The wine at the time was simple jug wine and no one
really paid much attention to it. The wine was on the table the same way that
the bread was on the table: you took the wine when you wanted to and you took
the bread when you wanted to.
Looking back, I miss those days with my grandmother and my thirty-or-so
relatives. I miss the food but do not miss the wine.
Now, for Thanksgiving, it becomes a multi-wine affair, pairing wine with
every course. The wine now has a prominent place on the table. To begin,
Michele makes an appetizer consisting of crostini,
olives, nuts, and fennel. This we serve with a sparkling white wine like the
Orsolani Spumante that we'll be tasting this week at
Vino. The second course would, of course, be pasta: either spaghetti or
ravioli. This we usually serve with a Barbera, like the Litina
by Cascina Castle't,
another wine featured in this week's tasting. If Michele does the turkey with
all the trimmings (potatoes, sweet potatoes, cranberry sauce, etc. etc.), we
do an Amarone. This big wine, in my opinion, stands up to all the different
flavors on the table. This week at the tasting, we'll be opening the Capitel Sant'Eugenio Amarone, a
wine made in the traditional style, with no barrique whatsoever.
Unfortunately or fortunately, we do not play cards anymore after dinner but
we sit around eating cannoli, cantucci,
and nuts, and we drink Vin Santo, which to me is
the perfect end to a meal (unless one wants grappa). The 1994 Vin Santo from Travignoli that
we're pouring this Friday and Saturday is one of my favorites.
A few years ago, Michele came back from a trip to Sicilia.
She had been invited to a woman's home and the woman served turkey. What made
this unusual was that the turkey was stuffed with pasta. Michele asked the
woman if this was a traditional Sicilian recipe and she said, "You're in
Palermo, aren't
you?" With this, the Conti Zecca Primitivo is a very good choice, not with the turkey but
with the pasta, which is eaten separately. The Amarone still goes with the
turkey.
One year, many years ago, we had Thanksgiving with the late Sheldon Wasserman,
an expert on Italian wine and author of the important book Italy's Noble
Red Wines (see the frontespiece pictured above
right). Sheldon was the one who introduced me to the idea of Amarone with
turkey. He said that it was the only wine that could really stand up to
turkey with all the trimmings. Also, he said something very interesting:
"If you serve the turkey alone, without all the trimmings, the Amarone
is much too powerful." Valpolicella would probably then work much
better.
This year, however, I will be in Puglia
during Thanksgiving with a number of journalists and wine writers. Some of
them are good friends and we often spend Thanksgiving together here in New York. Maybe we
will get the Italians to serve us turkey.
--Charles Scicolone, Wine Director, I Trulli and Vino
Look for Charles' dispatches from Italy in upcoming issues of the
Vino newsletter.
Charles would love to hear from you: please email him at charles@vinosite.com.
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