No. 1. I recently paid a visit to a highly touted new Italian restaurant in Miami Beach. This restaurant had an interesting, well-priced wine list covering most of the regions of Italy. My eye was caught by Ca’ del Bosco’s 2001 Curtefranca Rosso. While I have enjoyed many of Maurizio Zanella’s still and sparkling white wines, I hadn’t had any of his reds. When my waiter appeared, I asked him about the bottle. Waiter: “It’s a barbera.” Me: “Just barbera, or is it a blend?” He scampered off to find out. Answer: “Mostly barbera, blended with marcellino.” Eh? I’d never heard of marcellino, but on the strength of the producer’s reputation, I ordered it anyway, then checked with my source: the Google on my Blackberry. Turns out that the 2001 Curtefranca is a blend of merlot (27%), cabernet sauvignon (25%), cabernet franc (19%), nebbiolo (16%) and, coming in at the end, barbera (13%). Nothing I’ve run across mentions a marcellino grape. The red fruits of this soft, medium bodied wine went perfectly well with our meals—lamb shank and rabbit—but clearly it was not the wine I anticipated. Shouldn’t the wine director have known its contents? Isn’t honest service still better service? Caveat, sommeliers: Consumers armed with their Blackberries may soon make your job obsolete.
No. 2. The next day I took the causeway into Miami and dined at one of the city’s top hotel restaurants. Reading the wine list, I happened upon the 1994 Dom. Aux Moines, La Roche-aux-Moines, Savennières. Trailing that name were the words “Grand Cru.” Savennières is a famous dry white wine appellation in the Loire’s Anjou region, celebrated for its wines made from chenin blanc. Within Savennières are two sub-appellations, Savennières-Coulée de Serrant, a single estate run by the Joly family, and Savennières-La Roche aux Moines, in which several producers own properties producing notable chenin blanc wines, Dom. aux Moines among them. “Grand Cru” literally means “Great Growth.” But legally, there’s no “Grand Cru” designation to the wines of Savennières, or to any wines of the Loire. You will not see the term “Grand Cru” on that 1994 La Roche-aux-Moines. At the restaurant I dined, might the restaurant have used the term to justify the grand $80 price of the bottle? 1/9/09.
