Lambrusco Rising: The Ultimate Summer BBQ Wine

Class transcript:

Bill, can I interrupt you for a hot second? Are we recording? We are, indeed. Thank you, Zoe. And thank you to whoever signaled that reminder at home. So this is Niccolò Foscolo. He's a Venetian, was born in Greece. He lamented that the oligarchs and monarchs in Venice were as retrograde and conservative as they were. He encouraged Napoleon to take over Venice to forward his progressive aims. And many of us in the restaurant business and many of us in DC, which voted 90% against the current occupant of the White House, share his pain in forwarding a progressive agenda. So without further ado, this is 'To the Evening'. Perhaps because you are the image of that fatal quiet so dear to me, you have come, O evening, and when happy summer clouds and the gentle west wind are your escort, and when from snow to snowy restless heights you send shadows and darkness into the world, you descend summoned always and gently hold the secret ways of my heart, secret ways of my heart, it should be said. You make my thoughts wander forms that vanish into eternal nothing. Meanwhile, this cursed time flees, and with it the throng of cares with which it me destroys. And while I gaze on your peace, that warlike spirit sleeps, and yet within me roars. And I love that tone of resignation, but, you know, nonetheless, you know, perseverance and protest and, you know, that inner warrior spirit. And I think that's something that, you know, Lambrusco embodies as a wine of place, as a wine that was a victim of its own success in the 70s and 80s, that fell flat on its face, and that was debased fundamentally, and that people came to associate with these mass market brands, and is, you know, once again, coming back into its own.

So I'm going to bring my color commentator into the mix as quickly as I can, but I'm just going to give you a brief, you know, kind of overview of the region. So, first and foremost, I think it's important to understand that we are in the culinary heart of Italy. So, Emilia-Romagna, you're appending the names of two provinces. So, you have Emilia, which constitutes this bit to the west, and Romagna, named after the old Roman road to the east, abutting the Adriatic. And look at all this. Look at all this amazing food stuff. These are all DOCs. These are all designations of origin for amazing foods in Emilia-Romagna, and, you know, you're kind of abutting the northern regions of Italy, the Alps here, you have the Apennines, the central spine of Italy, which runs kind of, you know, north to south and east in the southern area of the region.

And, you know, you have this convergence of these more Mediterranean influences, more continental influences, you have, you know, olive oil, you have, you know, butter, you have parm, you have balsamic, you have mortadella, you have, you know, bolognese, you have white asparagus, you have truffles, you have, you know, any and all cured meats you could conjure. It is, you know, the gut of Italy. You know, it is everything you want to be eating personified, essentially, in one, you know, kind of Valhalla-ish region. And, you know, naturally, you know, you're going to want to, you know, dial things down a little bit in terms of what you drink with all that stuff. So, it stands to reason that when you reach for a red wine, you don't want, you know, Cali Cab.

You want something a little more refreshing, which is where Lambrusco comes to the fore. And important to understand about Lambrusco, we are talking about red wine with bubbles. Historically, it was a lightly fizzy red wine re-fermented in bottle, and it was, you know, mostly dry. I think most people don't understand that sweet wine as we know it, it's really a modern creation. There are a couple of things you need to make a sweet wine that is chemically stable in the bottle. You know, first and foremost, you can add sulfur. So, historically, to, you know, dessert wines, it would add quite a bit of sulfur, or you need sterile filtration. And these are things that didn't exist, you know, on a large scale until, you know, well after World War I and World War II throughout the world.

So, you know, much of what we take for granted about these products. That we, you know, think of as sweet, be it, you know, Riesling or, you know, something like Lambrusco, you know, historically they weren't that way. They've only become that way in the modern era and after World War II when, you know, globally people wanted to be drinking sweet things. Lambrusco is a designation of origin. It is a point of origin for, you know, this very special fizzy wine, but it is also a family of grapes, and these are, you know, the chief, you know, of the family of grapes. You know, kind of brothers and sisters for the sake, or cousins, for the sake of the Lambrusco family.

Should be said, You're dealing with a very ancient family of grapes, you know, so ancient that it could be descended from wild vines and could potentially put the lie to the Georgian claim that, you know, Vitis vinifera was only first domesticated in Transcaucasia, but neither here nor there. There are over 60, 70 different sub-varietals of Lambrusco. The word Vitis vinifera is a term that's used a lot, you know, and the word itself essentially means wild vine in Latin. Some of the most important that we're going to talk about Sorbara, it's the most widely grown in the region, is cultivated more broadly on the wild, kind of like flat plains of the Po River Valley. Lambrusco as a grape was famed since antiquity for its, you know, huge yields.

Cato the Elder talks about, you know, half an acre filling 300 plus, and for, you know, four worth of wine. So, and in the modern era, you talk about people, you know, operating with, you know, 200 hectoliters per hectare of, you know, yields, which is ridiculous. You know, in Bordeaux, the max is 50. To make good wine, you know, you have to limit yourself to 30, you know, 20, 25, and, you know, so just cartoonishly, massive amounts of wine on a commercial scale. And, you know, it was very much a commodity. In the modern era, and it's only, you know, recently, within the last couple of decades, that people have started to reclaim it as an artisanal product.

And sorbara is the ubiquitous kind of like most widely, or it should be said rather salamino, not sorbara, the most widely grown of the bunch. Grasparosa is the most tannic of the bunch. It is the grape of the hills. It is densely kind of structured, you know, more gripping in terms of the tannins. Sorbara, which I misidentified as the most widely grown, is, you know, actually the prettiest of the bunch. And it flowers very unevenly, which has a natural diminishing effect on the yields. And we have a Lambrusco de Sorbara here. It's a very special, pretty kind of, you know, subtype of Lambrusco, which is well worth celebrating. And then Maestri figures throughout, prominently throughout the region as well.

You know, what is really fun about Lambrusco more broadly is that it belongs to this even broader family of sparkling wines from Emilia-Romagna. And the diversity is really staggering, you know, I find. You know, you're not just dealing with Lambrusco, which occupies the central provinces of Emilia-Romagna. You're also dealing with, from east to west, a broader swath of what the Italians call these Bivace sparkling wines, which is the Bivace sparkling wine, which is the Bivace sparkling wine. So you can see, this is Emilia-Romagna, but in the foothills of the kind of low Alps and higher Alpenines in Piacenza, you have Giutornio Frisante, you have sparkling Barbera, and then further, closer to the Adriatic Coast, you have Pignoletto and all sorts of other grapes.

So there's this whole family of these historically lightly effervescent wines that are predominant throughout the region that are just now coming back to the fore. And people are just starting to celebrate and, you know, know, they are truly gastronomic wines. I love this quote from the seminal American importer, Louis Dressner. He says that on the one hand, you have all this history and tradition associated with Lambrusco, but on the flip side, these are wines that are designed to be consumed fairly quickly within a culture that loves eating and drinking. So you can almost turn off your mind and enjoy them in the moment. So, you know, they offer whatever you want of them. They can be, you know, fresh and fun, or they can be, you know, profound and multifaceted.

And, you know, that's really, you know, my entry point for the sake of them. Brent Kroll, what was your take on the fact that Brent, you know, in his former position at Neighborhood Restaurant Group, celebrated Lambrusco with a full week, or was it a full month of Lambrusco? We did a whole week, and it was basically because my employer was like, 'What do you think about restaurant week?' And I was like, 'I like Lambrusco this time.' And he was like, 'I like the time of the year in the summer.' So it's, I came up with 10 by the glass. They all paired with different types of charcuterie. And this is like the one of the best things for like the lazy man pairing.

Sometimes people talk about like composing this intricate dish and pairing it up with this wine with nuances. Lambrusco, it's just like a plug-and-play, like zero-calorie effort pairing. You get a stick of salami or chorizo, you open a bottle of Lambrusco, and you're like ready to rock. So I mean, it's taking like one of the simplest principles of like, you know, kind of what grows together goes together. And in this area, to get on a little rant too, Salamito is a grape. They named it after salami because it takes on a salami-type form. Bologna, the capital is referred to, or it translates to the fat one. So this isn't like your vodka soda. This isn't like a place in the world. They're literally just wanting you to basically, you know, double fist.

And when you double fist, it's not flutes. It's not even wine glasses. There it is, cups of meat and cups of Lambrusco. So you're double-fisting with cups of both because they both work well in a cup. And when you walk around, and it's warm there, and you saw that map, once you're eating and drinking, Lambrusco is also the regional pairing for the meat sweats. So when you get the meat sweats, and it's hot out, and it's the summer, that's, that's, I mean, what I tell people it pairs with all the time. Now to your point too, in like the 70s and 80s, a lot of times people knew there was like a Sutter Home Sauvignon Blanc craze. There were people calling like cooking wine, like champagne and Chablis. There were like the Lancers.

There was the, what is that, Matus. There's Blue Nun. There's all this stuff out there. So Ria Nitti in that category was like the Muhammad Ali of those. It was dominating for two decades in the US. It paved the way for bullshit like Yellowtail and Cupcake to follow. It basically just was people having just like sugar buzzes. It was like the old school way to, you know, I guess it kind of paved the way for stuff like flavored Moscato. And if you ever wonder why, like, drinking like margarita mix gives you a blistering headache, I mean, Ria Nitti and that can share like kind of a common thread with a bunch of like sugar just being dumped in.

When old school Italians, when they look at Lambrusco and they want to see if it's real, they actually look and they look at the alcohol percentage. And if they see the alcohol percentage is under 11, this is just old school. This isn't like something you read out of a book or fact. They consider them leaving too much sugar in the wine. And they consider that not to be like, you know, the secco that they want it to be. It's not to say that Lambrusco with sugar is like bad. I honestly think you can get around like 20 grams where you barely get the acid and the tannin kind of hide the sugar. So even sometimes, like not quite to the extent of Riesling, I would say, but like a little bit of sugar just balances the wine in a lot of cases.

Like I don't think like the Natura style is like making a lot of sense for Lambrusco. Like you gotta push the fruit like a little bit. But that's my Robin's ear Batman for Lambrusco. So Kroll, what was your kind of road to Damascus moment with Lambrusco as you know, everybody hates Lambrusco. And so it was a natural pivot, you know, to say to your employer, like, you know, great, I'll do Restaurant Week, but I'm going to drive sales on this wine that no one will reflexively buy anyway. You know, that was a great, you know, Brent Kroll kind of, but what was your, you know, you tasted the bottle, you think to yourself, 'Holy hell, this is amazing.' I should be, you know, actively, you know, fanboying this.

But when I when I started Lambrusco week there, I think it was like, I think it was about six, maybe five, six years ago. And that time in the market, there weren't a lot of good Lambrusco. And I was already doing Iron Gate. And I was seeing that, like, wow, I can get stuff brought into the city if the city doesn't have good representation in this category. So I was like, wow, the representation for good Lambrusco is pretty shitty in BC right now. So I did it. And it was wanting to avoid Restaurant Week. And it's one of those things where, like, you're so stubborn to prove a point that, like, you had a good idea. I was like, I did like service every single day, I was like telling everyone about it.

And I was like, you know, I was like, you know, I was like, about it, I was saying like, come by. And my the first year I did it, there were so few good producers in DC, that I was doing like two or three wines from the same producer to get 10 good dry Lambrusco. And now that that's not the case in DC whatsoever. Although as I was joking with you earlier, if you're in Montgomery County shopping for Lambrusco in retail, Ed Hardy stocked there, which is also do not recommend the Ed Hardy Lambrusco. But so you know, you have some, you know, really fascinating celebrity Lambrusco endorsers, it should be said that and we love this, we love our celebrity wines. You know, my personal favorite is the Jon Bon Jovi Rose, which is called Hampton Water.

My second favorite is the Raekwon the Chef. So this is a Wu-Tang Lambrusco. Raekwon is called the chef, developed his own Lambrusco. It is a touch sweet, but you know, he felt like he wanted to make an immigrant wine because to him, you know, Staten Island, you know, which which plays this mythical, you know, kind of role in the Wu-Tang mythology has this immigrant ethos vis-a-vis, you know, Manhattan and the other boroughs. So, you know, Lambrusco is ultimate underdog that way, in, you know, you know, really, really awesome fashion. So we kind of skipped past, you know, a little more like technical gossip, for the sake of how these wines are actually produced, and I don't want to put the cart before the horse.

So, I want to talk over the first two rosés I have in front of me and, you know, I want to make sure that I get proper time and space to tasting notes. So, I kind of play fast and loose with tasting notes because, you know, for me, you know, the experience of wine is hugely subjective, and, you know, I, you know, want to be careful about dictating tasting notes to a broader audience because the mere fact of me telling you that this tastes a certain way will inherently tell you, prejudice you, you know, to proceed the same set of flavors that I taste. And, you know, we're dealing with a very abstract and precise language.

My favorite, you know, kind of analogy for the sake of tasting wine is this, you know, great Zappa quote, Frank Zappa, that, you know, dancing about, or sorry, writing about music is like dancing about architecture. And I feel like, you know, tasting wine is the same way. But, you know, by the same token, you know, I know that a lot of you, you know, want to, you know, get our take on the tasting notes for these wines. So, you know, I want to, you know, come at this, you know, from, you know, both sides. So, first and foremost, we're going to take this wine from Cleto Chiarli. And Kroll is familiar with this. And I imagine this was one of the producers that you're probably featuring two wines from back in the day.

They are one of the oldest producers in Medina, started as a restaurant that was making wine in the 19th century. And you know, they started to essentially bottle their wines that they were, you know, very successful selling through the restaurant. Stylistically very modern, you know, so you're filtering your wine. It is made in what is called the Charmat method. So, that is the Prosecco method you see here. You're dealing with a fermentation, a secondary fermentation for the sake of introducing gas to the wine that's taking place under pressure in a large tank. And you tend to get, you know, a product that is crisper. And you know, it’s not a product that's going to be as good as a wine, but it is a product that is going to be a lot more fresher and cleaner because of that.

And, you know, for me, you know, the tasting notes on this wine are, you know, consistent with that. This is from Grasparoso and Pinot Nero. Pinot Nero, aka Pinot Noir. This is super floral. It spends less than a day on the skins. It’s, you know, essentially rosé, but it is fuller in body than you would typically expect of, like, a rosé champagne. And, you know, it’s, you know, this fun halfway house for me between, you know, that lighter, sparkling wine and something more sturdy and substantive for the sake of, honest to God, Lambrusco. And then on top of that, it has this, like, Chantilly cream kind of, like, you know, breakfast pastry thing. It reminds me of my dad making me, you know, breakfast strudel for some reason that I can't, like, fully, you know, wrap my head around.

But, you know, wine has that, like, evocative power. And then the second one up is a personal favorite. This is Fiorini, another historic producer in the region. But this is made in what's called the methodensis straw. So, you know, one continues fermentation. The wine is bottled early before fermentation has totally finished. And there's leftover yeast, leftover sugar in the bottle. And under pressure, fermentation finishes. And you're left with a lighter bead in the wine and something that's cloudy and typically more savory as well. And this one smells quite different. It has a little bit of that Jim Socks kind of, you know, you know, quality to it. And Brent spoke, you know, really, you know, directly to that whole Lambrusco cured meat connection. And this, like, is hugely evocative when it comes to that.

Kroll, you know these two wines, I would imagine. You know, what do you like about them both? And what do you like about the producers? So, clearly, this is like an example, for me, not like a micro producer where you say they're in a garage making, like, a couple hundred cases or something. I mean, they're a big one, one you can find. But then, again, like, they're making, like, a lot of different things. I mean, like, they're making a lot of different things. Really high-quality so, I think it's good a lot of times when you can tell people, like, 'Hey, here's a Lambrusco that you should be able to find readily available,' but they're making really high-quality stuff. Um, for me, their Sorbara is kind of gets this like almost like Pink Starburst, kind of like strawberry-type thing to it.

It cleans up really nicely in the palate, but how that goes really well too is, you know, not just cured meat, but cured meat that has spice to it, something with a little bit of fire to it. I mean, I like to hold you know pair this up against um, but I, I just generally like their stuff. They have a whole range uh of different like, you know, rosé and you know red from a grass brosa and stuff that I think is uh really like speaks to the varietal so, I think these two producers, I think as much as any producers there are when you see a certain varietal Lambrusco and when you taste what's in the bottle there, um, they're giving you like a classic example and I think that a lot of times.

The Fiorini is a little bit smaller, um, they're a hundred year old uh co-female run uh winery with Christina Fiorini who's in town a lot so I think that's a good example of what they're doing and I think that's a good example of what they're doing. This for me gets kind of like these um almost like uh balsamic or these kind of uh it's like um this kind of almost like savory but sour like black fruit type of notes. The grass brosa from Fiorini is probably the Lambrusco that I consume more than any other Lambrusco that there is. I really just enjoy how classic it is and to your point you said earlier, these aren't wines, you really Have to like, overthink they're wines that you unwind with and you don't have to like really wax poetic on them so much as I'd love to tell you, like, 20 years about like my childhood that like relate to these wines and they're just very, they're straightforward and delicious in like a really good way, they're wonderfully undemanding and it reminds me of, you know, so having worked harvest with winemakers, you know at the end of the day, winemakers rarely unwind with, you know, their own wine um, you know, usually people will throw around a few bottles and there'll be some fun parlor tricks for the sake of blind tasting but people are drinking beer because they want to turn off and you know um our our colleague matthew ramsey has a whole uh podcast around shipped drinks you know this idea of something that you drink to unwind at the end of the day and that's not that's that is very rarely you know the you know most uh complicated you know attenuated you know um like altering wine in the world you know it's something that allows you to turn off it's something that you know licenses you to just enjoy something at face value you know it's like you know going home and unwinding with citizen cane that is preposterous you know i want to unwind with Stepbrothers, um, you know, and this is like a little more like the Stepbrothers of wine, um, in a delightful way. Um, it should be said we also have La Colina uh there was a Luna in the mix um I love that wine um that is uh Salamino um on the skins um for a little less time what I love about that wine is what it embodies for the sake of the these are both two kind of slightly larger estates uh for those of you that have the Rosa Luna um and La Colina that embodies this kind of newer but you know by the same sense older tradition of this multi-use farm um you know this biodynamic movement where you know um vine growing is one small part Of the larger agricultural whole, um, and you know that's something that will bring more in, of but you know that is this true art, like artisan uh product for that winery, and what I love about La Colina is everything they do is whistle clean, so that wine is actually made in the Charmant method, um, so you know there's nothing inherently evil about making wine tank if you do it well, um, this is actually in its own way, you know, a little more artisanal in terms of the production process than La Colina, but you know by the same token, you know they're both very reflective of a sense of place and you know they're both, just like Fabulously, uh, delicious, uh, and easy drinking Zoe, we've left you out of the mix here, uh, do you have any questions or comments from the commentariat for either of us? Yeah, absolutely! So if there's such quality Lambrusco, particularly those ed party examples, where should we go in DC to find our our good dry quality Lambrusco? Um, actually bars sell wine to go now, so you should support um bars yeah, so um I think you should so exactly so um Brent is selling wine you're selling wine through both locations are you not? Yeah, yeah, yeah! So um, uh, Kroll uh, is selling wine through Maxwell Park um the original Maxwell Park which is right by the Convention center and then his new location, um, uh, which is, uh, so, you have wine out of do you have wine out of the new bar as well, yeah, they both sell wines to go off the entire list that we list and we discount it to go.

And the one in Navy Yard is right by like Chloe and Blue Jacket, it's at like fourth street, uh, southeast kind of close to like the probably like a 10-minute walk from the baseball stadium, and then yeah, it's all by the convention center. But they should get Lambrusco from YouTube. I appreciate the plug, you're uh, a great promoter there, I love that comment that's talking about words per minute, I feel like we Both maybe get told to slow down sometimes and someone totally called this out, yeah yeah um I think we both, we both do that naturally, table side because we get excited about things and uh, you know, we just kind of fast forward the, uh, you know agenda, agenda in the beginning of summer so we were kind of like 'oh, the well is near' with transitions in the half-hour lead up to one o'clock in late June. You know what I would probably pick up some brioche or whatever, you know? Each other and we'd talk for 10.5 minutes on the floor, and turns out we got one hour after that about 10 minutes until quick rest, then we stay up five hours, it's a shit um they're Just great people, um, I would love to forward any and all business their way that I can, um, you know. But sadly, I think you know Lambrusco is one of those things that retail has just like yet to come around on, um, you know.

I do digging for those of you that aren't participating locally every week and it was really dispiriting, you know, in trying to find wines outside of New York, California, DC, trying to find Lambrusco so like, you know. Your major national sites, you know Wine.com, um, you know Total Wines of the World, they're stuck in this like Riemite '80s place where the Lambrusco they're stocking is from some massive. Co-op and tastes like Robitussin with bubbles, you know, and you know that's not where we want to live. And you know for me, the other cool thing about these wines is you can get Lambrusco that's as good as shitty Lambrusco at the same price, like you don't have to pay up for Lambrusco; I mean, you can, but you don't have to.

And you know that, you know, just really elevated um, you know, for me, uh, it is a wine for the people, it democratizes wine and it's priced democratically, uh, as well. So I was saying how with Lambrusco too, that like, we've mentioned Rianiti a lot, we've mentioned a bunch of like shitty Lambrusco and How it's kind of like paved the way for just this whole bad kind of evil category in general, but there is a silver lining to that. I mean, right now in life, we define that something sucks you get a good deal and a lot of people think that Lambrusco totally sucks and this is from restaurants having one on there that they don't sell fast enough and you get stale Lambrusco or it's like most of the time it should be consumed pretty fresh.

Sometimes in the market too long, bad retail representation, mediocre restaurant representation a lot of the time. So that what that means is like when you get a great bottle and it's in retail and it's Priced like in a really everyday price point, it's because it's in this I think a little bit of a golden era where everyone thinks it sucks and the quality has gotten better and better, yeah. And in terms of the region as well, it should be said that you're in a golden era, so you know you had this category of younger winemakers coming up and reviving the, you know, more kind of artisanal uh production processes that you know existed centuries ago. And you know there is, as Brent spoke to more and more um wine available in a market like this that is absolutely well worth drinking, bone dry, and you know savory and transcendentally delicious.

Um, and you know that is, you know, absolutely well worth celebrating. And I think, you know, leaning into those things that are unfashionable will always serve you well as a wine drinker. Um, you know, leaning into those things that are misunderstood, you know, will always serve you well. You're going to find value there; you're not going to find value in Napa Cab, you know. It's just a lot, it's a lot harder, um. But you know, in Lambrusco, in Reisling, you know, in a million other things, you know, that are underappreciated, you know, there's great value. We have what else you got so, um, are any of the Lambrusco still amphora age? Uh, none that I know of. I imagine there are producers working in amphora, um, we do have a sorry, I think Sayetti through yeah, yeah, so um, so Sayetti is a producer, he's a, he was uh, Lambrusco society is kind of one of the first producers to you know, hearken back to the ancestral method, um, for you know, the sake of really traditional, uh, production. He works um, more with a grape called Salamino, um, in there are many sub-kind of appellations for Lambrusco, he works out of Salamino de Canta Croce, um, I love his wines that come with this like denim jean kind of, uh, label that's delightful, um, they're a little harder i hope to stock them at the store, um, they're what I call.

Day one wines, um, in the sense that if you leave in the fridge overnight, they tend to get a little, um, you know, mousy, um, uh, in a way that's not always enjoyable. But they're, they're, they're really, they are fabulous. Um, I haven't tried his amphora age offerings, um, I agree with what you said, I, I've gotten bottle variation, I bet sometimes they've tasted better than others. I mean it's kind of like what you can run into in the natural category sometimes it's, it's more and more of like a weird one, like the Chiarly and the Fiorini, those are like tried and true, you're gonna get consistency, like classic product if you go to like Saieti there's Like a fabric label on it, he used to be an egg farmer and he does amphora, you know very non-interventionist.

He went door-to-door selling it; it was yeah, yeah. So there is like an emergence of like kind of weird wines in the Lambrusco category too, I mean like weird, like creative, like more. I wouldn't I wouldn't say i would say that you know the natural wine movement is is part and parcel of you know the revival of these artisanal styles there; it's really important to the revival of traditional styles there. And it should be said that you know you're in and so that the Po River Valley, the Po um uh runs um kind of throughout um in The center of uh, the Emilia Romagna region, it's really defined by um, the river, um, from one side to the next, um, and then, uh, it was famously polluted.

Milan actually didn't have a sewage treatment plant until very recently, which is horrifying. You're dealing with industrial agriculture after World War II, um, and people aren't you know considering what's best for the land. And you know in as much as the natural wine movement has become prone to excesses and prone to Jacobins who are you know willing to die on that no-sulfur cross, it was a necessary corrective for those you know excesses and you know environmental. degradation and overuse of chemical treatments and all these other things that you know really have no place in um you know artisanal wine production um and you know emilia romagna has seen a real revival of um you know smaller um wineries smaller um you know kind of multi-use farms for the sake of people like localina just wanting to make wines in the spirit of the earth and and i think another thing that the natural wine movement doesn't get credit enough for is you know a the spirit of just kind of there's a spirit within natural wine of you know you know let's have fun with this you know let's make wine not stodgy um you know let's wait make wine let's let's make it an agricultural product and not something that you know people you know are treating as a commodity um you know and and also there's this you know uh you know spirit of uh innovation um as well there and and and you know that's part and parcel with this you know kind of return to historical traditions so you know in as much as it's prone to excesses you know um you know it's very necessary um by the same uh token so um that brings us to actually a wine that i don't have here we're going to switch gears for the sake of the red wines uh the pollicello um so uh those of you lucky enough to come By it, have a method ancestral wine from Lambrusco de Grasparoso which is represented here um and this is a single vineyard Grasparoso, this one is made um in the charmat method but it comes from almost 50 year old vines um it's one of my little vineyards um hugely herbal um in a way that I really love um and um you know uh Crowl talked about, you know, these emotional associations we attach to wine for me with these wines it's always Easter egg dying sounds really weird but for those of you had done it, you know, you had to drop these like color tablets in vinegar and smelling Lambrusco always reminds me of being in my grandparents' house.

Basement and dying Easter eggs for whatever reason, but that's my, you know, Lambrusco Association. Kroll, what do you love about Grasparoso, and having tried you know this particular Grasparoso, so what do you think about it? For me, for that, for like Grasparoso that one so I think that like Grasparoso is a grape in general so sometimes you can have them where they're a little bit I mean they're always gonna be fairly dark in color but sometimes they can be a little bit more delicate and I think sometimes like the variance in flavor can be to darker fruit to well structurally more tannin and sometimes like I said it'll have like this balsamic or almost shrub type quality to it, this is I think backing off that a little bit more so than the Yeah.

probably did so I would say that it's like a variance but I I think that like they're these are the types of wines where I like these specifically with like prosciutto or a brusola or those certain types of like meat, so I I look at these as or actually even like a steak off the grill right now. Totally yeah hundred percent and for me it brings you back to that like Lambrusco's ultimate barbecue wine thing I want like I want meat with fat you know I want fat with these wines you know the that tannic grip you know will cut through all that you know I want West Texas smoke you know with sauce on the side you know I want all those things with these wines and you know I love those you know kind of strange bedfellows you know there's no way that you know some pit master in West Texas was ever you know thinking about Lambrusco when he was firing up you know the you know mesquite you know grill but you know they work together and they're both great. The synergy is really, you know, amazing, yeah, um, yeah, and you know for this one in particular it's also high-toned so Grasparosa is great for the hills, the soils tend to be poor there than they are in the plains, and you know, in spite of you know, it's tannic grip, you know, I think for this wine there's something like delicate and floral about it that's that's really, you know, quite lovely as well.

The other wine we're drinking here is the Leaney 910 and I wanted to pull up a picture and talk about Leaney 910. Picture of the family that makes this, because this is another one that's rooted in tradition and I love this family photo so uh, this is the Lenny 910 family, um it looks like uh Amelia Romagna succession um in the best possible way um, you know I'm wondering you know I want to like personify each person like in the succession mold and figure out like who is the Rupert Murdoch who is the you know for a son uh etc but I want to celebrate uh this, it should be said that the woman in the leather couch um is like really kind of like the become the face of the brand um, you know but you know what an amazing picture we should all be uh so lucky uh to share you know such a lineage but um, you know a lot of these older producers um are very much rooted in tradition um, this particular wine um is a blend of Salamino and Enceloto, we haven't talked Enceloto at all, Enceloto is a local grape that very often is used in smaller percentages to lend additional color um to the wine. Um, and for me, this one leans even more in that Balsamico direction; it's actually like a little less delicate, um, and pretty than the Grasparoso, um, and a little more of that like you know full umami twang uh to it uh, but in you know a really you know kind of uh fabulous uh way, um, and um, you know it should be said that these are you know slightly more widely available um offerings as opposed to the the niche um kind of artisanal bottlings um. Are there any other you know pairings that you've arrived at for the sake of wines like this that you know have surprised you over the course of your career with Lambrusco, um, I mean some of the Cheese pairings, I think are super underrated. Like, I can't think of any restaurant I've ever gone to where they paired Lambrusco and cheese for me.

Um, but especially some of the cheese pairings that I've ever eaten, that I've ever had, I think some of those are like high, like I mean aged Parmesan is kind of like the obvious one from there. But I've actually got into this with like Gruyère or Pecorino or things like that where like different members just line up with it. I think the Leany uh is one of the, I think it's the only good white Lambrusco I've ever had. I've only had a few though, but that's not very common too. I would honestly really like to play around with pairing with that I'm kind of i'm not really sure uh how that would go but I do like the um specifically more so in Salmina, the delicacy of Grasparosas with like semi-firm, like acidic or too hard cheeses.

Yeah. And I could see, you know, for the sake of cheese like this, even going with, you know, something like a blue or even, you know, you know, some of the so my Brusco comes in many shapes and sizes for the sake of sweetness. So these are, you know, predominantly Secco or dry lime Bruscos, but there's this whole style called Mabile, which is kind of subtly sweet. And those are killer cheese wines. Those are killer, like Thai food wines. You know, I think about like Stilton or Valdeon or these other, you know, Gorgonzola Dolce is just like a really natural fit and kind of like an off-dry red Lambrusco, just being absolutely gangbusters together. I also think maybe that Laey 910 with like the fried chicken you guys have been selling would be pretty cool.

Yeah. If you could get into it, to kind of like deeper, like I'm trying to think like some of that Chico food, I could throw a Grasparosa against that or a Salamino. Yeah. They're, I mean, like the, the Euros love to say that they're gastronomic wines. And I think, I think too, and, and, and Kroll, maybe you can speak to this, but you know, you guys ask a lot about pairings for the sake of our wines. And I think, you know, for those of us in the business, we're a little more like kids acquisitive about it. I think we're willing to, you know, just kind of try stuff out. And if it works, it works. If it doesn't, it doesn't. But I encourage you all to, to do the same.

You know, I, I am continually surprised by what works and what doesn't, you know, for the sake of our menu at Tail Up Goat today, you know, I, I was trying out this like kind of spicier halibut dish. I ended up going with this Canary Island red wine that I wouldn't have, you know, imagined in a million years, you know, would be, you know, kind of this like, you know, yin meet yang kind of synergy, but, you know, paired beautifully. And, you know, those are my favorite moments with food and wine. It's, it's not necessarily the, you know, you know, the check box, you know, I thought this would works, you know, kind of more derivative stuff. It's the, oops, I happen to have this open, you know, let's give it a try, you know, kind of, kind of things.

And Lambrusco is the ultimate, let's give this a shot kind of pairing wine. Yeah. I think the cool thing with pairing too, is like, it doesn't take a sommelier certification. Like anyone on the Zoom could teach either one of us about a pairing that works that out. So it's cool to just, you know, play around in that sense too. Yeah, absolutely. And also like, I think the joy of it is just getting a sense of how the things play together. And, you know, there is no platonic ideal of pairing, you know, there are, you know, equally valid, you know, wine and food pairings for the same dish that vibrate on different wavelengths that will, you know, tease out, you know, a different specific flavor in one dish as opposed to another.

And, you know, I think it's, it's really fun to explore, you know, further those connections in, in more, you know, kind of profound ways. And, and, you know, that is my favorite thing about wine, wine and food pairing, you know, it's not dictating, you know, as some kind of like pairing Pope, you know, what, you know, shall be and what, what shall not be, you know, it's not like a can't wear white after Labor Day kind of thing, vis-a-vis pairings, you know, it's more of a, you know, here are my ideas. It's about what I like to eat with this. But, you know, I want you to build your own sandbox, you know, and I think at the end of the day, for both of us, you know, it's about empowering people to love wine in their own way, whatever you love about it, you know, because we're not going to eat the same stuff that you all do, you know.

But, you know, hopefully you come up with, you know, these like wild uses for Lambrusco that we never would have imagined. Otherwise, like that is, you know, that's, that's the moment, you know, that that is like, for me, you know, the growth moment as, you know, somebody that does that is, you know, someone coming back and say, I tried this with X or Y that I made, and it's something that I never would have thought of, you know, trying Lambrusco with. Those are the, those are the most rewarding, you know, kind of types of feedback that, that I get for the sake of these wines. Yeah, I'd say like when I was at Iron Gate, or when I worked for like Alain Ducasse, I would always line up pairings that made sense and pairings that made no sense.

And I would say probably, you know, I would always line up pairings that made sense and pairings that made no sense. Statistically, maybe like one out of five times, but it's something that made no sense would beat out everything else. Yeah. That's a high percentage. Yeah. And I think, I think like, those are the most interesting pairings. And I talk about like, you know, having like, as a, you know, person that's doing this, it's just like having the strength of your own convictions, you know, and, and, you know, not worrying about what people think, you know, a, you know, kind of mishmash as, as such, and just, you know, letting it live on its own, and, you know, letting people explore that for themselves.

And, you know, those end up being much more rewarding, hopefully, experiences for, you know, the people experiencing, you know, food and wine than the ones that feel much more derivative. So what do you got for us? Well, first, just a request, Brent, the words per minute is more helpful if we can see your hands, because that's, so if you wouldn't mind just getting your camera a little bit better. Oh, yeah, gesticulating. Yeah, there you go. There you go. Um, we have a lot of people talking about how the Fiorini is a little bit orange, and if there's something specific about the grape varietals, or about the vinification that has made that like, more orange and amber-like color. That has everything to do with the fact that it's unfiltered.

So that is a wine that rests on the lees, and they do not disgorge. So for those of you playing along at home, when you make a sparkling wine, you're dealing with, you know, a little bit of a, you know, a little bit of a, you know, a for the sake of, regardless of what you're dealing with. So you cap the, the wine in bottle for the sake of something like the Fiorini early. So we pop a cork, we pop, typically wouldn't be a cork, it would be like a bottle cap on this. And it finishes fermentation under pressure. But as it finishes, it dispels leftover dead yeast and other sediment that rests at the bottom of the bottle. And typically, at the end of the wine, making process, in order to clarify it, they will disgorge.

So they will rest the bottle on its edge, inverted, you know, this way, and turn it across, called lumage. And the sediment works its way toward the neck. They'll kind of subsume it in an ice bath, and a little plug worth of frozen sediment will be disgorged. And then they'll pop a cork on it thereafter to create something, you know, whistle clean and clear. They haven't done that for the sake of this wine, which is why it has a color that does. And then, this is a point that I meant to make earlier, but it's also why it has a texture that it does. So I think that, you know, people talk a lot about tasting notes when it comes to wine, I think, specifically with Lime Brusco, which has this added element of CO2.

The textural, you know, piece is, is really fabulous, you know, and, you know, that, that mousse, you know, that, you know, laziness, you know, that savoriness for the sake of the Fiorini, which, you know, for me, is an outlier for the rest of these wines that, you know, were disgorged, is something special, and we're celebrating, alongside any other tasting notes that you could, you know, potentially throw at it. So, you know, that is, that is very important. It's a big part of why it has the color, all that does. Are there any Lime Brusco's that are worth cellaring? I’ve, I’ve, I’ve heard a debate on some of this, and I’ve seen some champagne method, champagne method sorbaras, or secondary fermentation bottle sorbaras that are, what’s the, it’s Cantina del Volte, is the one where they age it, I think about five years before they release into the market.

Um, I, I think young and fresh is stylistically, like, what I even look for, even trying aged ones, but I’ve only seen one where it’s, like, purposely aged. Perfectly considered a, a high like a higher end lime Brusco which I think that one would probably retail for like around $30 and like yeah it's got about five years on it but I can't think of one other than that I I play fast so for me the notion of ageability in wines is fundamentally flawed um and it's something that I like to play fast and loose with um I don't think there's anything more intrinsically ageable about a lot of champagnes and a lot of these lime Brusco's The things that make wine age well um you know are alcohol and acidity first and foremost and you know people would prejudice alcohol but I would you know augur that acidity is foremost Um you know for the sake of sparkling wine.

People tend to prejudice time on the lees, um, as, as Kroll said, there are a lot more producers working with extended élevage of Lime Brusco and extended, um, time on the lees for the sake of the Lime Brusco's, which means that, you know, they tend to be, you know, um, releasing them much later, um, than historically they would have. Um, you know, and, and again, this is just about, like, the love of wine. Um, you know, I want to know what happens to these wines as they age, especially something like the Fiorina. So the fact that this is aged. Aged on the lees as it is means that it's essentially a living product. You know, the lees biologically are still kind of alive with, um, you know, dead yeast and that will preserve this wine and, um, you know, serve as a ballast against spoilage in a way that these other kind of more, um, you know, safe filtered products do not have.

Um, and I would love to try this five years from now. I think it would be fucking awesome. You know, it would have a little less, like, primary fruit. It would taste a little more, like, briny. Um, but I think, like, texturally, it would be, like, wildly interesting and super cool and still hugely enjoyable. It would just be enjoyable in a different way. Um, and you know, again, like, I, I, you know, good wine will age. It doesn't matter what it is, you know. It's like talking about, you know, we were having this conversation here earlier. It's like talking about, like, people who say, I wouldn't spend, you know, $100 for a lease. Or, you know, a Thai tasting menu or a Mexican tasting menu or whatever. It's like, fuck off.

Like, the cuisine is good. If the food's good, then, you know, pay for it. If the wine's good, then, you know, see what happens in a few years. You know? Good is good. Game respects game. If the wine is well made, it's going to age well. End of story. Like, you know, get after it. Same here. Yeah. What else you got, Zoe? Oh, um, do you think that this, that there's bubbles in red wine mainly because of vinification from, like, primitive times? Like, it was just done by accident and? I mean, like, bubbles are going to happen. I mean, CO2 is going to happen. You know, CO2 happens, you know, like, like, you know, every. Sorry. No worries. But, like, so it should be said that I think Lambrusco is not alone.

I mean, it's not just in Italy. So, like, this style of wine exists throughout, like, northern, it exists throughout northern Italy in particular. And it's called kind of Vivace. It's like the Vivace style of wine. And typically it was, like, about your uncle bottled his wine a little too early. And then the next spring, you know, it had a little fizz to it. And people liked that for the sake of freshness. So it's something, like, very artisanal and very homespun. But it exists everywhere in Italy. In particular. You know, it exists in, you know, Campania. It exists, you know, everywhere. Like, Emilia-Romagna in particular is like a bit of a hotbed, you know, for the sake of this style of, like, re-fermentation. But it's not unique.

You know, in the modern era, it's important to denote that, you know, wine in bottle has only existed in bottle for the sake of glass that could withstand that level of pressure for two and a half centuries, three centuries. Maybe two centuries. I don't know. But it's a relatively recent, you know, thing. But ever since people have been bottling wine there, wine has re-fermented unintentionally. And people have liked it or not liked it. And it just so happens that in this corner of Italy, they've liked it a lot. And I think we're just kind of starting to re-explore that. And actually, like, in as much as people like Lambrusco, actually the noble grape of Emilia-Romagna historically was Barbera for reds. And a lot of people love Barbaresco with a little bit of fizz to it.

And a lot of people are re-exploring that again. And, you know, I'm excited to taste more of those wines. There's, you know, one in particular called Giuttornio Frisante that's really lovely. It's up in the hills in, like, the western corner of Emilia-Romagna. But there's always been, like, fizzy red wine in Italy. Krug, I think it's going to be, if I were to have a crystal ball for wine in the next, like, five or ten years. Fizzy, cold reds. They're going to be amazing. They're going to be one of the, I think, coolest new categories that you're going to see. And I think that it is very easy for them to do it, even if they wanted to have, like, a little bit of fizz.

I mean, that's, like, when you ferment, you have to rack, essentially, to, like, get rid of it. So, I mean, I don't think that pertains to the actual question. But I think having just a little bit of a prickle or even doing, like, Fisante, I see that category, like, blowing up soon. Yeah, I mean, I don't know if it's going to blow up to the extent that anybody's going to make, like, real money off it. Like, so I don't know if it's going to be, like, trading on Madison. I don't know if it's going to be trading on NASDAQ. So, like, I feel like if Kroll and I were brokers, we would probably, like, double down on our lightly effervescent Italian red wine stocks.

But I don't think either of us is going to become rich that way. But, you know, I think people will start drinking more of it, you know, and it will bring joy to lives, hopefully. Yeah, I mean, I've even seen, like, what is it, Early Mountain in Virginia started doing a red petnaut to make a little love that's really good. And, like, you've seen these, like, wines, like, and for me, like, these red Petnauts, when I see them, I think maybe inspired by Dryland Brews going a certain way or maybe, you know, Loire Valley, what they do with Petnauts. But I'm liking what I'm seeing in the category a lot. Yeah, so it should be said that, like, in as much as I love to visit local wineries, I love to tell, especially in Virginia, winemakers to turn their, you know, either mediocre or good Petit Verdot into great, you know, busy Petit Verdot.

So I'm a huge, like, you know, you can do this well. But you can't do it well enough to be, like, you know, ridiculous. You know, add some bubbles to it. Just make it fun, you know. And, you know, I would love to see more people making wine like that and more people drinking wine like that, honestly. What else you got, Dale? Why do you think all these celebrities are investing in Lombrusco? I don't know. Kroll? It's penny stocks right now. I don't know. If you're like a celebrity mogul and it's just like, 'hey', you want to get into Lombrusco, I think this is like when you're starting to see people in California, like, get involved in South America on the cheap.

It's just like you look at places in the world where you can, like, get involved with nothing. And you also look at things like the rap culture and how it saves stuff like cognac. And if you're like a rapper and you have ties like that, you can kind of, like, uplift a whole category. Like, for your product. So I think buying in on the cheap is huge motivation there. Yeah, I think, like, I like the idea of, you know, any celebrity likes the idea of having a brand. You know, like, loves the idea of, you know, extending their portfolio into wine. And, you know, it is much easier to do that in Lombrusco than it is in Champagne. So, you know. Like, Hova has Ace of Spades, but that was a much bigger lift than Raekwon's Lombrusco.

Which, you know, gives you a sense of, you know, the market share that they each occupy. But, you know, I hope it's because more people are drinking Lombrusco, honestly, at the end of the day. You know, wine is weird. Like, as a branding entity, it is essentially a luxury good for a lot of people. And celebrities love to tie their names to luxury goods. But, you know, I don't know. I feel like the more celebrities – I don't want to encourage celebrities to invest in Lombrusco. But I want to encourage people in general to invest in Lombrusco. So, like, if, like, Spektadek, Raekwon the Chef, UGOD, Ghostface Killa, you know, Method Man, you know, each had their own. Like, if it was, like, Meth's Grasparoso. And, like, you know, you had – I don't know.

If you had, like, each member of the Wu-Tang Clan, you know, Redman was, like, Sorbara, you know, doing their own Lombrusco. I would totally, you know, be into that. And I would say you get a little gentler with Sorbara. Maybe into Lupe Fiasco. And then you go all the way to – Oh, that's very good. That's very good. All the way to, like, The Weeknd's Super Soft for the – Yeah. Well, we talked – we had – there was an extensive, you know, discussion. In the chat about personifying grapes as different wrappers earlier. Different Lombrusco sub-varietals is even nerdier than that. But, yeah, I would love to see, like, a Wu-Tang family of Lombruscos. I don't want Raekwon to be the only, you know, former Wu-Tang member with a Lombrusco brand.

That's a really good segue to another question, which is how the flavor profiles differ between, like, the main – Yeah. Varietals in Lombrusco. Significantly. Yeah. Significantly. You know, so I think people are just starting to get a full sense of how they differ genetically. Kroll has, you know, better experience with this. But, like, Grasparosa is very much the king of varietals in terms of, like, its tannic grip. And then Sorbara is kind of, like, at the other end of the spectrum in terms of, you know, more feminine and floral and, you know, the other varietals in between. Can you speak to kind of typicity there, Brent? I've actually seen, yeah. So, I typically get, like, Salamino to be very inky and Grasparosa to be slightly more floral.

But, for me, what I link this to is, like, do you know how sometimes you can see, like, a Nebbiolo or a Sangiovese or, like, some of these grapes? I've even seen it with, like, something more obscure, like, Mavro Tragono and, like, Santorini, where someone making it can do, like, a super light version and then someone making it can do, like, a super heavy version. Actually, you can apply that to a lot of regions and stuff. So, for me, it's like, it's hard to tell people that, like, for me, it's hard to tell people that you know, Grasparosa or Salamino or one is such, like, a powerhouse compared to the other. The Ian D'Agata grape book is the only one that I've really seen get into the varieties and information.

So, if you could have that book or look it up or get it on Amazon, that I think is the best Italian grape book that I've found for reading about these. Yeah, but I find it's like, it's better. So, like, the wholesale reference being like, the Jancis Robinson Wine Grapes book, but does not do a lot of favors to the Lambrusco family. It's so, I would say, like, Grasparosa or Salamino, I've seen them, depending on producer, where one's bigger than the other. They can both kind of, like, interchangeably be as powerful, but I would say that generally, Grasparosa for me is a little more floral. And it's just got, like, a little bit more pillowy. And I've kind of seen, like, Salamino be more, like, inky and astringent and kind of darker.

And I think it just has, like, a ton of color to it. And Sorbaras for me, I've seen these be, like, almost, like, fizzy and tart, almost like a Provence rosé. And then I've seen where it just smells like straight up candy on the nose, but finishes, like, you know, dry as well. So, I've seen the aromatics, like, range wildly on there. But pretty much, if you're going around and you're looking for Lambrusco, not to just get into it. Like, you know, there's so many different varieties. You're pretty much going to see Salamino, Grasparosa, and Sorbara almost, like, exclusively in the market, like, right now. I don't think that, at least for me, I don't really see a dominant grape in a Lambrusco, in, like, a quality Lambrusco outside of those three hardly ever.

And then, Kroll, are there other - do you have other favorite producers that we haven't touched on today that people might like to see count? You know, I've actually got a bunch of beer nerds. I've got a bunch of beer nerds who tell me they don't drink wine to try Donati, because there's Brettanomyces on it. So, the beer hipsters that love, like, stank sour beers, I've given Donati, and they're like, oh, this is great. And you bridge the gap to the beer lovers. I think - And Camilo Donati, for those of you playing at home, who's very much another kind of pioneer for the sake of reviving more artisanal styles of Lambrusco, and it should be said that, like, there are these extremes.

So, you pledge to Chiarelli to make whistle-clean wines that, you know, are, you know, as shelf-stable as anything in the world. And then, you have, you know, the maestries of the world that, you know, are making wines that taste like, you know, Jim Sox and, you know, only last a day. I think Donati is a little more shelf-stable than that, but more on the Jim Sox-y side of the ledger. Yeah. Yeah. And I would say those – the Delini 910. That you have here, too, is definitely one of my favorites. The Candida del Tavolte, the aged Sorbara that's a champagne method that I mentioned before is definitely a favorite of mine, too. I think that they're going in a completely different direction with how they age it and, you know, trying to make them in the champagne method.

And I think that that's a really cool one. I think that they just broke up with their distributors. They might be, like, out of the market. I actually – This is, like, the time of the year that I go on a hunt for, like, all Lambruscos around here and in, like, surrounding markets like New Jersey and New York to, like, stock up for Lambrusco week. So, I'm probably, like – this is a good motivational thing to give me. So, you are the, like, the Lambrusco, like, great white shark as of July for the sake of hoarding things for your future Lambrusco, you know, kind of bacchanal. Yeah. Yeah. For sure. But you have a lot of great choices here.

I also think when I was speaking about the consistency of Fiorini that I was, to correct myself, was speaking more about their Terra El Sole. And you're offering one that is very new to the market, that's been, I think, been in the market for less than a year, speaking of new good Lambruscos. Yeah. It is a – so, and this is, you know, very much a hearkening back to historic style. They – it's an older vineyard. It's a – they call it the Vigna di Padre. So, it's like a, you know, homage to an old vineyard. It's an older style of wine that's made in the Methoda Ancestral and bottled without, you know, binding or filtration and, you know, really special as such. And it's kind of – it's kind of fun.

I do like that they are, you know, pursuing more artisanal processes. And so, you know, you have a lot of times in the industry, you know, producers that are small and are trying – they're striving after consistency, and you have producers that are consistent, and they're striving after topicity. You know, they're striving after, you know, soulful – more soulful wines. And, you know, I always feel, you know, heartened when people are moving in the same direction, you know, whether or not they get, you know, quite get there. You know, at least they're, you know, headed the same way. But so, before we get to more questions, I just wanted to thank everybody for joining us and toast you all. Karol, you're not drinking, but, you know, thank you so much for joining us.

And it should be said that Brent – Brent said he was going to be on for 45 minutes. And has managed to shirk whatever he had going on later this afternoon for the sake of, you know, staying on this chat. And Zoe is courageously avoiding any and all service responsibilities for the sake of – for the sake of moderating this chat. So, thank you. Thank you all so much. It's been such a pleasure. We're going to continue to answer questions, it should be said. But I am, you know, thrilled that Lambrusco brings joy to our audience. As many of you as it does. And it should be said that, you know, I am committed to stocking more of these wines and making them more broadly available.

Brent, you know, has been doing that longer than I have. And we're not going to – we're not going to stop, you know. And I think we're both, you know, true, you know, kind of like jazz record collecting obsessives. It doesn't matter to us whether it earns a living, you know, it just feels like, you know, the right thing to do. So, we're going to keep on doing it. So, cheers to you all. Alone, together. As always, thank you for joining us. Zoe, what do you have? Oh, I did kind of want to know if bubbly wine, fizzy wine is related scientifically to hangovers and to headaches the next day. A few things. So, yes and no. Objectively, you know, it's all the same amount of alcohol.

But CO2 does speed the delivery of alcohol to your bloodstream. So, it's an accelerant. So, it gets you – it will increase your body's ABV faster, which can, you know, cause trouble depending on what you decide to do with your night. I used to have this thing for fun in college when I was much more of an idiot than I am now. There's the Sharper Image breathalyzer. And I used to, like, take a shot and then see, like, how quick it took to metabolize the alcohol. And it's interesting. With carbonation, like, the timer is faster. Even faster than if you get, like, a shot of, like, bourbon. Like, you know, spark – anything sparkling is faster for it making a little difference. Oh, wow. I didn't even know the Sharper Image offered that.

I don't know if they still do. Probably a bunch of idiots like me bought them. And then it - I don't think - I don't know. I don't think there's still a Sharper Image. I think Sharper Image is, like, dead. Wow. That's - I'm starting to get back-in-the-day type statements. Yeah. Yeah. Which is hugely sad. What else you got, Zoe? This is, like, the nerdiest functional alcoholism. This is funny. What about soil types for Lombrusco varieties? Mostly heavy. So you're - I mean, you're in an alluvial plane. So - and honestly, like - Yeah. You're in a - it - Lombrusco historically was famous as a productive grape. People lean into that. Your heavier soils, especially for the sake of Sorbar and stuff like that.

There is some – there's some limestone in the hills for the sake of, like, Grasparosa, you know, which can give you a little more, you know, of, like, a perfumey kind of, like, you know, kind of femininity about the wines. But it's – I mean, I'm sure that – Yeah. people who are in it talk about terroir and think meaningfully about it but it is not one of those regions that you know is famed for it as such. Kroll? Yeah, I mean I agree with like what you're saying on the soil, so I think when you're using soils like this, like and I'm sure this has been covered to some extent these classes, you can't like scientifically like prove or disprove like you know soil or terroir it's like effect in wine, but I mean for me some soils have like a minerality that's kind of like isn't like mineral water where it's like fairly neutral so I think that like you're not necessarily smelling like the extreme like Kimmeridge initially or like the La Crella shift of like Priorat when you're into these soils that Bill described they're they're more of like a neutral like minerality that what how it imparts in the wine, so I oh go ahead. I would, I would quibble though, so like there's not a science I would say science has yet to suss out the you know kind of like organoleptic you know kind of flavor profiles that soils ultimately derive.

I think that you know the deeper you dive into it as a wine nerd the more you become aware that there's so many variables with soil types and geology that even within you know adjoining vineyard sites, there it's impossible it's almost impossible to isolate an independent variable, so you know you just use you, you stand you know you're you're humble in the face of the things that you can't you know meaningfully differentiate otherwise. But I don't think I think the biggest difference here is is probably depth of soil which is something that people don't consider a lot so you know like a depth of soil and fertility of soil is hugely important when it comes to soil types and you know if you're in if you're in the alluvial plains so it's a lot deeper you know the the vines are picking up a lot more nutrients and you know you're you know you're you know you're you know you're you know you're you're more productive if you're on the hillsides the opposite is true and I think that's a major divide for the sake of this region is is hillside or plain and Grasparosa in particular tends to be great for the hillsides whereas Salomino tends to be great for the plains but you know as Brent said like there Are people growing Salomino in the plains or Salomino in the hills and Grasparosa? So, you know, there are always like with wine as with life, there are always exceptions to the rule.

And it's it's really important to address each wine in as much as you know um you want to consider it as an individual um and and you know try to understand it on its own terms. That's all I got that has to do with grapes and wine, what else do you have? Um, when can we play Lombrisco Pong? In terms of beer pong, I think oh yeah, that sounds amazing. Um, I want to dispense with that though, I want to make that happen and I feel like Kroll, I feel like we have to uh, I think. That could work in um, you know, just like stout kind of rocks glasses or solo, they can work in solo cups too, um, I think that like, uh, that's a great idea, I think that like, you know, especially with like all these fizzy kinds of like crazes with all your White Claws and Trulies; throw some Lambrusco into the mix, you know, like why not, why can't that have a seat at the table?

Yeah, I think too, you would uh, you'd have to be like legally obligated to play with the pink ping pong balls, I think that would be like an important part of the uh experience, but I think I think the rules should be the same um, you know, and and I, I think That sounds like good fun. Um, I once played beer pong with Yin Ling; it's one of the more traumatic experiences of my life, and I would much rather play with Lambrusco than anything else, but um, I don't think there's any like local tradition of Lambrusco. Problem for what it's worth, yeah, I don't can't...can't think of it. Oh, one thing that you mentioned about soil that I...I don't mean to backtrack too much, but like, what like in terms of you talked about like vines digging in and stuff that stuff creates like in terms of the vines struggling and yields it creates more intensity and Lambrusco if there's a common thread when You like, are doing a tasting grid or just smelling it.

Lambrusco is very rarely lacking intensity, yeah, yeah, and it's very, it's actually like, very rarely lacking in acidity either, which is typically, which is typically what goes wrong with the reproduction, typically wines get you know kind of vapid and like, you know, uh they just get kind of long and like, um, you know, not you know, they they get flabby, um, but that, that's not something that happens with Lambrusco. It retains its acid pretty well regardless of the yields, um, but you know, it goes into this like starburst candy place that's not, you know, quite as, um. Enjoyable, but um, you know, hopefully that hasn't been the case for the sake of the Lambruscos that you've all been trying today and um, you know, we hope that you continue to drink it and continue to appreciate it um as the multi-faceted um beauty um that it is.

You know, essentially they're squenching but you know wonderfully profound uh as well so um, pro you've said buddy. No one's asked me my personal life on here, so I answered. He's a happily married man uh, you know, with children uh, with child yeah. Anyways, I answered it in the chat; it's um, made me blush to its Sorbara shade right now uh great yeah great cross promotion there. Buddy, um, crawl, thank you, thank you so much for joining us, man, uh, such a pleasure to be here with you and we'll see you next time. It's been a pleasure, Zoe. You're the best, your treasure, as always, um, thank you all, um, I remember to report so we can, uh, you know, have this lesson for, well, ever, um, and, uh, love you all. Cheers! You guys are incredible. I'm a huge fan of your place; I like I said to you via email, and I'll say in front of everyone: lucky to have places like yours in DC and thanks for having me on today. Yeah, um, we feel as lucky to have you, buddy. Take care.