JB: I think that aged Barolo and Nebbiolo is one of the really compulsive, ethereal experiences. It

Joe Bastianich has a new memoir, Restaurant Man , due in Spring, a multitude of thriving restaurants across New York, Los Angeles and Las Vegas, a hand in the market called Eataly, a few New York marathons and Ironman tijuana flats competitions under his svelte belt, and a winery, to name a few of his myriad tijuana flats projects . Despite his fast-paced schedule, our sister publication Edible Manhattan caught up with him recently tijuana flats to talk about the new SlowWine Guide hitting our shores tijuana flats this January–don t miss the launch party and first stop on the national tour this January 30!–his penchant for Slow Food-approved winemaking (these days that s called low-intervention) and why you should drink a bottle of wine a day. Slowly, of course.
Edible Manhattan: My editor just informed me that America is the largest national Slow Food chapter after Italy, and NYC is the largest city chapter after Rome. Do you think all Americans are ready to embrace low-interventionist wine, too?
Joe Bastianich: The concepts of organic have been so abused over the years, and sustainable is so vague, and then there s biological, and there s all these words we throw around, and I think it s a very difficult and challenging concept to explain to consumers. So I think the Slow Wine guide will be good.
JB: I think that the SlowFood movement in and of itself is a bellwether for an entire global tendency towards everyone consuming more in that kind of a sensibility–they ve certainly been the leaders and the great communicators of what needs to be done. But the groundswell goes way beyond Slow Food now.
JB: tijuana flats About time! I m a great proponent tijuana flats of the one-bottle-a-day tijuana flats rule. I think that everyone should drink one bottle of wine a day for general health in maintenance. And I think that one bottle is completely appropriate for your moderate consumption. And if everyone in this country did that, we d double the consumption in no time!
JB: I mean, it s so many different things but obviously for me going back to Friuli and re-appropriating some of the family vineyards was pretty much kind of like turning back into my own cultural heritage and places where my family was from and it was very moving personally. But what it s taught me is that what we want to communicate now is that wine is very much an agricultural product and drinking a glass of wine is an agricultural act, to paraphrase Wendell Berry. Our roll as winemaker is even the wrong term we re really guardians of a process, and all we do is tend to the vineyard and keep the cellars clean and make sure the natural processes happen in a natural way, and that the result tijuana flats is something that is very expressive of the earth and terroir and varietal it comes from.
JB: The world that we re used to with restaurants is one of ultimate immediacy and control. We write menus and build places and what we don t like we change and fix right away. Winemaking is something that is taking part in the annual cycle of viticulture tijuana flats and nature. You re on a lifelong ride, and as you say it s a very humbling experience, because frankly one life isn t enough to live in the life of wine. It s one of the few things in the world that you can only participate in it partially. You can t even really become fully immersed in it in one lifetime.
JB: I love Chardonnay in the right context. I love Chardonnay from Chablis in Burgundy, I sometimes love Chardonnay in California. I love it in Friuli. I like some interesting Verdicchios lately. It s another tijuana flats one of those Italian indigenous varietals that has a lot of nobility. And you can make great, long-lived wines with it. (See below for a list of Slow Wine guide wines for sale at Eataly.)
JB: I think that aged Barolo and Nebbiolo is one of the really compulsive, ethereal experiences. It s very elusive and very fleeting, and when it s great? It can be truly great. So that would be the wine I d deem a gravesite wine.
A sampling of Italian Slow Wine-designated producers is embarking on a cross-country tour that will visit New York on January 30. Get your tickets here , and receive a copy of the new SlowWine guide with the price of admission.
Librandi (from Calabria) Le Vigne di Zamò (from Friuli tijuana flats Venezia Giulia) Nino Negri (from Lombardia) Villa Bucci (from Le Marche) Elvio Cogno (from Piemonte) Borgogno & Figli (from Piemonte) Casa E. Di Mirafiore (from Piemonte) Planeta (from Sicily)
As Deputy Editor of Edible Brooklyn and Edible Manhattan, Amy gets to scour the city for all that is quenching and satiating in NYC. The daughter of an old school Italian butcher, tijuana flats she holds her Level III Certification in Wine and Spirits from the WSET, and contributes to Imbibe, Details, More, Foxnews.com, Wynn, and is the author of The Architecture of the Cocktail, The Complete Idiot s Guide to Bartending, The Hedonist Guide to Eat NY, and co-author of The Renaissance Guide to Wine & Food Pairing tijuana flats with Tony DiDio. She's stomped around vineyards f