Blame it on Rioja

Manuel Ruiz, winemaker at Bodegas y Viñedos Labastida. Photo: John Barkely

Modern Rioja owes much of its early development to the winemakers of Bordeaux, who came to Rioja in search of wine to meet the demand of their markets after their own vineyards were decimated by Phylloxera in the 19th century. But in many ways Rioja is more like Burgundy. For one, like the Côte d’Or Rioja’s terroir is heterogeneous and can change rapidly from one vineyard plot to the next. Also like Burgundy, Rioja is composed of small vineyard plots owned by myriad grape growers, a fragmentation that has made it difficult for large bodegas to own significant contiguous landholdings. As a result, most bodegas buy in grapes from many sources. To give you an idea, there are around 500 wineries in Rioja and about 20,000 viticulturalists.

One way that grape growers have responded to this model is to form cooperatives, in order to negotiate better prices with the large bodegas. Some of these unions of grape growers have gone on to create their own wineries as well. One the most important of these is Bodegas y Viñedos Labastida, based in the town of the same name. They export all three of their brands–Solaguen, Castillo Labastida, and Manuel Quintano–to the U.S., and their wines have consistently received high critical marks in the U.S. press.

We spent a few hours with winemaker Manuel Ruiz when we visited Rioja last fall, who explained the cooperative concept.

“The basic structure of the family economy in upper Ebro valley hasn’t changed much in the last 150 years. Winemaking methods were of course much more rudimentary back then, but viticulture as the key component of the family economy had already been well established by then. And just as winemaking functioned in those days without the existence of the large bodegas, today that same economy maintains itself through continued individual ownership of the vineyards by the families who work them.

“As the industry grew and the model began to shift, there were disagreements over the price of the grapes between individual grape growers on one hand and the big wine companies who bought grapes from them. On many occasions, grape growers felt discriminated against, and perhaps this is the reason for the establishment of many of the cooperatives. Unions of grape growers established themselves, first, to defend their common interests and then, from there, some of those cooperatives took it a step further, dedicating themselves as well to wine production and marketing, a move that I think has made a significant contribution to providing for economic stability in this sector of the industry.”

Writing from the 14th floor of the Chancellor Hotel near Union Square in San Francisco, on day five of a ten-day West coast trip. It’s been surprisingly brisk here for the past few days, a biting kind of cold especially at night that gets under your skin and just stays there. Or maybe it’s just that I didn’t pack enough layers….

There’s always a special joy that attends one’s first meal after a long journey. Last time I was here it was an exceedingly satisfying grilled steak burrito from Taqueria Papalote (http://www.papalote-sf.com/home.html) in the Mission, known for its smoky salsa and fresh ingredient-driven and vegetarian-friendly menu, and a six-pack of Negra Modelo with my brother Patrick’s family in the Mission.

This time it was also in the Mission, but even more “California-style”: lunch at Café Gratitude (http://www.cafegratitude.com/) at Harrison and 20th Street, a charming little organic, quasi-raw food corner café with a great vibe and a surprisingly tasty fresh vegetable and whole grain-based menu. My vegetable “Biryani” over red rice had little mountains of super-sweet snap peas, raw cashews, avocado, cucumber, carrots, cilantro, etc., etc., so much so that I couldn’t finish it. I was full, but it was a really happy kind of full, made even happier with a lemon and ginger infusion spiked with a little cayenne (why don’t I do this at home after every meal?!?) If ever food alone could get you high, this high-quality, earth-friendly cuisine is it. (Kudos to young Ms. Caroline B. for turning me on this place.)

Dinner at Beretta’s (http://www.berettasf.com/) the next evening was the first time all three generations of my family have been together in over 7 years, and they were kind enough to accommodate a huge group of us on a Saturday night. The all-Italian wine list was reasonably priced (Planeta’s tasty Cerasuolo di Vitorria was $40), the service was extremely patient and kind, and the Northern Italian-inspired food on the whole did not disappoint.

My only quibble was that the pizza crust could have been crispier, a bit more speckled with char; and my brother Patrick rightly pointed out that carciofi alla guidia (a Roman fried artichoke dish that originated in that city’s Jewish quarter) on our check did not accurately describe what was served.

But as with all special occasions, especially this one, my dear Mother’s “Sgt. Pepper” birthday, as long as a restaurant’s heart is in the right place, whatever’s wrong with an evening can be easily eclipsed by what’s right about it. It’s easy to miss magical moments when you’re spending too much time worrying about why the magic didn’t arrive exactly as you scheduled it.

More to come, including late-night taqueria excess, tapas and Palacios Remondo Placet on the water, and the best spicy scrambled eggs I’ve had since a stop in Austin, Texas in the summer of 2003.

. . . Without the Slaughter

By Taylor Cocalis

The second installment of Taylor’s dispatch of a piglet’s dispatch in the mountains of Ecuador, in which the animal meets its maker.

Halfway through the week, Berta, the woman running the dairy farm in Ecuador where I was fortunate enough to have found myself staying, informed us that they would be killing one of the piglets (age: 3 months) in our honor. I can’t remember the last time I heard anyone using that phrase in reference to an upcoming meal, but it seemed to merit gratitude, as well as anticipation of what was to come. She asked if we wanted to see the slaughter, and I thought it only appropriate that if we were going to eat the piglet, we should at least honor the creature at its death.

Now, we had already established some measure of intimacy with the pig. Although we hadn’t exactly rolled around in the pen with it, during each meal we would prepare a bucket of our scraps . . . crab shells, whey from cheesemaking, and the peels and pulp of the fruit that we juiced each morning . . . on which the pig could feast. So in a sense we had shared some meals together. Soon the animal would become our week’s most memorable meal.

The morning of the slaughter we awoke a few hours earlier than usual and rushed up to the barn when Berta indicated they were ready. I came prepared for some pomp and circumstance, but what we witnessed was swift and only slightly painful (for us and, more so, for the poor pig). Within 30 seconds of our arrival, Alvaro (Berta’s husband) punctured the pig directly under it’s left foreleg with a six-inch kitchen knife (for the record, I think an 8-inch knife would have more effectively reached the pig’s heart for a slightly quicker and less painful departure).

These next two minutes were the hardest to watch, as the bright blood dripped down the pig’s chest, in stark contrast with its white skin. But the shrieking squeals soon subsided as the pig was laid to rest. Within a few minutes, the farm hands had transported the pig to a wheelbarrow where they poured scalding hot water over its body in order to loosen the hair for removal. Their hands poured over the pig’s skin as they removed its hair by hand (for the record one of the farm hands did pull out a pink plastic Lady Bic razor further along in the process to ensure that there were no extraneous hairs left behind).

We then watched how, in a matter of minutes, they opened the pig up to remove the contents of it’s body, all saved to be used at a later date (”No, we would never let these good parts go to waste,” Berta assured us). My jaw dropped as the intestines literally poured out of the pig’s body, and I wondered how it all could have possibly fit in its belly just a few minutes before.

The whole process, start to finish, took a swift 30 minutes (perhaps Rachel Ray should do a special slaughtering episode), at which point they took the prepared piglet off to the tiny town of Pintag where a friend of the farm had an oven large enough to roast the whole pig at once.

Taylor Cocalis manages Murray’s Cheese Course at Murray’s Cheese Shop in New York City and should not be blamed for the death of this small animal.

. . .Without the Slaughter

by Taylor Cocalis

Enlighten me for a moment. Imagine that you open your front door to find a box on your door step. You curiously open it up to find a plate full of food: tender juicy pork, crispy potatoes, and steaming starchy white corn. What do you do? Do you eat it?

I can see it now . . . all of you shaking your heads, thinking that I am crazy. Who in their right mind would eat a box of food left on their doorstep? From where did it come? How did it get there? It would be crazy to just go ahead and eat that. Right?

But the truth is that is what happens almost every day with the food that we eat. You may go to a restaurant and trust them to bring good food to your plate, but do you really know from where it came? Do you think that your waiter or your chef knows the person that cultivated that corn or that killed the pork on your plate? We don’t seem to be scared of that, but we do seem to be scared of knowing from exactly where our food comes . . . even (or especially) when it comes from the most natural source.

Let me explain.

When friends and family peruse my photographs from a recent trip to Ecuador, they always seems to have the same response, “I could have done without the pig pictures.” Despite that fact that they gush over the mountainous landscape, warmly note the colorfully dressed locals, and even relish in the crispy pork skin feast, nobody seems to enjoy the documentation of the pig slaughter. Except me.

Don’t get me wrong. Taking an animal’s life is never fun, but this was not merely frivolous slaughter. When most people view the pictures they immediately think of guts and gore. When I see them, I fondly remember the culture surrounding the whole process. Hopefully with a little insight, you’ll feel as warmly about the experience (and the photographs) as I do.

Part 2 of “The Sweet Just Ain’t as Sweet,” with photos, will appear on BioR tomorrow, Tuesday, April 8, 2008; Part 3 on Wednesday, April 9.

Taylor Cocalis manages Murray’s Cheese Course at Murray’s Cheese Shop in New York City. She is also one of the grooviest people I know.

Miguel Angel de Gregorio standing in his El Calvario vineyard near the town of Briones, Spain, September 11, 2007. Briones visible in the background. Photo: John Barkley.

My respect for film and video directors, scriptwriters, producers, etc., jumped a hundred-fold this winter as found myself neck deep in the tedious, time-consuming but ultimately extraordinarily gratifying work of piecing together the two-hour educational documentary tentatively titled, “Magic at the Limits of Viticulture,” a collaboration between D.O.Ca. Rioja and the Culinary Institute of America Greystone scheduled for a DVD release later this year.

In upcoming posts I will go into more detail about each stage of the production, bringing us up to where we are now. It was completely new territory for me and an object lesson in the importance of breaking down all of the myriad tasks involved into little pieces, as opposed to looking at it as a whole and getting buried under the weight of trying to do too much at once. I have the great luxury of working with an incredible team at Vibrant Rioja and CIA Greystone; another lesson was learning how to ask for help.

Why “Magic at the Limits of Viticulture”?

Well, as I said, it’s a working title, and I’m nervous about using the word “magic” for fear of sounding too new-agey or like too much like we’re making a hard sell (although they have been very hands-off up to now, the project is financed by the region itself), but there are reasons behind it.

As I was reviewing all 30 hours video and looking over two binders of transcripts in December and January, it became clear to me that we had on our hands some really amazing material, and that in that material, there emerged a handful of captured moments that would profoundly affect how I conceptualized the organization of the story.

One of those moments came on day two, in a vineyard outside Briones call El Calvario, with Finca Allende proprietor and winemaker Miguel Angel de Gregorio. No matter how you feel about his wines, the man brings so much passion and respect to his work–for wine, terrior, vines, Rioja–it’s infectious. I remember that when we closed the interview, I turned around, clenched one fist and whispered to myself “yes!” because I knew we had just captured something special. My colleagues, none of whom speaks enough Spanish to understand what had just transpired, we unphased. “You’ll see,” I told them.

Spain has almost 70 different Denomaciones de Origen, what does Rioja have that no one else has?

That’s one of the questions I asked Miguel Angel de Gregorio. Here’s my translation of his response.

Uy! Tantas cosas. Rioja es mágica….

Uy! So many things. Rioja is magic. Rioja is unique and inimitable, first, because of the richness and diversity of its terroirs.

No other area in Spain has such a rich endowment of terroirs: diverse soil types, varied expositions to the sun, these mountainous elevations.

There is a second reason: we’re an Atlantic climate in a Mediterranean country, in a warm and dry country.

We have our share of water shortages; in a typical year, Briones will get about 600 liters of rainfall, which is less than half of what Bordeaux gets. This is why we still grow bush vines instead of training our vines higher.

At the same time, we’re influenced by winds coming in from the Atlantic. Ours is one of those climates at the limits of the viticulture. Go 10 to 15 kilometers beyond this vineyard, and vines won’t ripen, they cannot ripen. We’ve already reached the limit, that limit where you’ll find all the great wine-producing areas of the world: Alsace, Bordeaux, Burgundy, Piedmont. They’re all found in marginal climates, where vineyards almost shouldn’t exist. But this is where you find aromatic complexity, that complexity of elements in perfect alignment, where vineyards using the same grape variety are nevertheless unique and unrepeatable.

Stay tuned for more excerpted interviews.

It was quite a thrill to learn on Friday on my way to work that Blame it on Rioja was nominated for a 2008 Amercian Wine Blog Award for “Best Single Subject Wine Blog.” This is only the second year Tom Wark of Fermentation has administered these awards, and from the looks of it, Mr. Wark is working assiduously to enhance even further the credibility and standards of the awards, as this year he recruited a panel of anonymous judges, presumably wine and or blogging insiders, to ensure that popular nominees are also maintaining a certain amount of editorial rigor.All of which makes it even more of an honor to be chosen to hang with the big dogs.

Okay, so the world of wine blogging is still a new dog run, and one that’s not without its critics, but I suspect that even the snarkiest of print wine journalists have done a few drive bys, if they haven’t already jumped in. It’s people like Tom Wark, and initiatives like the the American Wine Blog Awards, that continue to raise wine blogging’s profile in the popular imagination while at the same time encouraging its practitioners to continue raising the bar of excellence in their own work.

Congratulations fellow nominees (including my friends–and now bitter arch rivals!–Gabriella and Ryan over at Catavino.net); I’m looking forward to spending a little quality time looking over all of your sites and learning more than a few things along the way.

Adrian Murcia
New York City

Click here to vote for Blame it on Rioja today! Votes must be in by Midnight, March 29, 2008

A Table, Perfectly Set: Jamón Ibérico, Queso Manchego, and Vinos de Rioja, Finca Valpiedra, Cenicero, Spain, May 2006. Photo: José Guerra.

Apart from being the essential guide to anyone interested understanding the science of food, Harold McGee’s On Food and Coooking (Scribner, 2004) is filled with aphorisms of great resonance and economy. My favorite among them, which I first encountered as a quote in Peter Kaminsky’s terrific book on pork love, Pig Perfect (Hyperion, 2005), has become something of a mantra for me:

“Rotten grapes (wine), moldy milk (cheese), and ripened meat (ham) make our lives more interesting.”