Ep. 1901 Barbera, Bombino Bianco, Bombino Nero by Paul Bologna | Italian Grape Geek

The Italian wine podcast is the community driven platform for Italian winegeeks around the world. Support the show by donating at italian wine podcast dot com. Donate five or more Euros, and we'll send you a copy of our latest book, my Italian Great Geek journal. Absolutely free. To get your free copy of my Italian GreatGeek journal, click support us at italian wine podcast dot com, or wherever you get your pods. Welcome to the Italian GreatGeek Podcast. Join us as we explore personal stories of travel and tasting with Italy's must know grape varietals. Chart your own course with my Italian GreatGeek Journal. Your personal tasting companion to accompany the series. Available now on Amazon with thanks to Calangelo and partners for their generous support with this project. Okay. So welcome to the Italian wine podcast. This is Paul Bologna, and I'm here to talk a little bit today about Barbara. Barbara is one of the most famous grapes of Italy. So I'm guessing if you're listening to the Italian wine podcast, you probably already are familiar with Barbara. But if you're not, it's a dry, steel wine, mostly aged in steel tanks, to preserve the fresh acidity. And it's also made in a very serious style that involves oak aging as well. So you could buy a Marvera from five dollars to fifty dollars. So there's a lot of variability there with style and quality. And I'm gonna talk a little bit today about Arborra. Well, what you may not know is where the grape actually came from. In fact, nobody really knows. So the actual time it arrived in Piamanta is still a mystery. Certainly, the Greeks and the Romans were there. And there is a legend actually associated with Barbara. That goes back to the year six hundred, where, apparently, in Monteferato, the townspeople were able to fend off an invasion by the Franks by placing Amphora along the trails with Barbara. So the invading soldiers would drink the wine and then becoming incapacitated. And sure enough it worked, and the townspeople were able to hide in the woods. So legend has it. This wine actually saved the town. So that being said, I don't know if you went out of town yourself and put up Barbara in your kitchen that you would actually have the burglar drink it and then fall on the floor. But anyway, it's kind of a fun story. Let me get back to what you really need to know, the key traits with Barbara. There's three key traits. It has deep color, It has high acidity, and it has very low tannin. You know, that's an important thing to understand in the world of wine because if you are a new world drinker and like myself who lives in California, The idea of high acidity and low tannins in a red wine is really not one of the main grape varieties like Merlo or Cabernet or Pina noir. So Italy really kind of runs the gamut with all the grape varieties where you get wants high in acidity, winds low in acidity, winds high in tenon, low in tenon, etcetera. So Barbarra really is sort of a great food wine for this reason because the acidity really does kind of cut through food. So it's a great food wine overall. One of the things that we want to talk about with Italian wine grapes is how it got its name. The origin is unclear. It either came from a barbaro, which is a translation for a barbarian. So we're referring to the wine deep color or, Vinnum Barberis, which was a drink in the middle ages that was deeply colored and highly acidic. So, however, it got its name. It still is gonna go back centuries. I mentioned it mainly grows in Piamante. There's three DOCGs and twelve DOC wines, but it also has grown all over Italy and all over the world, actually. So it's mentioned in a hundred and six IgT wines. Throughout Italy. So, obviously, that deep color is a big plus when it comes to blending with other grapes. In California where I live, there's a lot of barbaric rome. Most Appalachian grow it up north in Amador County. They actually have a festival surrounding it, but I will tell you ten years ago I worked as a Psalm, a wine buyer for the JW Marriott in, Palm Desert, California, and I worked there as a wine buyer. And I was buying some Barbara, along with the pinot noir and the Cabernan blue and everything else. Everybody likes. And I will say that the Barbara, the California Barbera, this one came from Santa Barbara, if I remember correctly. It was different than the other reds. And, I mean, different than Merlo and Cabernet because of that key component of acidity. So a lot of people who were unfamiliar with Barbara would try the line and kind of be taken aback by its high acidity. So Generally speaking, I think wines that are high in acidity take a little bit of getting used to, and then you develop a taste for it, and then you really start to enjoy them. So for somebody who's been drinking Merlo and Cabernet their whole life, you give them a barbera, and they probably will be a little taken aback by that acidity. But in truth, that's what makes a great food wine. And people who call themselves foodies. Certainly, you have to have that level of adventure of trying winds with different acidity, different tenant levels and pairing them with foods to really understand what kind of synergies are out there. One thing that I would impress as a Psalm is that temperature is key to serving Barbara. And this is a topic that A lot of people don't really understand, but it is so critically important to enjoying a wine. So every grape variety has a correct temperature. And in general terms, the higher the acidity of the wine the lower the service temperature and the higher the alcohol in a wine, also the lower service temperature. So I don't know the the cent agreed equivalent, but in Fahrenheit, sixty eight degrees is a cabernet, and a merlot, and maybe sixty one degrees would be a pinot noir or a Zinfandel. Pinot noir has that key component of acidity. Zinfindels are often higher in alcohol. So that being said, you wanna make sure that if you're enjoying a Barbera, it's at its right temperature. Now, I'm not expecting you to put a probe in the, in the bottle, but usually if you put the bottle against your cheek, it's gonna be cooler than the room you're in or it should be. The room is seventy five degrees. My point here is if you go out to a restaurant and the bottle is sitting out on the counter and it's seventy five degrees, the wine probably won't show that well. Or if you're outside and want a picnic because Barrera's a great picnic wine, it's gonna heat up. And when it heats up, the wine is not gonna show well because the acidity and the alcohol will really get out of balance. So temperature is a key thing with Barbara. So I always try to tell people that it's also true with that Zenfadell example, and pinot noir, and etcetera. But do be mindful of that. So make sure always to have your wines at the correct temperature. You can still drink them when they're not, but they show best. When they are in that sweet spot. Let me circle back to talking about the docG and the doc wines of Piamante. Barbara has a grape. It does well in a diversity of soils and terrains. The three docG wines are Barbero, Barbera del Monterato Superior, Barbero de Esti, and then Barbara de Este Superior Nitza or just Nitza. That last one, the Nitza, that's the most ambitious of the three DOCGs. I mean, it's gotta be a hundred percent barbera. They allow for single vineyard bottlings. It's really the most ambitious for making the best barberas. I'll also mention you might be familiar with barbera to Alba, which is the DOC. I know I see that a lot in my area, and that one's a little fuller, Richard, Vaira. It makes a great barbera to Alba. Nitza, I mentioned, you know, it's a really serious barbera. Michaela Kiaro does a single vineyard La Court great needs of bottling. I'll even say Mckella Carlos just regular Barbara, which you can find. I bought a bottle of that the other day. I think it was, like, fourteen US dollars. Great bottle. Barbara de Mont furrato Scperiore is really known for being aromatic in perfume and less structured. So there's a difference between these different barberas, but overall, the barbera as a wine, you know, is a high acid, low tan, and deep colored red. One thing I would say now is I was recently in Chicago, and I was shopping for wine, and I went into the Italy there, and I was facing a wall of Barbara. They must have had more than a dozen selections. And they had, like, a signage explaining Barbara, and they had, like, a picture from the mid twentieth century of that stereotypical Italian table with wine on it, you know, and it had a big font. It said, Barbara, wine of the people. And, you know, historically speaking, Barbara doesn't really have a long history. It's been around forever, but it's really only in the 1980s has the renaissance of Barbara really started in that really thanks to Roberto Conterno and Jockmo Bologna. And because they really wanted to take the wine up to the next level. So, I mean, in the fifteen hundreds, in the sixteen hundreds, Barbara was mentioned in documents, in the eighteen hundreds, in the nineteen hundreds, Barbara was a very important grape in Piamante in the nineteen sixties and seventies. It was gaining notoriety, but, you know, it really turned a corner in the eighties, where these heroes can turn on bologna really wanted to make a statement. With Barbara. That it could be not just an everyday wine, but a great wine. So there was the introduction of barrel aging. And all of these focus was really put on making Barbara a truly, truly great wine. And for the most part, they've been successful. Be mindful that you can bring a Barbarra Nitza to a nice dinner party, and it should be very well received. Now I will tell you when it comes to food pairing with Barra. You know, it's very versatile because of that high acidity, but, it's most commonly. It goes with cold cuts, so a great starter with salami and prosciutto. Personally here in California, it would be my choice for just, you know, an unpretentious sandwich. If you're having wine in the day, Barbara served at that right temperature, it'll go with most all foods. So anyway, I hope you enjoyed this brief chat on Barbara, and I hope you get the chance to try one this week. Chinching. Are you enjoying this podcast? Don't forget to visit our YouTube channel, mama jumbo shrimp for fascinating videos covering Stevie Kim and her travels across Italy and beyond, meeting winemakers, eating local food, and taking in the scenery. Now back to the show. So today, I'm gonna be talking about two grapes from Pulia, Bombino Bianco, and Bombino narrow. Both are high quality grapes that make delicious wines. But I'm talking about both of these grapes together because they sound similar. And to talk about these grapes together is to really talk about how wine grapes are named in Italy. Both of these grapes are not related, but obviously they sound similar. I will say this that Italian grape varieties are named for five possible reasons. Their sensory attribute their physical attribute, their productivity levels and characteristics, their perceived origin, and they may also be named after people, saints, or religious references. When it comes to bambino Bianco and bambino narrow, it's the physical attributes of the bunch of grapes that they are in the shape of, like, a bambino, which is Italian for babies. The grape bunches kind of looked like a cuddling child. And when it comes to the sensory attribute, the visual, Bianco means white narrow is gonna be the darker. So it's sort of like the white and the red grapes, both that look like a cuddling infant. So there you go. Also, Bambino sounds a lot like Bambino. So it could be that as well. You see where I'm going with this. Each of the grapes have their own story about how they've been named. Let me talk about Bambino Bianco. Firstly, it is made in actually several regions, primarily in Kulia, but it has been found in Abruzzo, in Amelia Romagna, even little parts of Sardinia and Compania, And, you know, now I bring on to another subject. It's not unique, but certainly a Bambino Bianco story is that a lot of Italian grapes have been mischaracterized over time. That is to say Two grapes in two regions are the same wine, but over time, this has only been revealed. In the past, nurseries often were selling Bambino Bianco, but under a different name and vice versa. So there is a little confusion with Italian grapes. You're gonna have to, understand that if you're studying Italian wine, but let me go back to what we do know for Bambino Bianco wines. It certainly would pull yet Castel de monte, the DOC white wine, you're gonna find Bambino, Bianco, as well as San Severo, and if I pronounce that correctly, you know, you're gonna be seeing these wines if you go to the area. Once again, these are not wines that you're gonna find in every market. You know, what do they look like? It's gonna be a a straw yellow color for the visual for roma and flavor profile. It's gonna be peach, almond, white flowers. I did personally find a a hundred percent Bambino Bianco at Italy in Los Angeles a couple months ago, and it was an easy drinking fresh wine. Very enjoyable, but for the most part, you're gonna have to search it out if you're not going to the area. Something to note about the grape, its productivity is often not so high, which over the last century has made it not so popular, used to be more widely planted, but farmers certainly over the last hundred years, has made the productivity of a grape very important as to whether they're going to plant it, how much money they're gonna make from it. So certainly natural. When it comes to pairing with food. You know, gosh, when it comes to food from puglia, puglia is the breadbasket of Italy. Much like in California here, the central valley is. So many of our fruits and vegetables come from that area, and that is true of puglia. It goes to all over Italy. The cheese is the olive oils, the fruits, and the vegetables. So, you know, grilled vegetables is gonna be a great choice with bambino bianco and pasta. There's a orchiete pasta, cavatelli, trocoli. These are famous pasta as a puglia. Gonna be going great with the wine. Street food, there's a panzerotti, which is similar to a calzone, which is is a baked, the panzerotti's fried, and even the snack to Raleigh. Gonna be great to start off or maybe in between meals. Next, I want to talk about Bambino Nero. So Bambino Nero is really a great to look for when it comes to the risotto wines. It's gonna be lively, fresh acidity, match well with seafood, The flavor profile is going to be red fruits, wild strawberries, cranberries, almonds. Overall, great choice to pair with so many foods from cool yet. The weather in cool yet is hot. Let's just put that out there. You know, it's one of the the hotter areas of Italy and Italy can be very hot in the summer as most of you know who have visited Italy. With that said, I do offer some tips when it comes to finding a wine and serving a wine in hot temperature. I personally, I live in Palm Springs, very hot here in the summer, and I have served wine all year round in Palm Springs. And so when it comes to the service temperature of wines, very important. To always get the temperature right. That is to say, you know, if you've had champagne or Franca Corta serve too warm, you know, that cold temperature of the wine helps give the backbone of acidity to a sparkling wine, No. It's true with white wine and red wines as well. So the service temperature, I don't know the centigrade, but in Fahrenheit, you know, mostly from sixty one to sixty eight degrees. Is going to be most wines, certainly a little cooler with a white wine, but for the most part, if it's a hot day, obviously putting a bottle of wine out on a table is going to warm up very quickly. So making sure that your Rosato or your white wine stays cool and even your red wine stays cool is very, very important in hot weather. I always say keep that in mind to have a bucket or to store the wine in fridge in between service because you don't want a wine to be out of temperature. It is a sure way to be turned off by a wine. I've had many friends who don't like chianti. Part of their problem is they're not serving at the right temperature. So temperature, very important. But also, I'll mention as a buying tip if you are buying a bottle of wine at a retail establishment in a warm area, hot area. If you're in Arizona, if you're in California, if you're in a pool yet, When you're buying the wine, look at the fill level of the bottles. If you see a bottle that has a lower fill level, then the others don't take that one because if a wine is exposed to heat, what happens is the juice expands goes into the cork, you'll see that the fill level is lower so that the wine has been exposed to heat. So you don't want that. And, certainly, if you're, you know, removing the cork and you see that the cork is all wet, don't accept it. So, you know, in that ritual being in a restaurant when they give you the cork, that's one of the things you wanna look for. You wanna make sure that the cork is in good shape. So those are your tips on consuming wine and buying wine in a hot environment. So I hope that helps you out there. But other than that, I hope you get the chance to enjoy a Castel de Monte Bambino Nero. It's a great Rosato if you get a chance. It's a little lighter, you know, like the Negaro, Rosado's that you're gonna find in the south or, the famous Rosado from Abruso, the Chosuolo de Abruso. So it has its own niche, beautiful, elegant, goes great with food. It's really all around great choice. So I hope you get a chance to enjoy one soon. Listen to the Italian wine podcast wherever you get your podcasts. We're on SoundCloud, Apple Podcasts, Spotify, email IFM, and more. Don't forget to subscribe and rate the show. If you enjoy listening, please consider donating through Italian wine podcast dot com. Any amount helps cover equipment, production, and public costs. Until next time.