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 THIS WEEK: What's the Real Value of the Zagat Guide?

 “A” IS FOR ABBACCHIO AND “Z’ IS FOR ZABAGLIONE

By John Mariani

Prices reflect an average three-course dinner for two, without wine, but including tax and service.

BEST OLD-FASHIONED ROMAN COOKING

SPAGHETTI ALLA CARBONARA
Calling itself La Carbonara (Piazza Campo de Fiori, 23; 06-6864-783. $120)  suggests a certain pride in this quintessential Roman dish in which full-flavored eggs beaten with Parmigiano, black pepper, and guanciale bacon are actually cooked by the heat of the pasta.  This is a very friendly and comfortable trattoria on the lovely Campo dei Fiori flower market, and it does indeed serve one of the finest renderings of the namesake pasta in the city.  The incorporation of the ingredients at the precise moment gives the dish a satiny sheen, with a salty edge, a peppery spike, and a luxurious melding of cheese and egg—not a bad idea for breakfast, if La Carbonara was open then. They also do light-as-a-feather potato gnocchi with a bright tomato sauce. (There is another, unrelated restaurant of the same name on the Via Panisperna.)

BEST FETTUCCINE ALL’ALFREDO

Where else but at Alfredo’s on the Piazza Augusto Imperatore (06-687-8734; $120). Although not on the original premises, Alfredo’s is still run by the De Lelio family whose paterfamilias, Alfredo, created the luscious egg noodle-butter-and Parmigiano (no cream!) dish in 1914 to bring back his wife’s post-natal appetite. It will surely stir yours. The restaurant has a fine art deco cast, and the photos of movie stars and other celebrities who have dined here is astonishing, including Douglas Fairbanks and Mary Pickford who in 1927, while on their honeymoon in Rome, gave them inscribed golden fork and spoons—Alfredo’s uses copies to this day. Since it's become a  ritual for celebrities, like Jimmy Stewart to the right, to have their photo taken eating fettuccine. (Another restaurant, on the original’s  pre-war premises on the Via della Scrofa, of the same name is not related.)

 

BEST COFFEE

BEST PANORAMA

BEST WINE BAR

An old and revered favorite is the tiny Cul de Sac (73 Piazza Pasquino ; 06-6880-1094. $70) a stone’s throw from the Piazza Navona, a little trattoria with outdoor tables outside and attached wine store with more than 1,400 selections, along with a wide selection of grappas, amaros, and digestivi, and a menu with all the Roman favorites, including lustrous charcuterie like Prosciutto (right), culatello, and salsicce.

WHERE CAN I LEARN ABOUT ITALIAN WINE?
as also become home to the International Wine Academy of Rome,  (Vicolo del Bottino, 8; 06-699-0878; $140) located in a Sixteenth Century palazzetto, run by the redoubtable Ian Domenico D’Agata, an American who gave up a practice in pediatric gastroenterology to devote himself to his passion for Italian wines;.  Here you may take a wide array of wine courses, from a half-day course to an evening of eight weekly sessions. Classes are followed by lunch or dinner at the very fine Aroma del Palazzetto restaurant attached to the Academy.

BEST SEAFOOD

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NEW YORK CORNER

by John Mariani

La Silhouette is open nightly, with brunch on Sat. & Sun.

 

Komali
4152 Cole Avenue, Dallas
214-252-0200
www.KomaliRestaurant.com

  During a recent trip to Texas I had the opportunity to stop by and dine at chef Abraham Salum’s Komali restaurant in Uptown Dallas. I was a bit blasé about it when I heard Komali was a Mexican restaurant because although the city is known for its excellent Mexican cuisine, it is also known for plenty of dull Tex-Mex eateries.  However, Salum stated, when opening Komali, “I want the antithesis of Tex-Mex. Look for regional cuisine from Oaxaca, Guerrero, and Veracruz.” I wasn’t too worried.
     Komali (the name refers to the comal, an open fire grill used by the Aztecs) just opened this summer and is a wonderful addition to the Dallas culinary scene. The space is lovely, coated in a light beige canvas with a grand fireplace decorated with broken tiles and iconic Mexican sculptures and murals. There’s also a long, sleek bar graced by many of Dallas’ well-dressed socialites.  Salum, a very humble and enthusiastic chef, cooks nightly and occasionally pops his head out of the kitchen to tour the dining room and say hello to guests, some of whom sit at the communal table near the bar.
         Upon sitting down, our gracious waiter approached the table and asked, “Would anyone like a margarita?” I, of course, nodded, yes. There is a vast selection of terrific añejo tequilas on the menu and an assortment of flavored margaritas. Keeping it traditional, I ordered a standard margarita but was encouraged to have the rim of the glass coated with a chile powder that packed a whole lotta’ spice into each mouthful, a very nice touch. After a margarita or two, I saw the restaurant begin to fill up, leaving not one seat empty in the whole place. Komali, like any new restaurant in the city, is packed nightly and getting lots of hype from local diners, and rightfully so.
            Salum (left) is preparing some of the city’s finest authentic Mexican cuisine in a refined manner, serving dishes packed with tons of flavor and lots of heat. We started with some appetizers you should not miss, Oaxaca-style tamales topped with a thick brown mole sauce, chorizo sopes and tender pork tostadas.  There is a wonderful rich black bean soup, a runner-up to Dean Fearing’s version just across town, but still a contender, while the crema de pobano with queso fresco was uniquely its own. Ceviche comes splashed with fresh lime juice, mixed with fresh avocados, cilantro and red onions. There is also a choice of quesadillas del dia--a daily mix of three quesadillas with roasted tomato.
         Entrees include a thick cut of salmon wrapped in banana leaf and rubbed with achiote and bitter orange abobo. There’s a nice beef tenderloin topped with fried goat's cheese and a side of almendrado sauce. The meat  options are lengthy and go on to offer Mexican meatballs, grilled pork chops drizzled with honey and a braised pork soup with cabbage and onions.
         For dessert, I recommend the goat's milk crêpes served with caramelized plantains and toasted pecans along with the sugar dusted churros served with a cup of Abuelita hot chocolate.
         Salum cooks what he preaches and is showcasing food as far from Tex-Mex as possible. His dishes have gusto and he is not afraid to serve exactly what he desires. Salum is one of the few chefs who is taking Mexican fare to new levels by evolving many of the old dishes yet never losing the traditional flavor found throughout Mexico.

To contact Christopher Mariani send an email to christopher@johnmariani.com

         For consumers who still inexplicably adhere to the "Sideways" school of thought--Merlot is universally bad, Pinot is universally good, and the wine world is easily divvied up into clean-lined categorical imperatives--the Walla Walla Valley and neighboring AVAs of Washington State offer a delicious refutation. They are, I’ve grown convinced, home to some of the best Merlots this country produces, and with its passionate, dedicated supply of winemakers and vineyard owners, they only promise to get better.
         Fans of the region’s reds have known about this secret for years. Now, however, word is leaking out, and with a renewed focus on the Pacific Northwest in both the wine press and at the retail level, these AVAs--Walla Walla Valley, Columbia Valley, Red Mountain, Horse Heaven Hills, etc.--seem to be on the verge of a serious (and seriously well-earned) popularity explosion.
         This was brought into deliciously sharp relief this past July when I attended Merlot Camp, a three-day immersion into all things Merlot and Washington, put on by the excellent producer Northstar. Over the course of my time there--I was joined by eight journalists and two members of the wine trade--I had the opportunity not only to explore the various iterations of the region’s uniquely expressive Merlots (and other grape varieties as well), but also to see exactly what makes this unique place such a remarkable home for America’s most inappropriately denigrated grape variety.
         Any discussion of this part of Washington inevitably starts 15 million years ago, and this is exactly where my education at camp began. Dr. Kevin Pogue of Whitman College’s Department of Geology kick-started the immersion with a lecture and presentation on the geological history of the area. Over the course of this discussion, several things became clear. First, great wine regions don’t happen by mistake; they are the result of geological forces and phenomena thousands of millennia in the making. Second, the wines produced in these regions are a result of culture, of stylistic tendencies and the sense of community and shared knowledge that develop in the best regions, as well as non-human forces.
         As for the latter, lava flows 15 million years ago created the basaltic bedrock that’s such an important aspect of the terroir here. Then, 15,000 to 12,000 years ago, huge glacial floods, according to the Walla Walla Valley AVA’s web site, “deposited much of the well-drained sand and silt that today forms the soil of the Walla Walla Valley American Viticultural Area (AVA). . . . After the floods, ash derived from the eruptions of Cascade Range volcanoes was deposited throughout the region adding even more complexity to the Valley’s soil.”
         Practically speaking, this means that the rooting zone for the vast majority of vineyards here is typically wind-blown silt, which has a significant impact on the ways in water moves through the vineyard. Beyond that, however, the diversity of soil types and overall surface geology has the effect of accommodating any number of styles of resulting wine. This was brought home during a blending exercise we participated in that included samples from a number of the ones we visited, including standouts like Klipsun Vineyard in the Red Mountain AVA and Anna Marie Vineyard in the Walla Walla AVA: Each one provides something  unique to the final blend of a wine, and in a carefully considered final cuvee, the idiosyncrasies of each--spiciness, lush fruit, chocolate notes, tannic backbone, etc.--add up to that unique character that so beguiles fans of the Merlots here.
         As a result of over-cropping and under-thinking in certain parts of the American wine firmament, many consumers wrote off Merlot long ago. But as believers in the grape variety know, it is more than capable of producing wines of utterly astounding depth and complexity in both single-varietal bottlings and blends. (How many people, really, would turn their nose up at a bottle of Pétrus?)                 Luckily, Merlot is staging a bit of a comeback among wine lovers, and it’s likely only a matter of time until it breaks through the wider popular wine-snob aversion to it. And if I had to guess, I’d predict that the standout AVAs of Washington will continue to be leaders in the renaissance of American Merlot.
         Much of this comes down, quite simply, to style. As a result of the unique geology and terroir here, the Merlot is actually more tannic than the Cabernet Sauvignon. Right off the bat, this confounds the easy stereotype that Merlot is an inherently soft-souled--not to say flabby--grape variety. But that doesn’t mean that it’s rough here; far from it. Rather, the Merlot in this part of the country, to speak in gross generalities, exhibits plenty of fruity depth but also an excellent sense of structure alongside the sort of tobacco, spice, and mineral notes that connoisseurs of great Merlot-based wine swoon over.
         They age well, too. In what was one of the best opening-night tastings of a wine-immersion experience I’ve had in a long time, Northstar winemaker David “Merf” Merfeld (above) and his wife, Lynne Anderson, hosted our group at their home for a fantastic dinner prepared by local star chef and accomplished organic farmer Greg Schnorr. Over the course of the evening, we tasted a vertical of Northstar’s Columbia Valley Merlots from 2007-1998, as well as a magnum of 1994. These bottles demonstrated just how elegantly the wines here can age, and how nuanced they become without losing the sense of exuberance that characterized them in their youth. (Its tasting room is  shown in the photo below.)
         The primary red fruit of the 2007 still dominated, though the entirety of the wine still remained balanced. The 2006, on the other hand, was already far more complex, with smoke and warm clay aromas, a lush mouthfeel, and flavors of dulce de leche, cinnamon, and cherry. The 2005 showed more chocolate and kirsch, as well as a hint of birch bark, and the 2004 boasted a seam of eucalyptus and bright red fruit, both the result of a freeze and cooler weather that hit the region that year. 2003 found its footing on the opposite side of that coin with sappy cherry compote flavors--a sharp contrast to the spicier raspberries and drivingly youthful tannins of the 2002: This is one for the cellar. 2001 practically hovered above the glass with its licorice perfume and exuberantly expressive cherry fruit, and the 2000, all warm-souled cedar, lush fruit, and a touch of marzipan, remained remarkably persistent at 11 years old. The 1999 nodded in the direction of Right Bank Bordeaux with its dark cherries, fine-grained tannins, sage, green cigar tobacco, and spicy cedar. Amazingly, even at 13 years of age, the 1998 showed popping-fresh raspberries and other red berry fruit, in addition to beguiling secondary notes of leather and tobacco. And, finally that night, there was the magnum of 1994, a classic mature Merlot with perfect acidity and minerality for freshness, as well as deeply complex toasted vanilla, creamy tobacco, spice, and leather.
         Northstar is also working on a proprietary bottling called, right now at least, the “Big Dipper.” 2009 will be the first vintage, and its goal is to express, in premium-cuvée form, the full potential of Merlot here to be both enjoyable young as well as to age. I tasted a barrel sample, and the early results are astounding: high-toned red fruit on the nose, as well as perfumed spice that will continue to be absorbed from the barrels, and a palate of sweet, balanced black fruit, grilled herbs, tobacco, scorched earth, and a hint of tar. It promises to be a two-decade wine that will be approachable long before then. Even a month after tasting it, I can still conjure up its character.
         And that, it seems, is the hallmark of a great wine and a great wine-producing part of the world. The wines of this part of Washington, and the Merlots in particular, are exactly what both the grape variety itself and the American wine-consuming public need. It’s rare to find such approachability, complexity, agability, and exuberance from a single corner of the wine firmament. Combine that with the all-for-one-goal attitude that seems to permeate the region, and you have all the ingredients for continued success. And, I’d guess, a renaissance of American Merlot--starting right here, in Walla Walla, Columbia Valley, and their neighboring AVAs in Washington State.

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TRAVEL ARTICLES WE
NEVER FINISHED READING

“`BWOK!”
“BWOK!”
“BWOK-BWOK-BWOK!' The back seat of the car erupts in a riot of barnyard noises with every scraggly gaggle of chickens we pass. The boys, innocents of 5 and 3, are so excited to see actual real live chickens here on the quiet side of Grand Cayman you’d think they were watching leopards attack baboons in Zambia. It’s a symptom of the suburban captivity in which they are being raised and, therefore, nobody’s fault but my own, but the incessant bwok-bwok-bwoking is driving me nuts."--Dave Herndon,  "Creature Comforts: The Ultimate Cayman Island Family Vacation," Caribbean Travel and Life .

DON'T CLUB OWNERS AND COPS KNOW A
PRADA HANDBAG WHEN THEY SEE ONE???

On Miami Beach, Club Cameo refused entrance to Beyoncé Knowles' sister Solange because she was carrying an inflatable banana. Knowles, however, contended she was denied for racial reasons, then allegedly became "unruly" with off-duty officers, who "took her across the street to try and calm her down," at which point, says Knowles,  they pulled a switchblade on her banana. According to the Miami Herald, "Police said they did not take the banana into custody, and it is still unclear why Knowles was club-hopping with the fake fruit."

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I consider this the best and savviest blog of its kind on the  web. Potter is a columnist for USA Weekend, Diversion, Laptop and Luxury  Spa Finder, a contributing editor for Ski and  a frequent contributor to National  Geographic Traveler, ForbesTraveler.com  and Elle Decor. "I’ve designed this site is for people who take their  travel seriously," says Potter. "For travelers who want to learn about special  places but don’t necessarily want to pay through the nose for the privilege of  staying there. Because at the end of the day, it’s not so much about five-star  places as five-star experiences."  THIS WEEK: BIG SUR REVISITED

Eating Las Vegas is the new on-line site for Virtual Gourmet contributor John A. Curtas., who since 1995 has been commenting on the Las Vegas food scene and reviewing restaurants for Nevada Public Radio.  He is also the restaurant critic for KLAS TV, Channel 8 in Las Vegas, and his past reviews can be accessed at KNPR.org. Click on the logo below to go directly to his site.

www.EatingLV.com

                     

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