Road Reports

Today, I crossed the Italian border to Italy's Liguria region to spend the day in wine producing town and region named Dolceacqua. They make wine here and the places to dine are worth the short drive from Monaco.

Ristorante Re is one of those off the beaten track places which the Michelin Guide has finally discovered, two years after I did. Sadly says Maresa, the owner and wine steward, who leads me through a degustation menu bemoans Michelin. It seems the 1999 red book has overpriced this country style restaurant which features one of the best enoteca's around. That scares some people off she says. Their loss.

Marisa is a wealth of knowledge about local wines and Italian wines overall. Earlier in the day, when I stopped in to make a booking for lunch, she took me through three different Dolceaqua Rossese wines.

Lunch started with a 1998 Vigna Grande from Cantina Cerveteri a blend of Trebiano, Malvasia and Grechetto. This is a very lovely wite wine with a nose of spring flowers, good acid tructure that yearns for food. Up came the first course, Brandade. Boiled potatoes and sundried cod fish boiled together in a garlic parsley blend. With food the wine it is flavorful. Tastes of honeysuckles, bananas, dried melons and oranges. A long lingering finish that is sharp, not hot.

The second plate is Previ made from bread, eggs, parmasean, tomatoes, carrots, ham, salami all stuffed in cabbage leaves. The dish is very much country cooking. If the first was from the sea, the second is from the country. Again the Vigna Grande shows how it is wonderful wine with food. Imagine a multi-purpose white on a restaurant list for six dollars. That's all it cost.

Maresa and I have a long discussion about value wines and restaurants. She remarks that she does not double or triple the wholesale prices. She takes a wine and marks it up half of what she pays. That way she earns a profit, sells more wine and is able to buy more and more each year because of the promotional value to the wineries.

The second wine is a 1998 Pinot Bianco Schulthauser from C.S. San Michele Appiano in the Alto Adige AOC. It is served with a puree of carrots in a light fontina cheese shell, then covered with a sauce of spinach, parmesan cheese, cream and herbs, which are all blended together.

The white wine is very Alsatian in flavor, Germanic in body and of course Italian in style.

It has a rich body of tarty and spicy flavors. The flavors are deep with ripe honeydew and peaches in the finish. It also stands up very well to the pasta dish, a medley of casareccia, a twisted tubed pasta served with potatoes, olive oil, cabbage and parmigiano. This is not a place where you get pasta and red sauce, obviously.

We move to a red wine and Umbria, is a 1998 La Carraia Sangiovese from Umbria which accompanies Osso Buco made from local farm raised and butchered veal in a tomato sauce. This is another killer six dollar bottle. The nose is big and hearty, the body sexy. The flavors of Chinese five spice, aspic, licorice, zinfandel like currants, berries and blacc cherry soda. A touch of cola flavor in the middle and a long blueberry ending. Supurb..

Dessert is semifreddo al torroncino, a pastry molded in a triangle with chocolate sauce followed by very smooth nonacidic espresso.

Total cost is 68.000 lira, about 34 dollars. You can't beat that for this much good food and wine.

An absolutely stunning meal and worth a return the next time I'm nearby.

Andy