Health, Safety & the Environment

Before over-indulging at the dining room table over the Christmas and New Year holidays, I should have taken stock of Eric Asimov’s New York Times column, “An Italian Lesson for the Over stuffed”, which appeared on November 23, 2009.  “Bloated? Overstuffed? More than a little uncomfortable?,” he inquires. After all of the nibbles and noshes, the hors d’oeuvres, the sides and the turkey, the rolls, the stuffing and all of a second helpings, it this time, according to Mr. Asimov, to take gastric refuge in one of the elixirs intended to remedy digestive excesses.  Italian digestives, or digestivos, are known collectively as Amari. The Amari are not just any after dinner concoction. The proprietory formulas for Amari generally includes various herbs, roots, flowers and spices, which are macerated in alcohol, sometimes blended with a sweet syrup, and tempered in barrels or bottles.  Although there are dozens of Amari on the market in  Italy, in the United States well known brands include Fernet-Branca, Averna and Campari.  With an alcohol content that can range from 20 to 40%, Amari may be just the necessary tonic to address over eating over the holidays.  I confess to not knowing much about Amari but something tells me I should get up-to-speed before the next holiday meal. Both my tastebuds and stomach will welcome the effort.

It used to be that a wine store attracted business by having a friendly and knowledgeable sales staff, an attractive store in which to shop, and a good selection of reasonably priced wine. Some of the larger wine establishments have morphed into something more. In addition to a comprehensive internet search engine, replete with wine glossary and monthly wine club subscriptions, Astor Wines & Spirits  in Manhattan has branched out to provide additional services including formal wine tastings, cooking classes, and even a “Hands-On Pizza Workshop & Walking Tour of Little Italy“, which you can join in on for a mere $175 per person. The workshop and walking tour advertisement promises that soon after participating in the event your friends will begin calling you “pizzaiolo” …..Italiano for pizza chef)!  Astor even boasts several attractive rooms on its premises which can be rented to conduct classes or private events.  Smaller wine retailers are attracting customers by offering informal wine tastings and discounts on wine tasted.  From a marketing perspective, the brick and mortar wine businesses do not want to lose business to internet wine merchants with little nor no overhead, who can offer wines at a steep discount.  Our shop, these merchants seem to be saying, should become a community or neighborhood resource, which an internet site cannot become, no matter how successful.  Buy a book, learn to cook, taste some wine and…..just maybe…..while you are here, buy a bottle of wine!

John Mariani, a writer for Bloomberg.com, provides his ten predictions for wine in 2010, in a piece titled “For Wine in 2010 Expect Price Drops, Screwtops, Thirsty Chinese“.  Among the predictions: continued price drops for wine across the board; more on-line wine buying at sites such as wine-searcher.com and vinfolio.com and an increase in the popularity in wines costing $10 or less per bottle. Ominously, for this author, he also predicts an increase in wine blogging and cautions that readers should be wary of these bloggers’ recommendations.