Tre Bicchieri (Take Two)

First stop was the Palace of Fine Arts, which was truly one of the most beautiful monuments I've seen in the US. Just behind it, the Exploratorium where we hung out and played with all the fun experiments.


Obviously one of the wine industry peeps. Quite clever.


Onto the wine. So many beautiful wines tasted. First we wandered around on our own, making a few repeat stops for the 05 Sassicaia and Tignanello. My friend Summer, turned her nose up at these, of course, as Italian wines made for Americans. I don't even disagree neccesarily, but I was damn sure certain to taste them. Then, as a highlight, Fabrizio Iuli took us around to taste the Barolos of his contemporaries- Massolino, Damilano, Elvio Cogno, Michele Chiarlo, Vietti.. Really Beautiful Stuff.
And then, one of my highlights, the wines of La Tunella. A Ribola Gialla, a Tocai Fruilano, a blend of both, and a refosco.


After the tasting, we rounded up some extra wines for the dinner afterwards. In addition to Fabrizio's 04 Barbera, we also got to try his 03 Malidea (Bad Idea) a blend of Barbera and Nebbiolo. and his 02 and 01 Barbera. His '02, typically a horrendous year for wine in Italy, was amazing. Possibly the best Barbera I've ever had, knocking Vietti from it's previous post.
Here we are at an unnamed resto in San Fran where they tried to charge us $25 a bottle for corkage. Unfuckingbelievable. Even after approaching the GM, and the Wine Director, they kept up with their bullshit party line about the corkage fee. Maybe I'm harping too much about this, but none of us could believe the inflexibility of these guys. A table full of winemakers and industry people, straight from the Tre Bicchieri tasting, and they wouldn't even begin to budge on an outrageous corkage fee? Just when we were about to start popping our own bottles under the table, Summer, our fearless leader, grabbed some bottles and some winemakers, pinned the wine director to the bar, popped some bottles, translated, and then spun on her heels back to the table. Sure enough, in less than two minutes, all of our stemware was swapped out, apologies were offered, and bottles were popped. Fuckin rookies tryin to play us? My girl SumSum put a stop to that quickfast.