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I now require soft, fresh white mozzarella cheese every morning. And sometimes as a first course in the evening , too. Strewn with red, juicy cherry tomato halves, a drizzle of this season’s gold-green olive oil, and a sprinkling of salt and pepper. This the cucina povere (cuisine of the poor) from Puglia, the Italian province in “the heel of the boot.”
The food is abundantly fresh in this warm Mediterranean climate, though traditionally without much variety: pasta made without eggs, fresh cow’s milk cheese, native greens and wild onions, chick peas or fava beans, and bright, ripe cherry tomatoes, both fresh and dried. They decorate their few pastas and creamy new mozzarellas with knobs and twists and curls. They create a golden tan sauce with fava beans for their wild chicory, and augmented it with a chick pea condiment. They eat petal-shaped pasta with simple, fresh tomato sauce. For a side dish, they caramelize wild onions then scramble in some egg. Today, these are prized elements of native Puglian cuisine. Along with wines made from grapes that have been used for wine for 2500 years

What do they drink now? This is not a simple answer, as Puglia is made up of several different provinces, 25 DOCs, each with their own rules about which grapes to grow and blend. Many Puglian indigenous grapes are unheard of in much of the rest of the world: Bombino Bianco, Bianco d’Alessano, Greco Bianco, Nero di Troia (also known as Uva di Troia), Negroamaro, Sussumaniello. Some of the grapes we know, but not well: Aleatico, Aglianico, Fiano, Malvasia, Moscato and Primitivo.
Tourism is expanding in tandem with the wine industry’s revitalization. Puglians are reaching out to industry professionals from other countries. Though there are, of course, more hotels and rental properties being built, I was fascinated with the country houses and masserias – ancient, fortified farmsteads – converted into hotels with often with restaurants, spas, pools and beach shuttles. Their welcoming rooms offer privacy as well as sanctuary, opening off central living spaces, courtyards and lanes. Like those I visited: country house hotel Cefalicchio with its restaurant, spa and biodynamic vineyards; and village-like Masseria Torre Coccaro which has spa, restaurant, pool and even its own cooking school, if you want to learn how to make the Puglian dishes you’ve been tasting – along with all those newly-discovered wines.

I asked so many wine questions I had to come clean.
When I confessed to the crew of Singapore flight 25 I was going to the Singapore Airlines wine forum, an off-duty crew member overheard and took me through an impromptu wine-tasting at 33,000 feet — or whatever the actual altitude was. It was also 2:30 am, or perhaps 2:30 pm, depending on whether you’d changed your watch yet.
Anyhow, there I was with Faizal, who is a young and very polite air-sommelier-in-training. He took me through several whites and reds. In his experience, some wines become “dumb” or closed at high altitudes, showing much less aroma and flavor than the exact same bottle sampled on the ground. I’m hoping to find out more about this from Steven Spurrier and the other wine judges for Singapore Air in the next few days.
One of the best wines to drink in the air — especially with the spiced Thai dishes on the menu — is a Riesling from Balthasar Ress, 2006 Rudesheim Rheingau Spatlese. Its floral and fruit aromas wafted up pleasantly in the glass, and a bit of sweetness pairs well with Thai spices.Bouchard’s Beaune de Chateau 2006 Premier Cru was enjoyable with Western flavors including cheeses, though some of the aromas seemed lost in the altitude.
With hearty meat dishes, Faizal favors the Rive Barbera d’Asti 2006 Il Cascione or the Dry Creek Vineyard 2005 Cabernet Sauvignon Dry Creek Valley. It was a treat for me to taste the Cos d’Estournel 1999 St. Estephe and we had an interesting discussion about what people expect from “older wines” these days. Twenty or 30 years ago, knowledgeable wine drinkers looked for these secondary developmental characteristics in “properly aged” wines; today’s consumers favor bigger fruit flavors from younger wines and perhaps don’t even understand how a wine does evolve over time because they never experience this.
Faizal and the whole crew regret recently running out of the Clos de los Siete 2007 cabernet sauvignon-malbec-merlot blend. Apparently this was a great favorite of passengers as well as crew.

2 weeks of non-stop french fries — aka frites aka chips! That’s what I did on my summer vacation in the north of France and the south of England. With salt, with ketchup, with mayonnaise. Because it was during a heatwave, miraculously all the calories evaporated!

The KINGDOM of Navarra: a blend of super-chef, medieval castles, good to great wines and it’s green, too: 38 windfarms generate 65% of their energy.

An ancient tradition of wines and spirits, and very modern hearty but beautifully balanced red wines, often temperanillo and temp blends.  And a few lyrical sauvignon blancs, too.

We had all this recently with the inventive yet simple food from noted chef Enrique Martinez of Hotel Maher in Navarra – who cooked at Boston’s Estragon Restaurant.

To sample each dish was to uncover surprises in the infusion of mushrooms, sprinkling of toasted chopped nuts, ribbons of herbs.  But most of all it was about texture: perfectly cooked lobster nearly translucent as tender as possible.  And fish with firmness that spoke of being taken off the heat just as it came to the exact moment of doneness.  A meal memorable for the mouthfeel as much as the taste.

For dessert, the piquant Ochoa 2007 moscadel, made from the “petits grains” muscat: aromas of flowers, orange and mint; not too sweet, balanced with a touch of citrus peel and finishing nearly dry.

After that, a sip the ancient custom of a digestif of relatively Pacharan, sometimes poured over ice, the red liquid glowing in the glass.  In September and October, people pick sloe berries and add them to some anisette liqueur they’ve bought.  Tradition says the Pacharan is ready to drink for the July fiesta, when the berries are a red carpet at the bottom of bottle, having given their color and flavor to the liquor.

The best part about The Bubble Lounge Champagne Bar in SF?  Yes, there are the small-production Champagnes, which have gotten better and better (since Terry Thiese began introducing them to the US a decade or so ago).  And then there’s the new, sensuous small bites menu to pair with the Champagnes.

But my favorite part was riding off into the night – well, to meet up with my college friends – on the back of Kimberly’s bright red Vespa!