Holiday Wishes from Joy of Wine Journeys
Vintner Varietals: Winemakers We Love
Like parents with their children, we can’t say we have a favorite among the many outstanding wineries we are lucky enough to work with and visit on our tours. However, as those of you who have traveled with us to Italy can attest, the Demarie Winery, tucked in the Roero hills of Italy’s Piedmont region, is worthy of a special place in our hearts.
The vintners, brothers Aldo and Paolo, are third-generation winemakers who have embraced innovation while honoring the region’s winemaking history and traditions. Committed to sustainability and responsible land stewardship, the brothers power their winery entirely with green energy and have been farming their vineyards organically for over ten years.
With an ethos of curiosity and experimentation, they have introduced intriguing pet-nat and “orange” wines (white grapes macerated with their skins) to their superb catalog of classic regional offerings like Barbaresco, Barolo, Nebbiolo, and Roero, all marked by the region’s unique limestone terroir.
Aldo and Paolo are especially excited about this year’s vintage. The quality of the grapes harvested this fall was excellent, and the harvest season was short and intense but not fraught with the bad weather of the previous few years. We cannot wait to taste Demarie’s 2024 vintage on future tours!
Cultural Terroir: Places We Love
Piedmont & The International Alba White Truffle Fair – October 12 – December 8, 2024.
If you have joined us on one of our tours through Italian wine country, you have had the opportunity to experience a truffle hunt in the woods of Langhe, an area in the Piedmont region known for its wine, cheese, and the esteemed Alba truffle. White truffles, aptly called “white gold” due to their culinary value and high market prices, grow wild in the forests around Alba from September to December. They are prized worldwide for their delicate, nutty, and earthy flavor.
These exquisite truffles are celebrated at the annual International Alba White Truffle Fair, a two-month-long event that coincides with the peak of the truffle season.
The highlight of the fair is the market, where judges selected by the National Truffle Study Centre help customers choose from an array of extraordinary truffles sourced from the nearby Langhe, Roero, and Monferrato forests.
In addition to truffles, the fair features an abundance of wine, elaborate dinners, and exhibitions showcasing the region’s history and folklore. If you want to immerse yourself in Piedmontese culture, this is undoubtedly a must-visit event!
Wine Key: Insights We Love
Wines To Pair With Your Holiday Dinner
As this year closes, we are reflecting upon our gratitude for our family and friends, including those of you who we’ve had the pleasure of getting to know on our tours. But we also must send up thanks for what has brought so many of us together, in work and in play: Wine! Truly, the experience of sharing one of our greatest interests and pleasures with those we love and those we’ve just met enriches our lives on a daily basis, so you can bet we put a lot of care into choosing the perfect wines to pour at our holiday gatherings.
Like always when pairing wine with food, we think about the concepts of complementary and congruent pairings. Complementary pairings play off each other’s opposite strengths, like how the drying astringency of tannins can cut through the unctuous fattiness of a steak. Congruent pairings match and enhance the qualities of each other, the way a wine’s bright acidity might match the tang of a lemony sauce.
Zippy, medium-bodied whites, such as the Borgo san Daniele Friulano, serve both purposes at a holiday feast, cutting the richness of all that butter and cream that find their way into nearly every dish, while not overwhelming the lighter fish or white meat of poultry and playing up the brighter flavors of vegetable sides.
For those who prefer red wine, the light body and low tannins of Le Morette Bardolino, which can be served slightly chilled, will similarly enhance without overwhelming, while its cranberry notes echo the eponymous sauce.
However, some components of a holiday meal beg for something sturdier; we choose a dry, medium-bodied red, like the Demarie Barbera d’Alba, with bold dark-berry tones, to stand up to the deeper, more assertive flavors of ham or red meat. Sparkling wines, like the Le Morette “Cepage” Chiaretto Sparkling Brut Rose, pair beautifully with almost everything, offering a refreshing interlude between bites and courses. And we always like to have a dessert wine on hand, like Demarie “Birbet” Brachetto, an off-dry, sparkling red with pronounced strawberry and raspberry notes, which will complement the array of cookies and tarts or stand on its own as a sweet finisher for those who can’t fit another bite.
“When pairing wine with food, we think about the concepts of complementary and congruent pairings.”
Pairings: Recipes We Love
Piedmonte Brasato Al Barolo & Wine Pairing
Across Europe, you’ll find traditional dishes featuring beef slow-cooked in wine or beer, such as French Boeuf Bourguignon and Irish beef and Guinness stew. However, Italy’s take on this classic pot roast introduces an elegant twist: by pureeing the vegetables into the wine used for marinating and braising the beef, you create a deeply savory, silky sauce that complements the tender meat perfectly.
In the Piedmont region, a bold, herbaceous, cherry-forward Barolo, crafted from the area’s prized Nebbiolo grapes, is typically used. While other dry red wines can also work, ensure it’s a wine you enjoy drinking. After preparing the recipe, you’re likely to have some left in the second bottle, and we definitely wouldn’t want that to go to waste!
Piedmonte Brasato al Barolo
- Serves: 6 People
- Active Time: 50 Minutes
- Total Time: 3 Hours 50 Minutes Plus Overnight Refrigeration
INGREDIENTS
- 3-pound chuck roast
- 2 medium yellow onions, diced
- 2 large carrots, peeled and cut crosswise 1/4 -inch thick
- 2 stalks celery, sliced crosswise ¼-inch thick
- 4 garlic cloves, peeled and thinly sliced
- 2 sprigs rosemary
- 2 sprigs thyme
- 3 bay leaves
- ½ teaspoon ground cinnamon
- ¼ teaspoon ground clove
- Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper
- 1 ½ to 2 bottles of Barolo wine
- ¼ cup extra virgin olive oil
- Mashed potatoes or polenta for serving
METHOD
- Place the chuck roast in a large bowl and add the vegetables, herbs, spices, and 1 teaspoon each of kosher salt and black pepper. Pour in enough wine to fully submerge the meat and vegetables, using anywhere from 1½ to 2 bottles. Cover the bowl and refrigerate for 12 to 24 hours.
- Preheat the oven to 325°F. Remove the chuck roast from the marinade, scraping off any clingy vegetables back into the bowl. Pat the meat dry with paper towels and season it generously all over with salt and pepper
- Heat the olive oil over medium-high heat in a Dutch oven or heavy-bottomed pot until shimmering. Add the chuck roast and sear it on each side until it is deeply browned, about 3 minutes per side. Set the meat aside.
- Reduce the heat to medium. Using a large slotted spoon, transfer the vegetables and aromatics from the marinade to the pot; it’s okay if some marinade comes with them. Cook, stirring and scraping up any browned bits from the bottom of the pot, until the vegetables have softened somewhat, about 4 minutes.
- Return the meat to the pot with the vegetables. Pour in the marinade until it reaches about three-quarters of the way up the meat, reserving the rest. Increase the heat back to medium-high. Once the liquid reaches a simmer, cover the pot and transfer it to the preheated oven.
- Cook for 1½ hours. Then, remove the lid, flip the meat, and add the reserved marinade if needed to reach the three-quarters mark on the roast. Replace the cover, return it to the oven, and continue cooking for another 1½ hours, totaling about 3 hours, or until the meat is tender and gives easily under a fork.
- Remove the roast to a platter and tent it with foil for 30 minutes. Discard the rosemary and thyme stems, as well as the bay leaves. Transfer the vegetables and cooking liquid to a blender and puree until smooth. (Alternatively, use an immersion blender to puree directly in the pot.) Taste and season with salt and pepper as needed. Return the sauce to the pot and heat it on medium until it simmers. Then, reduce the heat to low and cover to keep warm until serving, stirring occasionally.
- After the meat has rested, slice it against the grain into ½-inch thick slices. Ladle the sauce generously over the slices and serve with mashed potatoes or polenta.
ENJOY!
New Growth: Joy Of Wine News We Love
Exciting New Journeys For 2025 & 2026
After twelve years of leading tours throughout Italy and now expanding into France, we have decided to rebrand our business to allow for even more exciting itineraries.
Our focus on facilitating joyful travel experiences has evolved and grown, and we are more committed than ever to our mission to provide our guests with life-enriching adventure and delicious food and wine.
To that end, we are now Joy of Wine Journeys, and we are thrilled to launch our brand-new website and travel blog. We want to give you access to us all year round, with inspiration, aspiration, and real connection.
On that note, we would love for you to join us on an upcoming tour! The 2025 and 2026 Italy and France Tour Dates are now live. We can’t wait to connect!
