Food and Wine in Italy : A Meal in a Secret Garden

Four generations of the Vietti family have made wine in this tiny medieval town a few miles from Barolo. Alfredo Currado, a genial man in his 50s, took over the wine making shortly after he married Luciana Vietti in 1957. Today their daughter Elisabetta, 28, makes the wines with her father. The family is known not only for their highly individual Barolos, but also for their extraordinary hospitality.

Perched at the edge of the village, the Currados’ house has a comfortable, lived-in feeling. The heart of the house is the large kitchen, which looks out onto the Langhe hills and the castle of Serralunga. There’s a corner fireplace where they grill meats in winter and a bold drawing of a horse and rider on the wall close to the table. One night at dinner, a Genovese artist friend noticed that blank white wall and leaped up to draw the prancing horse to amuse the Currados’ grandson Francesco.

The entire house is filled with paintings and drawings, most of them acquired by trading wine for art. The prize of the collection is an Etruscan terra-cotta wine cup with two handles. “It gives me goose bumps every time I hold it in my hands,” Alfredo says, “to know that people drank from this cup more than 700 years before Christ.”

From June until October the family eats outside in the shelter of the veranda, where Luciana has set the table with her grandmother’s hand-woven tablecloth and French turn-of-the-century china. She’s planned a menu of Piemontese dishes including risotto al Arneis, rabbit braised in Barbera wine, local cheeses and a hazelnut torte. While she takes a basket and sets off to collect herbs and greens from her kitchen garden, Alfredo goes to collect the wines.

The door to Luciana’s secret garden opens onto the broad medieval wall which surrounds Castiglione Falletto. Wild roses, mint, basil, rosemary, and flowering thyme are all mixed up in the thick blanket of scents. She and her mother, Pierina Vietti, have planted tomatoes and garlic, artichokes and fava beans; strawberries and raspberries, too. None of it is neatly laid out in rows. The garden is lovely and a little wild. Luciana likes it that way.

Alfredo decides to open the two Barolos right away. He feels they should be decanted and left loosely stoppered for at least an hour before serving. As an aperitif, he’s chosen their most recent vintage of Arneis, an old Piemontese grape, just coming back into fashion after a lapse of some years.

For the Currados, Arneis is a perfect aperitif wine, because it can hold up to strongly flavored antipasti dishes, including salami and prosciutto, which are usually considered matches for red wines. “It’s a white wine that interests me because it presents some of the characteristics of a red wine,” explains Alfredo. “White wines generally manifest their taste, their flavors, more on the point of the tongue, while this Arneis affects the entire palate.”

To emphasize this point, he sometimes serves it in red wine glasses, at a temperature somewhere between white and red wine. He wants it cool, but not chilled, so that it exhibits all its perfume of summer fruits. The grapes for Arneis come from the Roero Hills on the north side of the Tanaro River where they also grow peaches, strawberries and all sorts of other fruit.

For the first course, Luciana has made a dish that is typical in this mountainous region: risotto. But she has created a variation on the classic risotto al Barolo, substituting Arneis. The white wine’s acidity gives it a sprightly taste, and each grain of rice is al dente at the center, creamy on the outside.

Luciana braised the rabbit for the next course in Barbera d’Alba from their Scarrone vineyard just below the house. “The vines are 55 years old and still planted to the old system,” explains Alfredo. “For every row of Barbera vines, they used to plant one Nerano vine, so the Barbera is about 5% Nerano. It’s a very sweet, intensely colored grape with a thick skin, and it is also one of the most delicious grapes for eating.”

Every peasant has enough vines to make a little Barbera. “To honor a guest, it’s still the custom to open a bottle of Barbera, preferably a bottle with a little dust on it. And at one time this was the wine a father put aside when a son was born, to celebrate his son’s coming of age at 20, when he went off to do his military service.” Now it’s more the fashion to put aside Barolo.

In the Currado household, Barolo is not reserved just for cold weather, a roaring fire and a serious piece of roasted game. They like a young Barolo with cheese: in this case, a local sheep’s milk cheese called toma delle Langhe and Parmesan chiseled from a handsome piece of Reggiano. The cheese makes the tannin retreat a little, allowing the fruit to come forward.

But the really perfect match is the wine with the hazelnut torte. The Barolo, with its hint of chocolate on the nose, is an inspired match with the warmth of the hazelnuts. This is one of the real surprises of the meal.

To finish, the Currados offer small cups of espresso and a taste of their grappa distilled from the grape pressings of their Barolo Rocche. “This,” says Alfredo, as he pours a second round of the clear fiery spirit, “is the way we end a meal in Piemonte.”

Risotto does not hold well and should be made just before serving, but Luciana does have one time-saver. She sautes the onion and stirs the rice into the butter and oil ahead of time, then goes back to the stove and adds the wine and continues the cooking just before serving.

RISOTTO WITH ARNEIS

3 to 3 1/2 cups light veal or chicken stock

3 tablespoons butter

2 tablespoons light olive oil

1 small onion, chopped

2 cups arborio rice

2 to 3 cups Arneis

1/4 teaspoon salt

1/2 cup freshly grated Parmesan cheese

1/2 pound asparagus tips, steamed

Heat veal stock in saucepan over low heat and keep at simmer.

Melt 2 tablespoons butter with olive oil in skillet. Add and saute onion until tender. Stir in rice until coated with butter and oil. Continue cooking until rice is transparent, stirring frequently.

Pour in enough wine to cover rice. Cook over medium heat, stirring constantly, until wine is completely absorbed.

Add simmering broth, 1/2 cup at time, stirring until broth is absorbed by rice. Continue to cook and stir until rice is done, about 25 minutes. Season to taste with salt. Rice should be creamy, but still firm.

Remove from heat. Stir in remaining 1 tablespoon butter and grated Parmesan. Garnish with asparagus tips. Serve immediately. Makes 6 servings.

One of the standards of Piemontese cuisine is beef braised in Barolo, preferably the same Barolo which will be served with the meal. Luciana takes the same idea and applies it to rabbit which she cooks in Barbera made from the vines just below their house. Sometimes she cooks it with chopped carrots and celery to give a sweeter flavor to the sauce. This could also be served over polenta in winter or with grilled polenta in summer.

BRASATO AL BARBERA D’ALBA (Rabbit Baised in Barbera d’Alba)

1 rabbit, cut into serving pieces

Salt

Freshly ground pepper

2 tablespoons olive oil

1 clove garlic, chopped

2 slices prosciutto, pancetta or bacon, chopped

1 tablespoon chopped parsley

1 cup Barbera d’Alba

5 tomatoes, peeled and chopped or 1 (1-pound 12-ounce) can plum tomatoes with liquid

Season rabbit with salt and pepper to taste. Heat olive oil in large skillet. Add rabbit and garlic. Cook until well browned on all sides. Add prosciutto and parsley. Continue to cook few minutes. Pour in wine and cook briskly until wine has almost entirely evaporated.

Add tomatoes and about 1/2 cup water (omit water if using canned tomatoes). Bring to boil. Reduce heat and cover loosely. Simmer slowly about 1 hour or until rabbit is tender. Adjust seasonings to taste. Makes 4 servings.

In the Langhe hills, wherever the land isn’t good for grapes, they plant hazelnut trees, especially on slopes with a northern exposure. Wine makers here sometimes offer grissini, the region’s skinny handmade breadsticks, and a basket of hazelnuts when they offer you a glass of wine to taste. These intensely perfumed hazelnuts also go into bread, and into traditional sweets like torrone. Luciana’s recipe is interesting because it includes cornmeal.

TORTA DI NOCCIOLE (Hazelnut Torte)

1/2 cup butter, softened

1 cup sugar

3 eggs

3/4 cup flour

3/4 cup cornmeal

1/4 teaspoon kosher salt

1 teaspoon lievito di angeli (Italian baking powder flavored with vanilla, available in some Italian delis, or 1 teaspoon baking powder, plus 1/2 teaspoon vanilla)

1 1/4 cups hazelnuts, toasted, peeled and finely ground

1 tablespoon olive oil

6 tablespoons milk

1 tablespoon whipping cream

Powdered sugar

Cream butter and sugar until light. Add eggs, one at time, beating well after each addition. Add flour, cornmeal, kosher salt, baking powder, (vanilla, if used). Mix to blend. Stir in hazelnuts, olive oil, milk and whipping cream. (Batter should be thick.)

Turn into buttered 9-inch cake pan dusted with bread crumbs or cornmeal. Bake at 325 degrees 35 to 40 minutes or until done. Cool, then sift powdered sugar lightly over top. Makes 8 to 10 servings.