A recent trip to France has started me thinking about relationships. I am a partner in a new business, which markets Burgundies from small, family producers. My partner Steve has known many of them for a decade or more, and has imported their wines over the years for sale in the states. Their relationship has evolved well beyond that of buyer and seller. He is welcomed into their homes as a surrogate family member, and does the same when they are in the States. Their children have visited each other over summer. As Steve’s new partner, I was given the same welcome.

I got to thinking about wine’s part in these relationship equations. It is the commodity that binds us all together, but there is something unique in the nature of this commodity. Wine is most often served in a communal setting, as part of a meal. It is something to be shared. Even the size of the bottle encourages this. At about five servings, a bottle contains more than one person should consume. That same amount, however, is perfect for sharing. The simple act of sharing creates and nourishes relationships. Sitting down to a meal together, even just relaxing with wine, some good bread, and cheese, creates an environment for moving beyond “persona” and relating as people.

Wine is also a living thing, a simple product of the natural process of fermenting grapes. It continues to live in the bottle, nourished by that small amount of air trapped between cork and liquid, and evolving over time. You can actually have a relationship with a wine if you put some bottles away, sampling it from time to time over the years. You experience its evolution from youthful, bright aromas and flavors into a smoother, more intricate and complex entity. There is greater depth as the wine matures, and flavors develop that were not present in its youth. A good wine fades over time with grace. This mirror of our own human experience should not be discounted. I know of few things with which you can have a similar relationship.

It is harder to experience the same feeling with the wines from large wine “factory” producers. I am sure that the grapes, in many instances, come from individuals much like those I am forging new relationships with in Burgundy. The connection to these individuals gets diluted, however, and the identification is ultimately with the company, rather than the individuals involved. It’s tough to have a relationship with a factory.

There is greater sense of place and person for those wines made outside the factory system. I encourage you to get to know the stories behind these wines – the people, where they live, how they live, the character of the wines. These relationships will greatly enhance your wine experience. As the weather warms and we gather on patios and decks, raise a glass to relationships, and enjoy the feeling of connection.

Rob Campbell moved to Asheville in 1999 and with his wife, Dorsey, opened The Wine Guy shop on Merrimon Ave. A second location was added in 2002, and is staffed by their longtime friend and fellow wine enthusiast Steve Nelson. Rob has been in the wine business for more than 20 years, as retailer and wine wholesaler, and he has judged wines in international competitions. Check out theashevillewineguy.com for upcoming tastings, classes, and features.

ASHEVILLE – When planning her global travels, Fairview’s Dianne Tuttle often arranges her itineraries around a particular attraction: food.

“You get a real flavor for the culture,” she said, noting the pun. “No matter what country it is, they have a special dish. Whether you’re 2 years old or 90, you can get excited about food.”

Tuttle isn’t alone in crafting culinary trips. During the last decade, travel planned around food and wine has grown in popularity, said Laurey Masterton, who operates culinary tour group Delicious Expeditions with Monroe Moore of the Homewood special events facility.

The Asheville-based travel company has led trips to Italy’s Tuscany and France’s Provence regions for about seven years and is planning to add a trip to the Basque region of Spain and France.

“It’s learning about a place through its food and beverages,” said Masterton, who owns Laurey’s Catering & Gourmet-to-go on Biltmore Avenue, downtown. “We start in a big city and explore that city through its food and markets.”

Wine is also a popular element of culinary travel. Wine importer and sommelier Steve Pignatiello has teamed with Mark Rosenstein, chef and owner of The Market Place restaurant in Asheville, to lead gourmet tours of France’s famed Burgundy and Champagne regions.

“They invite us into their homes and make regional specialties,” Pignatiello said about the family winemakers on his trip itineraries. Participants also visit markets to select items that Rosenstein uses to prepare meals, such as local pike poached in white wine from aligoté grapes.

“They really go to the heart of the living culture that is Burgundy,” Rosenstein said about the trips. “We’re honoring what they do.”

On trips with Delicious Expeditions, participants learn about the agriculture of Tuscany through visiting local growers and enjoying dishes such as “pici,” or hand-rolled pasta strands served with a bricciole sauce with toasted breadcrumbs, garlic and olive oil.

“The markets in Europe are so amazing,” Masterton said. “It’s nice to see a society that cares about what it eats.”

Tuttle, who has traveled to Tuscany with Delicious Expeditions, said focusing on food helps visitors remember a region and its people. The trips also add knowledge about food ingredients used back home.

“I will never feel the same way about olive oil,” she said. “I learned so much about it.”

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Market Place Tours is planning culinary trips to the Burgundy and Champagne Regions of France in June and October. Trips are limited to six participants and cost about $5,000-$8,000 per person, excluding airfare. Call 274-9323 or 252-4162 for more. Market Place chef Mark Rosenstein will also conduct additional culinary tours to the region in 2007. Call 252-4162 for more.

ASHEVILLE – Asheville sommelier and wine importer Steve Pignatiello served as the Burgundy authority at the 11th annual International Food and Wine Festival at Disney’s Epcot Center. Pignatiello’s P. Comms Int’l specializes in importing Burgundy wines from some of the region’s finest single-family winemakers, many of which are not otherwise available outside of France.

The Epcot event, which showcases flavors from around the world, ran Sept. 29-Nov. 12.

ASHEVILLE – Chef Mark Rosenstein and Burgundy wine importer Steve Pignatiello have been inducted into the prestigious Confrerie des Chevaliers du Tastevin (Brotherhood of the Knights of the Tasting Cup).

The induction took place during a recent trip to France. “There are only about 2000 members of this brotherhood in the US,” Pignatiello said. “Only a tiny handful are invited to actually be inducted at the famous Chateau Clos de Vougeot in France. Mark and I were so honored because of the personal relationships we have with the French wine makers we visit on the culinary/wine trips we lead to Burgundy.”

Rosenstein and Pignatiello will lead their unique, exclusive tours of winemakers’ homes and French vineyards June 7-14 and July 12-19, 2006. For more information visit www.marketplace-restaurant.com or www.pcommswines.com or call Pignatiello at 828-274-9323.

Imagine being able to prepare a gourmet meal from produce that was picked mere hours before, as an expert chef gives you tips. A wine expert helps you pick the perfect wine to go with the meal. You sit down to dinner with a small group that shares your passion for good food, just as the sun slips over the green French hills.

Culinary travel is a great way to blend a love of food with the desire to learn more about the wines and cooking of a country. And this national trend is taking hold here in the Western North Carolina mountains.

Beth Brannon and her husband, Broadus, recently returned from a culinary trip to the Burgundy region of France led by local chef Mark Rosenstein and local Burgundy wine importer Steve Pignatiello. “For us, it was the ultimate travel experience,” Brannon said. “We’ve always enjoyed food and wine, and to be able to go to an area like Burgundy and have hands-on cooking classes with a great chef was just wonderful.”

“With a little bit of knowledge and instruction, people can really increase their enjoyment of food and wine,” said Rosenstein, chef/owner of Asheville’s The Market Place. “In Burgundy, the food was unforgettable, from simple grilled entrees with wines from the 1980s to dinner at a three-star restaurant paired with a 30-year-old Chablis.”

Rosenstein based the menus on the local markets, using whatever the local farmers had picked that day. “We would go in the morning and select the ingredients and take them to the home of a winemaker,” Brannon says. “Some of the winemakers shared wines from their private reserves that aren’t available in the United States. It was a fantastic experience.”

Rosenstein and Pignatiello aren’t the only food experts from here leading tours aboard.

“We have gone to Provence and Tuscany,” said Laurey Masterton of Asheville’s Laurey’s Catering, who with partner Monroe Moore runs Delicious Expeditions, specializing in trips to France and Italy.

“We take a group of 10 people, and we go when it’s not crowded,” Masterton said. “There’s nothing worse than being somewhere and seeing a bus full of people pull up led by someone with a megaphone.

Their next trip is to Tuscany. “And we’ll be there in time for the grape harvest and to see the olive oil being pressed,” Masterton said.

Rosenstein plans to return to Burgundy with Pignatiello two or three times next year, as well as lead trips to the pinot noir country of Oregon’s Willamette Valley next month and again in 2006.

Beth Brannon says she took a lot of knowledge away from the experience that applies to cooking back home. “We really learned that even with simple foods, the freshest ingredients and the right sauce can enhance the food. The sauce is the bridge between the food and the wines.”

Rick McDaniel writes about food and cooking for the Citizen-Times.

E-mail him at southerncooking@charter.net.

Steve Pignatiello is an importer of fine, hard-to-find scrumptious French wines. During a family vacation nearly 10 years ago to the Burgundy region of France, he uncovered a business opportunity that has enabled him to combine his masters degree in international business, his fluency in the French language, and his unbridled passion for both the wines and the people who produce them. In essence, while Pignatiello is simply a wine importer based in Asheville, N.C., a more appropriate title might be ambassador to family-owned vintners in Burgundy. A cumbersome title, assuredly, but one that is entirely apropos.

In his spare time on that trip, Pignatiello literally began knocking on doors in hopes of tasting wines from this highly respected wine-growing region. In Burgundy, there are few of the large chateaux and estate vineyards one might find in Bordeaux. Here, the majority of winemakers are nothing more than farmers living in modest homes with a hereditary instinct and panache for producing excellent wines, primarily in small quantities. Pignatiello”s declaration, “I would like to taste your wines,” was met with guarded enthusiasm even though the notion of a business opportunity was the farthest thing from his mind at the time.

Following these first tastings, Pignatiello and some of these unassuming wine producers became friends. It was later that they would become business partners, as many were reluctant to consider the notion of exporting their wines outside their own region, much less to the United States.

A TASTE OF BURGUNDY
At Pignatiello”s exclusive tastings throughout the Southeast (many of which are here in Atlanta), connoisseurs and novices alike receive an education about the wines they are sampling as well as the region itself. Pignatiello charismatically engages his audience with personal tales about the winemakers. These are not movie stars or athletes who thought it might be neat to purchase their own vineyard in some posh and trendy enclave. These are grape growers who may own several rows of vines along with dozens of other small producers in towns like Gevrey-Chambertin, Vosne-Romanee, Beaune, Pommard, Macon or Chassagne-Montrachet.

“This is one of the world”s undisputed, most respected and sought after wine regions,” Pignatiello related. “In Burgundy, these are just normal people and most of them are fairly unpretentious and spend their days out in the vines. These are famous towns that mean something to those who know wine, but the vineyards are tiny, perhaps the size of a couple of football fields.

“These people are farmers, not savvy marketers. Some of them are from families that have been making wine for eight generations. They own the vines, they harvest the grapes by hand, but their specialty is the expertise of how to turn their grapes into some of the world”s greatest wines,” Pignatiello offered.

“Many of the winemakers Pignatiello represents go through exhaustive steps to ensure quality. “One of my winemakers in Pommard once told me that there is no such thing as a bad vintage in Burgundy, just bad winemakers,” Pignatiello stated. “Because you are a small mom-and-pop operation doesn”t mean you make good wine. Out of 10 winemakers, two make lousy wine, six are just pluggers who make decent wine but don”t do it with any pizzazz or enthusiasm, but the top two make extraordinary wines. They are excited about their wines and passionate about them. All of my winemakers fit into that top two category.”

CRÈME DE LA CRÈME
The process necessary to produce quality wines, regardless of whether the vineyard is based in Burgundy or Napa Valley, begins with using good grapes. Sounds simple, right?

“Even in the worst of years, as long as you take what God gives you, a quality winemaker can produce great wine. If the grapes are separated by hand and you take only the best fruit, you can make great wine every year. Certain vintages may have less production but the quality remains the same,” Pignatiello said. “Poor winemakers won”t go through those exhaustive steps to ensure quality.”

There are many other facets to growing good fruit that produces fine wines, but avoiding shortcuts is a big way to ensure quality, as is experience. In Burgundy, the overwhelming majority of wines are produced using two types of grapes ” Chardonnay and Pinot Noir. Gamay and Aligote grapes are also grown here but in less quantity.

Interestingly, the Pinot Noir grape, which yields an abundance of sweet colorless juice, is used to produce both Pinot Noir and Champagne. The red hue of Pinot Noir produced in Burgundy is due to the presence of the skins in fermentation vats.

“In Burgundy, good winemakers allow the grapes and soil to express themselves. They don”t mask flavors with oak, different types of yeast or sugars like we find in many New World wines,” Pignatiello said. “One of the hallmarks of Burgundy is that you can take a wine produced from the same vineyard, same town and same classification from two different winemakers and it can have its own unique characteristics. The grapes may have been grown just a few rows apart and the wines can be very different in taste. That”s why Burgundy is such a minefield for consumers who don”t know who the best winemakers are.”

In fact, most Americans recognize wines from just three Burgundy winemakers: Bouchard Pere et Fils, Joseph Drouhin and Louis Jador, whose influential marketing arms have given birth to an expansive distribution network throughout the United States. The winemakers Pignatiello represents are virtually anonymous here for a variety of reasons.

“The wines I import are not mass marketed, nor mass produced,” Pignatiello said. “When you only make 75 to 200 cases of a particular wine per year, you don”t need the entire United States buying your wine. Publications like the Wine Spectator give winemakers a broad audience. They rate the wines and Americans go buy them. With the small lots that I am selling, my winemakers don”t need the power of the pen to help them sell. They already are in high demand because of the quality and limited production.”

A DISCRIMINATING PALATE
While the larger producers sell thousands of cases of wine each year, Pignatiello concentrates on providing access to some of Burgundy”s most respected winemakers, including Laurence Jobard, Domaine Drouhin”s esteemed oenologist, but who also maintains a watchful eye over her family”s exclusive wines in Pommard (Domaine Gabriel Billard).

“Laurence is one of the world”s most respected winemakers, but the difference is that she cannot possibly oversee every wine produced by Drouhin, whereas at her family estate, she and her sister can maintain that oversight,” Pignatiello advised. “She proudly puts her name on the label of her personal family wines.”

Another example of the exclusive nature of the wines P. Comms International imports is those produced by Domaine Servin. The vineyard now overseen by fifth generation descendant Francois Servin, Domaine Servin produces some of the world”s finest Premier Crus and Grand Crus in Chablis. While those Servin wines are widely available in 16 countries, bottles from Francois” own vineyard are not. Pignatiello has exclusive access to those.

“Francois told me in order to import Domaine Servin wines, I would have to work through his agent. When I told him I was not interested in doing that, he said that he owns vines in his own name,” Pignatiello said. “”I have never sold my personal label wines to anyone else,” he told me and then asked, “Would you like to have those?” I am the only one in the world with access to those.”

And those limited production exclusive wines are what Pignatiello offers aficionados primarily in North Carolina, South Carolina, Florida, Alabama and Georgia. He provides access to some of Burgundy”s most exclusive wines that, for the most part, would not otherwise be available. “Not every one of my wines fit that description, but at least half of them do. Because of the friendships I have forged during the past 25 years, I know who the better winemakers are,” he said.

Just because they have solid reputations, however, doesn”t mean that Pignatiello imports every wine they produce. “They allow me to cherry pick. Out of the 15 or so winemakers that I represent, there are only two or three that I take every wine they produce.”

Another vital aspect to Pignatiello”s business is he is a single entrepreneur with direct connections to the winemakers he represents. Thus, he is able to cut out the middle men and imports better wines at less cost.

“I think a more important distinction is the fact that I am not just selling wine,” Pignatiello said. “I am passionate about these people. They are friends and I am selling who they are and their whole lifestyle.”

In Burgundy, that lifestyle is a blend of nothing more than sharing good food and good wine. The region is famous for its cuisine. Beef Bourgogne, Coq au vin and escargot are some of the more well-known dishes. Burgundy is a gastronomic capital where food and wine are one and inseparable.

“One of my winemakers said, “Unless you have food, what”s the point. Wine is made to be drunk with good food,”" Pignatiello recalled. “One of the most surprising things about Burgundy is how down-to-earth the people are. Their lifestyle is centered upon good food and good wine.”

Thanks to Pignatiello”s friendships in France, we have access to that wine, too.

Use a fingertip grip with the wrist cocked. Don’t squeeze too hard. Keep your head slightly tilted, and don’t hurry the finish….

Drinking wine and playing golf share these techniques and more, says wine expert Steve Pignatiello, who imports some of the refreshments that will be served at Augusta National Golf Club during Masters week, as well as choosing wines for other vaunted venues, from the Cloister at Sea Island to Kiawah Island to the Biltmore Forest Country Club.

“Golfers appreciate quality wine,” says Pignatiello, who founded Asheville, North Carolina’s P. Comms International in 1998 and served as sommelier for the kickoff dinner at the 2001 PGA Championship at the Atlanta Athletic Club. “A golfer told me he thought I had the best job in the world. I said I thought he did.”

Asked what vintage might lift a golfer’s spirits after a flat round, Pignatiello recommends a fruity red from Morey-Saint Denis: It’s a light, easy-sipping wine you can drink on the veranda all afternoon.” To celebrate an ace, try Crémant de Bourgogne, a sparkling wine made in the Champagne method from Burgundy grapes. “This is a unique, creamy treat, with tiny bubbles and a crisp finish,” says Pignatiello. And for the truly discriminating, he chooses Chablis Monté de Tonnerre, Premier Cru. “It’s an unoaked chardonnay by François Servin, one of the top two wine makers in the Chablis region. Servin releases fewer than a hundred cases a year, and I get forty-five to fifty of them.” Much of Pignatiello’s stock makes the 220-mile trip to Augusta, to be served by the glass at Augusta National. “That’s a Chablis with crisp flavors that are pure on the palate – a striking wine with a killer finish.”

With a handicap of fourteen, Pignatiello has no sour grapes about failing to compete professionally, and he isn’t jealous of Ernie Els, Greg Norman, David Frost and other pro golfers who have squeezed into the wine business. “Norman’s wine is okay, not great, but his name on the label makes it more appealing to the public,” he says. “That’s fine, too. It gets people drinking wine, and they can graduate to better wines.”

Match Play: Frost Wines vs. Norman Estates

“Great golfers don’t necessarily make great wines,” says Steve Pignatiello of P. Comms International. We sent him a shipment of the recent vintages produced by wine-making golfers David Frost and Greg Norman, and Pignatiello found them subpar. “They are nondescript,” he says. “The Norman Estates wines are good examples of New World-style wines. The ones from David Frost I can’t praise. The Frost Merlot is so oaky it reminds me of a two-by-four.” After a sampling, Pignatiello pronounced David Frost Wines’ 1999 Cabernet Reserve “drinkable, but quite unripe. They tried to make up for that by toasting it with too much oak.” He praised Norman Estates’ 2000 Shiraz as “vibrant, with rich fruit.” Then we asked him to taste Frost’s and Norman’s chardonnays head-to-head:

David Frost Wines 2000 Chardonnay
“Smooth if a bit bland, a little buttery. It’s not bad, really – an industrial-style wine for the masses. And that’s a nice marketing touch, putting Arnold Palmer on the bottle.” (Rating: 2 stars)

Greg Norman Estates 2001 Chardonnay
“Fuller on the palate, crisp, with better balance, fuller flavors and better acid than the David Frost chardonnay. In this match, Greg Norman has clearly come out ahead.” (Rating: 2.5 stars)

When you hear the word “Burgundy”, what thoughts come to your mind? Some think of a generic red wine. Others think of wines such as Gallo’s Hearty
Burgundy. Those who know fine wines think of those wines which come from that exclusive wine region in France known as Bourgogne.

Bourgogne (or “Burgundy” as we say in English) is the name of the most complex single wine region in the world. When I give wine talks throughout the Southeast, I meet many people who are very knowledgeable about wine. But if they have one area of weakness, it’s invariabley their lack of knowledge about Burgundy and its wines. Well, I’ve been asked to “de-mystify” Burgundy through a series of articles, of which this article is the first.

Burgundy is a tiny, tiny wine region surrounding the cities of Dijon and Beaune in France. Because it is so small, it produces a very limited amount of wine each year — in fact, it produces only a fraction of the wine that is produced by other well known areas, such as Bordeaux and California. Yet, Burgundy is so famous because the best wines from that region are among the top wines in the world.

The simplest part of a Burgundy is that its wines are single-grape wines. In general, red wines are made from 100% Pinot Noir grapes, and the white wines are made from 100% Chardonnay grapes. From this point on, it can become very complicated. One small village can include dozens and dozens of tiny vineyards. And a narrow dirt road or a simple stone wall can separate a Grand Cru vineyard (one of the world’s best) from a more ordinary village vineyard. This patchwork of vineyards means that wines can be of quite different qualities even though the grapes might have grown up right next to each other.

The situation becomes further complicated by the ownership of vines. Each small town may have between fifty to a hundred winemakers, but it’s rare for winemakers to own an entire vineyard. Instead, winemakers measure their ownership of vines by rows within a vineyard. A quality winemaker will make exceptional wine while a pedestrian winemaker will make mediocre wine — yet the grapes were only grown a few rows apart. To further complicate matters, the bottle labels contain the exact same identifying information, except for the name of the winemaker.

So, if you are not familiar with each small town, and you’re not familiar with the patchword of vineyards in those towns, and you don’t know who are the top winemakers in the area — then what’s a wine-loving American going to do when it’s time for a good Burgundy or when you want to pair great wines with a killer dinner party menu? It can be downright intimidating to try to pick excellent yet affordable wines when choosing from this melange of towns, vineyards and winemakers.

One of the main reasons I founded P.Comms. Int’l was to make some of the best Burgundy wines from some of the top winemakers available and affordable to Americans. Most of these wines are reserved for consumption in France. Through my friendships with these world-class winemakers, I get an exclusive selection of their quality wines here in America. Future articles will discuss how to identify the best Burgundy wines and how to pair these wines with food. A votre sante!

ASHEVILLE (Reprinted with permission) – Two Asheville men have passed the examination to become certified sommeliers administered by the American Chapter of the Court of Master Sommeliers.

Steve Pignatiello, owner of P. Comms International wine distributors, and Kevin Schwartz, general manager of Horizons at Grove Park Inn Resort & Spa, passed the exam in Naples, Fla., last month. “It gives a whole new level to our wine service,” Schwartz said. “In order to pass the test, you have to know about wines from all over the world.”

The Court of Master Sommeliers was established in 1977 as the premier international examining body for wine professionals. For wine professionals, the master sommelier diploma is the ultimate professional credential anyone can attain worldwide.

“The introductory course covered all aspects of wine,” Pignatiello said. “You have to know everything from grape varieties to the proper way to serve fine wines.”

The course of study leading up to the designation master sommelier requires at least five years” experience in the wine service industry and the completion of an introductory and advanced sommelier class administered by the Court of Master Sommeliers.

Admission to the advanced course is by invitation of the court”s academic committee. At the basic level, Pignatiello and Schwartz can use the title sommelier and were awarded a lapel pin denoting the certification. “We’re both pretty excited about it,” Pignatiello said. “As far as I know, Kevin and I are the only certified sommeliers in Asheville.”

At the Country Club of Asheville on December 7, Bailli Tom Ruff, Professionnel du Vin Steve Pignatiello, and Chef Rotisseur Bryant Withers were a triumvirate non pareil! Excellent cuisine, fine wines, and the superb presentation of both made for a memorable evening. After the champagne reception, which featured hand-passed hors d’oeuvres and copious amounts of wine, it was time to get serious about the food.

Once we were seated, Bailli Ruff offered a surprise: To commemorate the tenth anniversary of the Asheville Bailliage, we were treated to glasses of Veuve Clicquot Rose La Grande Dame 1990 from the house that was founded in 1772 and that made the champagne that conquered Russia in 1814! It was an auspicious beginning.

Professionnel du Vin Steve Pignatiello specializes in the wines of Burgundy and the lesser known, small estates, which have limited distribution in the United States. He chose Domaine Parent Volnay Close des Chenes 1999 to accompany the first course of antelope carpaccio and winter root salad. The pairing was a stroke of brilliance!

Arriving next was pan-seared squab breast with wild mushroom risotto, matched with Gabriel Billard Beaune les Epenottes 2001. Madame Billard’s wine is from her family estate; only seventy cases are made each year.

The next offering of potato and leek bisque with lobster nuggets was complemented by a rare Servin Chablis Bougros 2000. Only 165 cases are made each year from the winemaker’s personal vineyard. The family’s Chablis roots trace back to 1652.

Delightful blackberry sorbet prepared us for the main event. Chef Withers’s entree gave new meaning to the term “au jus”! Turkey, venison and veal stocks were reduced and presented with rack of lamb royale with herbed pork forcemeat. The reduction was a rich and powerful complement to the meats and accompanying vegetables. All the flavors were enhanced by Domaine Camus Latricieres-Chambertin 1999.

Our wonderful dinner finished with a delicious chocolate holiday sampler. The Asheville Bailliage is looking forward to the next ten years!

ASHEVILLE – Can a Midwestern farm boy with an Ivy-league education find happiness importing fine French wines in the mountains of Western North Carolina?

Steve Pignatiello has.

Pignatiello (pronounced pin-a-TELL-o) is a nationally known importer of burgundy wines who also gives wine dinners at some of the most exclusive country clubs and restaurants in the Southeast. ‘If there’s anybody in town who knows Burgundy, its Steve,’ said Kevin Schwartz, general manager of Chops at Sunset Terrace at The Grove Park Inn Resort and Spa. ‘He’s extremely knowledgeable and has a burning passion for what he does. When he gets involved in something, he puts both hands around it and lives it.’

Rob Campbell of The Wine Guy, who stocks several of Pignatiello’s wines, agrees. ‘He firmly believes that the best wines in the world come from Burgundy,’ Campbell said. ‘His makers make wines with more quality than others. His wines are outstanding and the prices are very reasonable for the most part.’

Pignatiello was born in New Jersey, spent time in upstate New York and New England before graduating from high school in Centerville, Ohio. He graduated from Dartmouth College in 1981 with plans to go into the environmental field. Immediately after graduation, things changed. ‘I was hired by one of my professors to teach either English as a second language or French, depending on whether we were in western Europe or the United States,’ he said.

This led to a chance meeting that started the ball rolling toward Pignatiello’s move to Asheville and involvement with wine.

‘One summer, we taught an intensive course in French for medical students who wanted to go to French medical schools,’ he recounts. ‘We had six weeks to teach them enough French to do this, so we looked around for a place with no distractions and settled on the campus of Western North Carolina University in Cullowhee. My wife, Gail, was one of the students I taught. Midwest farm boy meets Southern California beach girl in, of all places, Asheville, North Carolina!’

After Gail graduated, the couple moved to Loma Linda, Calif., and Pignatiello started Pignatiello Communications, a telecommunications company that was on the ground floor of the voice mail revolution.

After the couple decided to move back to the mountains of WNC, Pignatiello next owned a chain of hot tub and spa stores. Finally, on one of the couple’s annual trips to France in 1997, inspiration struck.

‘Gail and I took a week’s vacation in Burgundy, staying with a different wine maker each night, drinking their wine, and about halfway through the week, in this little cellar in Morey-Saint-Denis, Gail elbowed me and said, ‘Have you figured this out yet? The wine is fantastic, you can buy it dirt cheap, you have a degree in international business from SAIS at Johns Hopkins University ‘ it’s a business opportunity.”

So, in 1999, Pignatiello went back to France and ordered 125 cases of wine. ‘I was told I’d never be able to sell it,’ he says. ‘I sold out in a month.’

One of the keys to Pignatiello’s success is the personal relationships he has formed with the winemakers in these small vineyards. ‘I talk to them on the phone probably once a week, and each year I travel back to France to visit them, share a meal, and sample the new vintage.’

The roots of these small vineyards go deep into French history. ‘I went to France with him for a week and I tasted the wines of 10 makers,’ said Mark Rosenstein, chef/owner of The Marketplace, who offers several of Pignatiello’s wines. ‘I stood in the same parlor as Thomas Jefferson and bought wines from the same family and vineyard that he did over 200 years ago.’

Most of the wines Pignatiello imports cannot be obtained from anyone else in the United States. Some of the smaller cellars may only export a few dozen cases a year. Jean Aufauvre-Bouley, a respected vintner in Chassagne-Montrachet, only exports to Pignatiello, and then only 50 cases a year. ‘Laurence Jobard, winemaker for Maison Joseph Drouhin, has a personal estate called Domaine Gabriel Billard,’ Pignatiello said. ‘Her entire cellar would fit in a small living room. I’m the only person who imports it.’

As would be expected, Pignatiello is fluent in French, as are his wife and daughters. They speak French predominately at home.

In addition to holding tastings and wine dinners that feature pairings with the food of local chefs orchestrated by Cheri Jones, who studied wine pairing under some of the top chefs in the country, Pignatiello is actively involved in teaching sommeliers, as well as teaching the section on burgundies at the Cloister’s Food and Wine Classic as well as the Savannah Wine Experience. ‘When he does a tasting for my staff, he educates them,’ said Schwartz. ‘He starts with the pronunciation and goes into the story of each wine, where it comes from, who the maker is. His stories make it easy to sell the wine ‘ people remember them.’

Rick McDaniel writes about food and cooking for the Citizen-Times. Write him c/o the Asheville Citizen-Times, P.O. Box 2090, Asheville, NC 28802, fax him at 251-0585, call him at 232-0808 during business hours or e-mail him at southerncooking@charter.net.

Where to get the wines:
P. Comms International, Pignatiello’s company, doesn’t sell direct to the public. His wines may be found at The Wine Guy on Merrimon Avenue and Hendersonville Road. For more information, call 254-6500.

One of my winemakers said it best when she said that “ the wine is made in the vineyards, not in the cellars. If you don’t start with quality fruit, it is not possible to make quality wines.”

Therefore, top winemakers are in the fields assuring that the harvest will be of the highest quality possible. Even though they may have workers to do some of the work for them, these winemakers can often be found in the vineyards examining the vines, working the soil, and testing the fruit. They are getting their hands dirty.

These are small families who have been entrusted with their ancestral homes and plots of land. They are stewards of the land for the next generation. Their job is to maximize the potential of the land in an environmentally friendly manner. And their special skill is turning the quality fruit into some of the world’s best wines.

People who go on these trips are veterans of barge trips and other wine trips where you eat on the barge or in restaurants most of the time. Those are all good trips. And the people had enjoyable times on those trips. But they are unanimous in their preference for my trips. One man said it best. He and his wife went on a barge trip and loved it. So, they went on a second barge trip and again had a good time. Then, they met me and decided to go to Burgundy with me. About halfway through their Gourmet Trip with me, he said that “this trip is the major leagues and the other trips, while enjoyable, were the minor leagues.”

So, what sets my Gourmet Trips apart? Among other things, it is their uniqueness and authenticity. On no other trip do you actually get invited into the winemakers’ homes. Either the winemakers cook for you or we take a chef who cooks some of the meals in their homes. You are invited as a good friend and family member to experience their daily life, which is centered around their world-class wines and the delicious Burgundian culinary specialties prepared in their homes.

It’s all very relaxed and informal. In fact, one man who has traveled extensively to Europe said that this trip has a “level of intimacy that is rare in Europe”.

Trip participants say that if you enjoy food and wine together… and if you really want to connect with the winemakers on a real and significant level, then you will absolutely love this trip.

One of the best examples of that was a lovely lady who attended an exclusive tasting that I did many years ago. She only drank White Zinfandel. I was told that was all she has ever liked. That evening she tasted a few of my wonderful wines. I just knew that she would find some wines that were even more pleasing to her. Well, at the end of the evening, all she wanted was her White Zinfandel. That wine is simply yummy to her. I have gotten to know her family well. To this day, when I go to a dinner and I know that she will be there, I make sure to bring her a bottle of her favorite White Zin. She is appreciative and the rest of us drink my wines.

In a future blog, maybe we can get into the mechanics of actually tasting wine and even of opening wine and serving wine, especially the serving temperature.

Of course, we all know that France, Italy, and the US are among the top wine producing countries in the world. And within each country, there are several regions – all of which make different styles of wines.

In France and Italy, the most famous regions are actually codified as to which grapes can be made into wine that bears the name of each region. America is less regulated in this respect. For example, in Bordeaux, there are 5 grapes that may be used for their better red wines, most notably Cabernet Sauvignon and Merlot. In Burgundy, the red wines must be 100% Pinot Noir. In the Rhone, there are 13 grapes that may be used in any combination, principally Grenache, Mourvedre, and Syrah. But in the Northern Rhone, it’s 100% Syrah.

Therefore, knowing your wine regions can really help you to know what type of wine you are drinking. And if you know the grape characteristics, then that will help you to further know what to expect in a glass. Basic sommelier training seeks to help you identify the wine in the glass by learning flavor profiles and characteristics of different grapes as well as the influence that regional differences (climate, etc) have on the wine. It’s all very deductive. With a little experience, certain patterns will fall out and become obvious. Before you know it, you could be impressing your friends by correctly identifying that dark, bold, and spicy red wine as being made from 100% Syrah grapes grown in the Saint Joseph area of the Northern Rhone. Very nice!

You can approach it from either angle. There is no “right” answer. Some people always select their wine first and others select their food first. If you have a favorite dish you want to prepare for guests, then by all means start with the food and then select a wine that goes well with that food. Conversely, if you have a special bottle that you want to open with a friend, then you would select the appropriate food that will complement your special wine.

One of the tricks that I have learned over the years is that TEXTURE plays a major role in pairing. Food and wine both have texture. Let’s take the example of a ribeye steak and a tenderloin.

Think of the ribeye steak with its big flavor, but also with its fat. The ribeye is more flavorful, but is much tougher than a tenderloin. The texture could be considered as “coarse and rough”. The tenderloin has almost no fat. It is very tender, but has comparatively less flavor than a ribeye. The tenderloin can be considered as “delicate and elegant”.

Not just any red wine will go with both steaks. For the ribeye, you need a bigger red that has good acid to cut through the fat as well as big fruit and tannins to stand up to the toughness of the meat. But that big red would dominate the tenderloin and diminish your enjoyment of the meal. With the tenderloin, you would select a wine that is smoother and softer. Its elegance would match the tenderness of the meat and maximize the pairing. Yet, this more elegant wine would fall flat if served with the ribeye.

Notice that we really haven’t talked about specific flavors or sauces. We have simply talked about the texture of the food along with the texture of the wine. For me, this is probably the first building block to master when pairing food and wine to maximize your enjoyment at the table.

One example is the 3-tier system that our government enforces to import wines from other countries. By law, there must be 1) an importer, 2) a distributor or wholesaler, and 3) a retailer or restauranteur. This system is supposed to protect the consumer, but I’m not so sure it does that. What I am sure is that it adds to the cost of the wine for the end user.

A case in point: Some states allow a company to be 2 tiers of the 3-tier system. This eliminates at least one middleman. One less person touching the wine means one less profit margin to pay; so the wine should cost less. In NC, my company (P. Comms Int’l) has permits as an importer as well as a distributor. So, I buy directly from the winemaker and I’m the only middleman between the winemaker and the retailer/restaurant.

Not only does this make for a better price on equivalent wines, but it also allows for better quality control throughout the entire process. Higher quality at less cost equals greater value. And understanding a few Wine Distribution basics will help you to realize these benefits.

The question always makes me smile because most people don’t keep wine very long at all. We are drinkers and not collectors. I usually tell them that the wine will “keep” longer than they will wait to drink it. But that’s not what they want to hear. They want a number, such as 8 years or 3 years or 22 years.

I tell them that a more serious response really depends on how they like their wines. People generally fall into 3 categories:

• they like their wines young and fruity
• they like them old and mature
• they like the wines somewhere in between

Depending on how people like to drink their wines will determine how long to cellar them.

For example, one Premier Cru Pommard I have should be consumed 3-6 years after bottling for the folks who like their wines young and fruity. They appreciate the big black fruit flavors and the noticeable tannins.

But those in the “old and mature” group would want to wait 15-20 years to drink that same wine. The wine has lost a lot of its fruitiness and the tannins have softened. Secondary and tertiary characteristics have come to the forefront. This group appreciates these flavors more than fruitiness and power.

Finally, the people in the “in between” group should probably drink that same wine about 8-12 years after the date on the label (the harvest year). These people seem to want some of the fruitiness to still be present, but they also appreciate the development of more subtle flavors.

Bottom line is to determine when a wine is pleasing to you. At that point, simply drink!