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1 week ago | 
avvinare.com | Susannah Gold
This month the Italian Food Wine and Travel crew looked at wines from the mountains also known as Alpine wines. I am always excited to drink wines that I know are grown at altitude and as climate changes continue, many more areas are looking to plant higher up, in search of freshness, straight forward flavors and purity of fruit that I find you get in wines that come from grapes grown at altitude.
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1 month ago | 
avvinare.com | Susannah Gold
I wish I were at my favorite steakhouse, Keens ,right now, sipping some Irish Whiskey and eating a steak. Keens has a long and glorious New York history that started in 1885 when it was part of an actors club. I like to take non-New Yorkers there for dinner. I like the pipes hanging on the walls, the art, the armor, the old wooden seats, the iceberg wedge. Keens Steakhouse owns the largest collection of churchwarden pipes in the world.
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1 month ago | 
avvinare.com | Susannah Gold
What are you studying for someone in the wine industry asked me recently? I have been attempting to focus on the Master of Burgundy wine with the Wine Scholar Guild for awhile now without much success however, last week’s tasting of Burgundy wines and an upcoming focused one on Bouzeron’s Aligote have turned me into a believer that this could be the year, finally. I have always been on the side of that debate that opts for education, formal and informal.
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1 month ago | 
avvinare.com | Susannah Gold
Tomorrow I will be at the Slow Wine Event in New York at Eataly serving wines from Abruzzo made with Montepulciano. Come say hello if you are at the event! Even though Montepulciano is Italy’s second most widely planted grape variety after Tuscany’s Sangiovese, it is still not as revered as it could and, in my view, should be. Many tend to see this welcoming variety as an easy, quaffable beverage.
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2 months ago | 
avvinare.com | Susannah Gold
This is the year of the Wood Snake. In the Chinese Zodiac there are 12 signs and 5 elemental powers. This combination is what is represented this year and is supposed to bring a year of wisdom, new beginnings, and hope. I had always thought of the holiday as Chinese New Year the Lunar New Year is celebrated in many Asian countries including Vietnam, Hong Kong, Taiwan, Macau, Singapore, and Korea.
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Jan 23, 2025 | 
avvinare.com | Susannah Gold
This fabulous bottle of Lugana was my drink of choice this week. It was a 2016 Lugana Riserva from Zenato, a venerated winery in the Veneto, equally famous for Amarone and Lugana, among other wines. I was the Lugana brandambassador for 8 years and worked hard to transmit and promote this amazing area. When I got to serve Zenato’s wines my job was very easy. This 2016 was amazing and showed how beautifully Lugana can age and show notes of honey, pear, and even tropical fruit.
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Jan 7, 2025 | 
avvinare.com | Susannah Gold
Gearing up for the end of the winter holidays, everyone makes numerous resolutions, including me. One of mine is to write more copy on this blog. I will start with today’s holiday – la Befana. It is a holiday in Italy where an unattractive old looking woman gives out coal to children who are bad and candy to those who were good on January 5th, the Epiphany Eve. January 6th is the Feast of the Epiphany.
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Dec 9, 2024 | 
avvinare.com | Susannah Gold
Last night I had the pleasure of trying these two beautiful bottles of bubbly that hailed from Ridgeview in England. I have had other English sparkling wines in the past which I wrote about here but never these two and never a blanc de noir. The winery started in 1995 in Sussex. The winery’s second generation is now also involved. Ridgeview is a certified B Corporation and is also a founding member of Sustainable Wines GB. The vines at Ridgeview are up to 28 years old, some of the oldest in England.
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Dec 7, 2024 | 
avvinare.com | Susannah Gold
December 7th is always a strange day. On the one hand, I think of Pearl Harbor, the day that will live in infamy and how the USA got into World War II and all that that meant and all the lives that were lost on this day. My great Uncle was at Pearl Harbor. It was the signature event of his lifetime. His license plate even spoke of it. On the other hand, I think of my adopted city of Milan which celebrates its patron saint on this day,.
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Dec 3, 2024 | 
avvinare.com | Susannah Gold
This lovely sparkling wine from Argentina graced my table and helped ring in the December holidays. It hails from Mendova from AltaVista. It was made using the Charmat method which works well in wines that want to show primary fruit aromas. This wine had plenty of charm with its bright pink color, fine bubbles, strawberry and citrus flavors and its zesty acidity, which was listed as 7.2 g/l. The wine is made from the French grape Malbec which is so omnipresent in Argentina.
