Indigena World Tour
@ Il Buco Alimentari & Vineria, NYC (6/4-6/2018)


I had the good fortune to be invited to participate in a three-day educational tasting event which was the first stop of the Indigena World Tour. This event was organized by Ian D'Agata's Indigena and Jeffrey Porter of the B&B Hospitality Group.

The goal of the Indigena project is to create the first and most important scientifically rigorous meeting on the Italian native grapes and their wines, including both Italian and world products in a three day series of tastings, seminars, conferences, state of the art lectures and winery visits. The first one was held in the town of Barolo. This is the first one to be held outside of Piemonte as part of the Indigena World Tour.


Contents of this main page:

Here are brief descriptions of each day with links to the tasting notes for each day:

Indigena Tasting Day 1: Monferrato
Day One focused on Monferrato. The two sessions in the morning were all Barbera. Session 1 on Barbera d'Asti and Session 2 on Nizza. The two sessions in the afternoon focused on other grapes including Grignolino, Freisa, and Ruché.
Tasting Notes for Day 1: Monferrato

Indigena Tasting Day 2 Morning: Langhe
The morning of the second day of the Indigena World Tour in NYC focused on the Langhe. The first flight was all Barolo, while the second flight was Barbaresco and a few other grapes of the Langhe (Arneis, Favorita, Barbera).
Tasting Notes for Day 2 Morning: Langhe

Indigena Tasting Day 2 Afternoon: Aglianico del Vulture and Basilicata
The afternoon of the second day of the Indigena World Tour in NYC focused on the wines of Basilicata, mostly Aglianico del Vulture. In fact, 14 of the 15 wines tasted were Aglianico del Vulture. The last one was Primitivo (aka Zinfandel). This afternoon was the first time that there were representatives of the wineries present. In some cases, it was the winemaker or owner. In others it was the US importer or sales rep. So this page contains quite a few photos of these folks.
Tasting Notes for Day 2 Afternoon: Aglianico del Vulture and Basilicata

Indigena Tasting Day 3: The Marche
Day Three focused on the wines of the Marche region of Italy, primarily Verdicchio dei Castelli di Jesi. In fact, Indigena titled this day 50th Anniversary of Verdicchio dei Castelli di Jesi & Friends since Verdicchio dei Castelli di Jesi was granted DOC status in 1968. The first three flights were all Verdicchio dei Castelli di Jesi. Flight 4 had two Verdicchios from the other important Verdicchio DOC, Verdicchio di Matelica. Flight 4 concluded with five reds from the Marche.
Tasting Notes for Day 3: The Marche


Click on an image with a border for a much larger view of that image which may contain additional image.

All three days were held upstairs at Il Buco Alimentari & Vineria, one of my favorite informal, authentic Italian restaurants in NYC.

Views of the upstairs room at Il Buco Alimentari & Vineria from my seat as the first flight of the first day is being poured:


Lunch

Each day lunch was served, with the wines from the morning tasting, outside on the patio.

To get to the patio, you have to walk past the opening to the downstairs where there is an interesting sculpture hanging:
For more on this chandelier and a view from below, see my notes on a lunch with Jeremy Parzen, Alice Feiring,
Frank Butler, and other luminaries at the table below the chandelier in 2013.


The patio is above the front of Il Buco Alimentari & Vineria, the alimentari (market) part. The first photo looks out
across Great Jones Street. The second looks back at where our tasting are held.

There was a delicious array of food for lunch on Day 1, and a similar array on subsequent days:

A couple of photos from lunch on Day 2:

And excellent coffee:


Summary

A terrific three days of tasting and learning about a broad range of the wines of Italy.

 

 

 


All original content © Ken Vastola