A Hedonist in the Cellar_ Adventures in Wine - Jay McInerney [7]
The history of Tocai is obscure, and its name seems to come from the Hungarian region that produces dessert wines from the Furmint grape, but the Friulians consider Tocai their signature local grape, an indispensable accompaniment to the salami and prosciutto that start every meal here. Indeed, prosciutto and Tocai seem to be one of those magical marriages made in the soil, like Sancerre and chèvre, or Chablis and oysters. Sipping a Zamo Tocai at the tiny Enoteca Lavaroni in the village of Manzano, with a platter of Lorenzo d’Osvaldo artisanal prosciutto, I experienced one of those moments of sensual satori that gourmands live for. The Friulians insist on the superiority of the local Prosciutto San Daniele over Prosciutto di Parma, but Tocai works very nicely with both, as it does with speck, Spanish ham, Virginia ham, and most things fatty, smoky, and salty. And that’s just for starters. Appropriately, for a grape born so close to the Adriatic, Tocai is also a dream date for seafood.
“Tocai is crisp, but it also has weight on the palate,” says Morgan Rich, the wine director at Del Posto in New York, which generally features a dozen or so Tocais from Friuli on its list. Tocai’s pearlike fruit is balanced by a refreshing lemony acidity and mineral highlights. It can resemble a blend of Riesling and Sauvignon Blanc. Friuli made its reputation with bright, refreshing, stainless-steel-fermented whites, and most winemakers think Tocai is best kept away from wood, although Borgo San Daniele and Miani both make compelling barrel-aged examples.
“Tocai is absolutely one of the great food wines,” claims Joseph Bastianich, a first-generation American whose family hails from Friuli. “It’s versatile and flexible—you can make young, fruity, early-drinking wine or a bigger wine that ages.” The burly baron of a food-and-wine empire that encompasses some of New York’s most acclaimed Italian restaurants, including Babbo and Felidia, Bastianich has an eponymous wine estate in the hills of the Colli Orientali region of Friuli, where he makes an old-vine Tocai that he turbocharges with a healthy dose of late-harvest, botrytis-infected grapes. Bastianich’s Tocai Plus, grown on steep hillsides in the town of Buttrio, is a prime example of the fatter style of Tocai—a Botero of a wine—which can stand up to dishes like stinco di vitello (roasted veal shank) and which Bastianich likes to drink with full-flavored cheeses. His young winemaker, Emilio Del Medico, makes a similarly rich and powerful Tocai called Tocai Vigne Cinquant’Anni, at the nearby property Zamo, as well as the more typical, lighter-style Tocai Friulano. The Zamo family made their fortune manufacturing chairs, and they seem to have spent a fair chunk of it on a new, computerized, underground winery just down the hill from the thirteenth-century Abbey of Rosazzo.
The most complex Tocais come from the hillside vineyards of Collio and Colli Orientali, a kind of meteorological inter-section of the cool Alpine climate and the warm Adriatic. The other prime area is the Isonzo Valley, which is naturally air-conditioned by an Alpine breeze called the bora that funnels through a gap in the foothills. Some other names to seek out: Ronco del Gelso, Villa Russiz, Edi Keber, Polencic, Scubla, and Marco Felluga.
The best way to get acquainted with Tocai is to sit down with a bottle alongside a plate of salami or prosciutto. But almost any grilled fish would be happy to make the acquaintance of this versatile grape.
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