THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Sunday, July 31, 1994 TAG: 9407280061
SECTION: FLAVOR PAGE: F3 EDITION: FINAL
COLUMN: HUMBLE STEWARD
SOURCE: JIM RAPER
LENGTH: Medium: 92 lines
SUMMER WINE festivals in Virginia have their charm, but I usually come away from them wishing for more coordinated selections of food and wine, and for a more comfortable dining environment.
It is no pretty sight to see the sweaty festival-goer standing in a cow pasture and juggling a glass of cabernet, a paper plate of grilled sausage and a crust of bread.
But once in a while a warm-weather celebration of wine and food promises all the right things, and I lay aside my skepticism.
Bell' Italia - billed as an Italian food and Virginia wine festival - is the weekend of Aug. 13 and 14 at a farm near Warrenton.
Here are the ``right things'' the promoters are promising:
The festival will be held under ``beautiful striped tents set amidst the venerable oaks and quiet ponds of the 3,000-acre farm of Airlie in Fauquier County.''
Food will be prepared by the staffs of six Italian restaurants in Washington, D.C., and Northern Virginia. All are members of Grupa Ristoratori Italiani, an international organization that champions authentic Italian cuisine.
Participating restaurants include three owned by the talented Washington chef Roberto Donna: I Matti Trattoria, Il Radicchio, and Galileo. It would be worth the trip to Warrenton just to taste dishes that originated in the kitchen of the glorious, and expensive, Galileo.
Two other Washington restaurants are involved: Petitto's Ristorante D'Italia, with chef Carlo Davila, and I Ricchi, with chef Francesco Ricchi. The sixth participating restaurant is Fantastico of Warrenton, with chef Franco Stocco. Donna says some of Washington's other well-known chefs will contribute dishes.
Menus were not available, but we are told: ``Bell' Italia's signature antipasti, piatti (main courses) and dolci (desserts) promise to reveal the complex culinary heritage of la cuciana Italiana.''
Wine will be poured by 11 of Virginia's best wineries. A few, such as Naked Mountain Vineyard, are not regular participants in outdoor festivals.
Naked Mountain and its Northern Virginia neighbors, Linden Vineyards and Oasis Vineyard, are sure to serve good wines. Williamsburg Winery and Barboursville Vineyards, two of the state's largest, also can be counted upon to pour impressive wines.
Other participating wineries are Chateau Morrisette Winery, Dominion Wine Cellars, Meredyth Vineyards, Oakencroft Vineyards, Piedmont Vineyards and Tarara Vineyard.
The wines served will be ``varietals . . . selected carefully'' to pair with the dishes.
Festival-goers can relax at ``intimate cafe round tables in the shade of (the) large, beautifully striped tents.''
There will be live music of the Big Band variety and vendors offering antiques and crafts.
The festival will be from 11 a.m. to 6 p.m Saturday and Sunday. Tickets - $11 in advance and $13 at the gate - cover parking and wine tastings. Food will cost extra. A nonwine-tasting ticket will be available for $5.
For more information or to order tickets, call (703) 349-4133. Proceeds go to an environmental research project, two feed-the-hungry programs and the GRI restaurant organization. RECENT TASTINGS
Sonoma's Matanzas Creek Winery, which I invariably mention as one of my favorite domestic producers, has delighted my taste buds again, this time with its 1991 Merlot Sonoma Valley.
Regular readers will remember the generous praise I have given the 1989 and 1990 vintages of the Mantazas Creek Merlot. The 1991 is good enough to make me wonder if it might be the best of the three. Maybe someday I'll be lucky enough to taste all three at one sitting, and only then would I dare rate one as better than the other.
The 1991 is 86 percent merlot, 6 percent cabernet sauvignon and 8 percent cabernet franc. It is big and warm now, with blackberry and coffee flavors enhanced by a touch of toasty and spicey oak. It should soften some and gain complexity over the next five years and stay in lovely form for at least a decade after that.
The 1991 may not be Petrus, but it's as exciting as another well-regarded Pomerol, La Fleur-Petrus. And at $29 the Matanzas Creek is less than one-tenth the price of Petrus and one-half the price of La Fleur-Petrus.
Sandra McIver and her cohorts at Matanzas Creek also have released a $70 chardonnay, the 1990 Journey Sonoma Valley, that is getting high marks in the wine media. I haven't tasted the Journey, and probably shouldn't - for the same reasons I don't test-drive Mercedes convertibles.
The winery's regular bottling of chardonnay, which costs less than $20, is good enough for me. So is its sauvignon blanc (about $14). MEMO: The Humble Steward is a regular feature of Flavor. Write to The Humble
Steward, Sunday Flavor, The Virginian-Pilot and The Ledger-Star, 150 W.
Brambleton Ave., Norfolk, Va. 23510. by CNB