A Personal Odyssey by A Calabrian Wine

I embody Odysseus, go deep into the trenches of the mind, and meditate on this Calabrian wine.

Vigneti Vumbaca Ciro Rosso Classico Superiore Riserva

Varieties: Gaglioppo

Region: Ciro, Calabria, Italy

Producer: Vigneti Vumbaca

Costs: $40-$45

Missive: A Personal Odyssey by A Calabrian Wine

A recent undertaking of mine has been the concept of a vino da meditazione. Throw out the idea of pairing, open up that big red wine, and enter a meditative zone. Much like Aang when he enters the Avatar State. In this case, I opted for the underdog. The one that you would probably pass over in a wine shop for a number of reasons. That’s if you see it on a retail shelf or wine list at all. Calabrian wine is definitely a deep dive for most, but I am willing to take the plunge for you all. This wine had me feeling like Odysseus in my own right, battling my own Scylla. But here comes the important part: will I end up fleeing like he did? Or will I take the stand here against this wine made from Gaglioppo? I am opting for the latter but the night is young, and the strength of this wine makes it all unpredictable. I’ve got a lot floating around in this head right now, both the good and the bad. The good: I have recently fallen in love with true crime books related to Italian organized crime. I am on my third one in a row, with the current one being Gomorrah by Roberto Saviano. So that will probably come up at some point. The bad: my brain is being pulled in ten different directions. I feel like I am currently on the Western Front in World War I. When I make an inch of progress in one aspect of my life, I immediately follow it with a setback in some other one. It’s a give and take, but it feels like it has been all out of whack recently.

Alas, the wine is setting in and this is definitely the meditazione hitting me. Sometimes I give myself a chuckle, the best kind, and I have fun coming up with a clever title. At least clever in my mind. That’s how I feel about the play on the Odyssey and Meditations. Like every young man, I had to go through my intense Marcus Aurelius & Stoicism phase. It’s absolutely a philosophy I continue to take nuggets from, but on reflection it always seemed so black and white. Modern known proponents are sort of victims of their own rigidity. Haha - the wine really is talking! I’ll get to the wine before the meditazione goes any further.

We are in Calabria, Italy. The tip is opposite of Sicily, only separated by the Strait of Messina which is a mere two miles at the closest point. Calabrian wine production only accounts for approximately 1% of overall Italian wine production. Thus, my reference to the deep dive is not necessarily overstated. And here we have one of my favorite examples of Calabrian wine: a Gaglioppo wine from the folks over at Vigneti Vumbaca. Kudos to Ideal Wines and Easterly Wines for importing and distributing this level of wine. Giving a wine like this representation in the United States is only going to get younger wine drinkers interested in more niche and intriguing styles in the long run. Your grandparents probably weren’t drinking Calabrian wines folks! So, if people are indeed drinking less but are being more intentional with their purchases, then this is a wine that would intrigue said people. Why is it intriguing in particular Alex? Thank you for asking as I am just now getting to that. You can’t rush me and you can’t rush this damn wine either.

The room is pulsing. So is the wine. It’s alive, vibrant, silky, refined, yet a touch rugged that just keeps you wanting more. This thing has an intense aroma and it really pops out of the glass. You can tell there are layers and savory components to the wine upon opening it. On the nose, it has this beautiful dark cherry and pomegranate aspect. That’s just the beginning, however, and there is an underlying spiced component to the whole thing from start to end. At the very end, when you really put out your lampada and look for it, you can pick up on a Mediterranean shrub and violet component. There are three very distinct layers to this wine. One of the things that impresses me the most with this wine is that only stainless steel is used. So all the complexity and tertiary aspects you get are simply from the grape and terroir. That’s pretty darn cool if you ask me. The palate follows the nose, like the carrot leading the horse. It had a real bite at the beginning and you felt every bit of those tannins. However, after a pasta influenced by Sicilian caponata and Calabrian chile pesto, the wine really settled into itself. The tannins became significantly more relaxed and balanced out with the acidity. The flavors really opened up, and you get more of this earthy, spiced, dark fruit component. Dried figs, rosemary, and almost an iron note reminiscent of something you would see out of the Etna region. This wine is singing. It’s loud but in a palatable way, not like a drunk relative talking politics at Thanksgiving. It’s more focused and angular. Loud like a symposium, intellectual, with a touch of grace to it. All the while knowing that refined aspect, engaging in the intellectual arts, also probably wrestled and threw javelins as well. Meaning that while this wine is indeed put together, it always retains this rustic component. It could recite Homer just as well as it could hunt a wild boar. The Scales of Justice are balanced in this case. And if I can find a night of solace and balance in this wine then I will take it.

Oh to grow up and age if I do say so. Being in my family home definitely reminds me of the times I would visit as a child. Presents hiding under my pillow planted by my grandmother. Lifting rocks and looking for crabs with my sisters. Family meals that used to use the entirety of a long wooden table. Here I am a decade or so later and we hardly use the table at all. My sisters have not been here in years. There are significantly fewer of us now. I miss my grandfather terribly. He is the one I would turn to in a situation like this where I feel as though I am staring at a wall and watching everything happen in the periphery around me. If this is my Battle of the Somme, where do I go from here? If I feel as though I am letting all sides down, what does that leave me with? Well, a good bottle of wine of course. Maybe I should just become a hermit with a world class wine cellar. “This guy in rural Maine has the largest collection of Calabrian wine in the United States!”. That has a nice ring to it. Most adults, at least I tell myself, probably know what I mean when I say it’s like trench warfare in World War I. You fight and fight for a tiny gain in one aspect of your life only to be set back in another one. This must be how Sisyphus felt. Oh lord, I am entering my Camus phase. From Marcus Aurelius to Albert Camus in one missive means that the brain is indeed going haywire. The wine played its own role in this, but I would not place the blame on the wine itself. Wine only enhances what is already going on in the brain already. If I am already feeling scrambled, then this big ol’ Gaglioppo is only going to scramble these eggs further. Add a little crème fraîche please for the consideration of the gentleman! I need something to mellow this all out. Maybe two months in Tuscany will do the trick. He has retired to the hills! All jokes aside, there’s not much admirable in running away from these things. Marcus Aurelius did make an incredible point that your problems are your problems and they will follow you wherever you make your home. Oh, I’m going to move to this city and all of my problems are going to be fixed because of X, Y, or Z. Yeah… probably not likely. So full circle moment here: THIS IS WHERE I TAKE MY STAND AGAINST SCYLLA. I may have lost some men, my ship may have been battered, but I stand tall. I have fallen short, I have made my mistakes, but I make my stand here. The Gaglioppo has fortified my soul, given me courage, and I shall use that to propel my sails forward. To home. Home would be where I feel tranquil, relaxed, and balanced in my life. Happy with myself and the choices that I am making, or have made. Christopher Nolan should have cast me for the Odyssey movie instead of Matt Damon. This is character acting here at its finest folks!

This is the sort of internal dialogue you can have with yourself if you pick up a wine from Vigneti Vumbaca. A family in Calabria that is doing all the right things on a very small scale. We are talking about roughly five hectares here folks. And if the thought of spiraling like I have scares you, just try the darn wine and make up your mind for yourself. I personally enjoyed this as it felt cathartic for me to put all this jumbled mess on paper, so to speak. The brain was overflowing with thoughts, and the wine brought out the best in me. That’s a dangerous combination there. But dangerous in the best way possible, like your own 007. There you go, I’ll end it on that: drink this wine and become your own James Bond. Or John Wick. Or a Camorra member. That’s going back to the book mentioned above. I wish I had been able to perfectly match up the book with the wine, and in that case I’d be reading about the ‘Ndrangheta. But a man can dream, and he will continue to do so. Go out there folks, begin your own Odyssey, and buy that bottle of Calabrian wine. You won’t regret it.