Issue link: http://digital.copcomm.com/i/1013885
august 2018 / the tasting panel / 107 COMBATING HUNGER AT THE SHEP GORDON ULTIMATE WINE DINNER Somehow the most extraordinary food-and-wine-tasting event in the United States managed to seem all the more spectacular thanks to the attendance of a handful of celebrity chefs and winemakers. Together, they rallied to create an unparalled five-course dinner in honor of Shep Gordon, an incredibly successful talent manager who established Alive Culinary Resources. The first talent agency to represent chefs, its legacy made Gordon essentially responsible for creating the concept of the "celebrity chef" in the first place. The night's proceeds were donated to the Maui Food Bank, a vital orga- nization which, according to its website, serves roughly 10,000 people per month. "I've been here 43 years," said Gordon. "A lot of us have worked hard to feed people and we're losing the war. As we sit here enjoying our dinner, I think we should think about our brothers and sisters who can't afford a meal, much less a home, but we can change that. If we can pay $1,000 for a meal, we can use our expertise to help fight that problem." MON TALCINO, I TALY Lars Leicht serves as the Trade Development Director for savvy importer/producer Banfi Vintners, where he's worked for more than 32 years. Leicht is the man behind the Cru Artisan portfolio, a collection of Banfi's luxury wines, in addition to the creator of the Cru Artisan College, a successful educational trade tasting now in its fifth year. He's also quite literally the voice of the company, translating for its Italian winemakers and deciphering complicated texts on clonal research. Sixty years after Giovanni F. Mariani, Sr. established Banfi Vintners in 1919, Mariani's sons, Harry and John, founded Castello Banfi in Montalcino. Banfi has been a steward of the area ever since, conducting extensive clonal work with Sangiovese, maintaining a comprehensive custom cooperage program, and developing progressive winemaking techniques and technology like its patented wood-and-steel fermenters. The complex soils of the Brunello di Montalcino DOCG are known to produce Tuscany's boldest expression of Sangiovese. While the soil varies widely, clay and sand can generally be found in the lower areas, with poor gravely soils covering the higher hillsides. Fossilized marine deposits, meanwhile, are scattered throughout the 9-mile-wide area. "When I lived in Montalcino and I wanted to grow tomatoes, I had to bring in dirt. Nothing else would grow there except for olives and wheat!" Leicht said with a smirk. "Sangiovese grows anywhere, but it needs those poor soils to make great wine, and that's why you can't make great Sangiovese anywhere else in the world—although you can try!" Leicht then presented the dark, bold, and ageworthy Castello Banfi 2013 Brunello di Montalcino and the Castello Banfi 2013 Poggio alle Mura Brunello di Montalcino: both a result of the calcareous soils of Banfi's Poggio alle Mura estate vineyards, which surround a medieval castle. "These wines demonstrate how Castello Banfi earned the moniker 'Builders of Brunello,'" Leicht said. "They speak of both innovation and tradi- tion, they define our pursuit of excellence, and above all, they express a very special sense of place." ing them down, even flying to Kauai to pick up one of the bottles. When asked why he selected these two bot- tlings, Okubo responded that they provided "an opportunity to isolate the terroir by using the same grower and producer from the same hill and same vintage," while the different varieties (Pinot Noir for the Corton and Chardonnay for the Corton-Charlemagne) highlight the differences in the terroir. "The Chardonnay is grown on the higher part of the hill, which has more of the exposed limestone, and the Pinot Noir was grown on the lower slope, which, due to erosion thousands of years ago, has more clay in the vineyards," Okubo contin- ued. "The result was a rich stony Chardonnay with vanilla spice and tartness on the finish versus a dense red cherry, pomegranate, and mushroom-y Pinot Noir—two completely different wines in the glass determined by a stone's throw in the vineyard." Lars Leicht, Trade Development Director for Banfi Vintners. Too many celebrity chefs in the kitchen! From left to right: Master Sommelier Michael Jordan, Mark Tarbell, Nancy Silverton, Shep Gordon, Cat Cora, Hubert Keller, Nancy Oakes, and Michael Fox created their own stunning courses to pair with an incredible selection of rare wines.