I Love Italian Regional Cooking - Pairing Umbria Cuisine With White Wine
Great Umbrian food, fine Umbrian or other white wine...Umbria lies smack dab in the middle of Italy. The countryside is unspoiled and dotted with medieval churches. You’ll love visiting this relatively isolated region of central Italy, and you’ll love its food. Its fairly gentle terrain is composed of hills, valleys, and small mountains. Umbria is the only region of Italy with neither a seacoast nor a foreign border. But it has lakes, rivers, and even a waterfall. It’s home to great food and passable or better wine.
Classic Umbria kitchen for making classic Umbrian specialties.
Let’s start with soup. Minestra alla Perugina (Soup Perugina Style) is named for the region’s main city, one known to generations of foreigners who want to learn Italian in Italy. It’s a fairly simple beef soup that can be enjoyed with Soave Superiore DOCG from Veneto.
You may want to start with a Tegamaccio (Fish Stew Lake Trasimeno Style). This hearty dish is a meal in itself. What fish does it contain? Answers include eel, pike, tench, cod, shrimp, and perch. Accompany it by a Verdicchio di Castelli di Jesi DOC or its cousin, a Verdicchio di Matelica DOC, both from the neighboring Marches region.
There is nothing quite like the local truffles. Try the black ones in Frittata ai Tartufi (Truffle Omelet) paired with Lombardy’s Franciacorta DOCG, a bubbly wine made in Champagne style with a Champagne-style price tag. You could replace this wine with a bubbly Prosecco DOC from Veneto but that would be like replacing the truffles with mushrooms. You could save even more money and calories by going to an Egg-Beaters omelet accompanied by a diet drink.
Pollo in Porchetta, simply delicious.
Pollo in Porchetta (Chicken in Porchetta) is stuffed with cured ham, a single chicken liver, wild fennel seed, and other good things. This is an excellent way to finish that bottle of Soave Superiore.
If you got your hands on some truffles and you don’t feel like an omelet or up to buying an expensive wine, make a truffle risotto and pair this delicious, slightly decadent dish with an Italian Pinot Grigio.
You should try Trote al Prezzemole (Trout with Parsley). It’s simple and simply delicious. Pair it with a rosé Bardolino Chiaretto DOC from Veneto. If you’re insisting on having a white wine, try an Italian Chardonnay, Gewurtztraminer, or Sauvignon Blanc.
About the Author
Levi Reiss has authored or co-authored ten books on computers and the Internet, but to be honest, he would rather just drink fine Italian, French, or other wine, accompanied by the right foods and spend time with his wife and family. He teaches classes in computers at an Ontario French-language community college. Check out his global wine website at www.theworldwidewine.com with his weekly column reviewing $10 wines and his new sections writing about (theory) and tasting (practice) organic and kosher wines. Check out his Italian wine website at www.theitalianwineconnection.com.
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