The Slow Wine Guide of Italian wines in English has arrived in the US. Last week saw CPR staff embracing the Slow Food movement by hosting press, trade, interested consumers and 70 Italian wine producers at tasting events in New York and Chicago.

The Slow Wine Guide adopts a new approach to wine criticism and looks at a variety of factors to evaluate wineries in their entirety, taking into consideration the wine quality, typicity and adherence to terroir, value for money, environmental sensitivity and ecologically sustainable viticultural practices.

The innovative guide uses three symbols to evaluate each winery:

• The Snail, the Slow Food symbol, signals a cellar that has distinguished itself through its interpretation of sensorial, territorial, environmental and personal values in harmony with the Slow Food philosophy
• The Bottle, allocated to cellars that show a consistently high quality throughout their range of wines
• The Coin, an indicator of great value

The level of interest and positive feedback from attendees has been terrific. Our clients at Slow Food headquarters in Bra, Italy are equally enthusiastic about their US audiences:

“We are delighted. It was our first experience in the USA and we were pleased to meet with a very attentive, interested audience,” said Giancarlo Gariglio, one of the Chief Editors of the Slow Wine guide. “Both the trade and consumer audiences were engaged.” Fabio Giavedoni, the guide’s other Chief Editor, added “There is an attention here that is difficult to find in Italy, something that even our Italian producers noted. The quality of the questions and comments was excellent.”

The Slow Wine guide is published in the USA by Chelsea Green and is available on amazon.com.

Representatives from the European meat industry are continuing to promote their international campaign: “Tradition, quality and European taste.” The goal of the campaign is simple—to expand consumers’ knowledge about the qualities of European meat and to announce their entrance into the US market. The campaign is mainly addressed to distributors, wholesalers, importers, local manufacturers, meat processers and industry associations. Throughout the duration of the project, widespread information and promotional campaigns will be conducted which will introduce the properties of European beef, pork and products on their base.

Europe is a well-known traditional producer of excellent beef and pork. Strict rules regulate every stage of production, processing and distribution, while experienced breeders care about getting a unique flavor and juiciness. European producers exports more than 40 million tons of pork and approximately 120,000 tonnes of beef to the United States.

“America has a wonderful and diverse culinary tradition. What binds Europe and USA is a multitude of meat dishes and ways of preparing,” says Wieslaw Rozanski, President of the Union of Producers and Employers of Meat Industry (UPEMI), the organization implementing the project. “America is the fifth consumer market of meat in the world. European producers appreciate those facts and are aiming to satisfy the most demanding needs of American consumers.”

For additional information about the campaign, and/or to learn more about the European production standards, log on to www.europeanmeat.eu.

Next stop will be the Summer Fancy Food Show inWashington,DCon June 17-19. We look forward to see you at the UPEMI booth!

http://avvinare.com/2012/01/07/spirited-saturday-partida-tequila-neat/

Happy 2012!

My favorite in the ‘outlandish’ category is probably A Small World’s ‘Favourite Experiential Gifts’ guide, which highlights such generous goodies as a Zero Gravity Flight on the Boeing 727-400 G Force One starting at $3,675 and the Momentum Adventure: trekking through mountain passes in Mongolia, crossing the deserts of Jordan, or canoeing through the Yukon… these are for the faint neither of heart nor of wallet.

And so it’s a period of plenty… of receipts, daily distractions, calories and inspiration. From everyone at Colangelo & Partners, we wish for you all that it is also a period of plenty of warm moments with family and friends and of good food and drink, and the beginning of a joyful, prosperous New Year.

We liked this article that gives a bit more of a historical perspective on this important date, Cheers to America’s Alcohol System.

To celebrate the arrival of this dynamic and distinctive new guide to US shores, Colangelo & Partners will host a series of events in late January and early February in NYC and Chicago for trade, press and consumers.

Registration for an industry event in NYC is now open. An afternoon press briefing and walk-around tasting for press and trade will take place Monday, January 30 at the Metropolitan Pavilion in Manhattan. Registration is available at http://slowwinenyctrade.eventbrite.com/

For information about the industry event in Chicago and events for consumers in NYC and Chicago, watch this space.

About Slow Food International
Slow Food is an international organization founded in Bra, Italy in 1986 and dedicated to respecting the pleasures connected to food, learning to appreciate a diversity of foods and tastes, recognizing place of origin, respecting the rhythms of the seasons, and enjoying food together.

In the last few months, we have seen quite a trend emerging in the Colangelo office. Our once happy and sybaritic existence of indulging in artisan cheeses and meats from Italy washed down with premium tequilas and royal wines has been replaced by 6 day antioxidant regimes and gluten free, guilt free indulging. Are we bucking a trend that seems to be taking over the food industry and turning CPR into an altogether holistic agency?

Just last week, pizza was classified as a vegetable and will take it’s place in school cafeterias alongside the much maligned spinach. Enter one of our newest clients, BOLD Organics gluten free, frozen pizza. Feeling a little sluggish after the holidays? I’ve got just the thing for you, take the Six-Pack Challenge courtesy of our free radical fighting client, Reboot.

And while we are treating our bodies as temples we are definitely not forgetting about the physical temples we reside in. Bio-Green Crystals, our non-toxic, all natural eco-friendly household cleaners has us cleaning house and feeling nearly 1oo% puritanical.

All we need now is a client to cleanse and purify our minds and make us completely wholesome. I wonder if Deepak Chopra needs some PR?

“Pig: A Restaurant” will show again on November 17th at the Upright Citizens Brigade Theatre on West 26th St near 8th Ave.

http://newyork.ucbtheatre.com/shows/view/2850

The “invitation”…
You’re invited to the opening party for Pig: A Restaurant, East Gowanus’ hottest new eatery. Join luminaries like model/actress/hostess Aurora, supplier Ian (of Crown Heights’ preeminent household farm), and Top Chef quarter finalist Annie as they usher in the most pork-obsessed restaurant in Brooklyn.

Tasting Table New York City: The Best Cocktails of 2011 and Where To Drink Them

The 2011 US tour also included a day of seminars and tastings on Monday, October 17 at the Italian Embassy in Washington, DC. This is the 14th international tour of Vinitaly. The 2011 tour includes Russia, the United States, China and Korea with representatives making a stop in Japan as well. Vinitaly in the World is dedicated to opening up the exciting world of new Italian wines, new vintages and other developments to US wine press and trade including importers, distributors, retailers, restaurateurs and sommeliers and conversely to educating Italian wine producers about the US market.

This year’s tour featured more specialized seminars, including one entitled “How has social media added to the conversation about wines? Is there a place for standardization and what makes someone an authority?” Another seminar spoke to the difference that communications technologies have made in the wine business and how online sales are affecting the wine trade. Additionally, for the first time ever, the Worldwide Sommelier Association offered a master class was for sommeliers, featuring Italian indigenous varieties.