Bold Women Make the Best Wine (Naturally).

Marilee Bramhall is the founder of Iola Wines where she sources and direct imports organic wines from top women winemakers in France and Italy. 

Listen in to hear:

• What led her to specialize in such a specific niche of the wine market
• The % of women winemakers versus the % of wines being purchased by women
• Her observations about how different genders approach wine differently
• 2 unique and surprising Italian wines both made by sisters (Cue “Sisters, Sisters….” from White Christmas)

Use the code NIKKI20 for $20 Flat rate shipping at Iola Wines.

You can purchase the Oro Di Baal Sparking Fiano.

Grab the beautiful Cascina Vengore Arneis from Northern Italy.

Be sure to sign up for Iola Wines newsletter and take advantage of your Free 10 minute Master Class “Discover Your Perfect Bottle

Try a delicious and highly limited wine from a California woman winemaker! Nikk’s 2021 Sollevato Sangiovese is available to be shipped to most US States. Use the code PODLISTENER for 10% off

You NEED some delicious California Olive Oil from our awesome sponsor American Olive Farmer. Use code SipWithNikki for $10 off your order!

If you'd like to Support the Podcast, you can buy me a glass of wine and get a shoutout on a future episode.

Please leave a RATING or a REVIEW (on your podcast listening platform), or thumbs up and subscribe (on YouTube!)

Questions? Comments? Guest requests? nikki@sipwithnikki.com

That's what I see in the research that I do.

And champagne, I think is actually closer to 85%.

Some say 86 percent of purchases of champagne are made by women.

Why aren't dudes buying champagne?

What's

going on dudes?

They're making a lot of it.

There's a lot of dudes making champagne.

Well, hello and welcome to Sip with Nikki.

I'm your host, Nikki Lamberti, coming at you from Sonoma County, California.

Hey, if you haven't grabbed your perfect Thanksgiving wine yet, my 2021 Solovato Sangiovese needs to be on your table.

Yes, I'm biased, but I'm allowed to be.

I made it.

And for our listeners, if you use the discount code PODLISTENER, I will give you 10 percent off your wine purchase at solovatowines.

com.

Link in the show notes, and I can ship to most states across the U.

S.

This week, I am talking to a new friend, Marilee Bramhall.

She is a Washington native currently based in Seattle.

And like me, Marilee is a wine educator.

She got into wine at a very young age and is now the founder of Iola Wines, which sources and directly imports organic wines from top women winemakers.

in France, in Italy.

She has an online shop and wine clubs at Iola Wines, and today we get into what led her to that very specific niche of organic women made French and Italian wines only, and we talk about the imbalance of the percentage

of women winemakers on this globe, of which I am proud to be one, versus The percentage of women that are making all of the wine purchases on the planet.

It's a very interesting juxtaposition.

We taste two beautiful wines, and yes, spoiler alert, I chose Italian.

No disrespect to my French winemakers, we love you, but had to go deep in the Italian wines today, especially some Italian whites.

And what's so cool is that Every wine that Merrily sources, she has spent time on the property, meeting the families, in the vines, in the winery.

So she's going to share some stories of the wines that we're tasting today.

And finally, she's going to share her thoughts on making wine more accessible and more inclusive and less intimidating to everyone.

And if you are a regular listener, you know that that is what I am all about here with this podcast.

So she and I really had a lot in common, and I'm so excited for you to learn from Marilee Bromhall.

Here we go.

I'm so excited to meet you.

I'm so excited to have you here, Marilee.

Thank you for being here.

And I know that you are quite the jet setter, so I can't believe that the stars aligned and we're here today.

Thank you so much.

Transcribed

You know what?

First of all, Nikki, thank you for inviting me.

It is such a pleasure to meet you.

I love listening to you.

I absolutely love what you're doing.

It's inspiring to me.

So thank you for having me.

I'm glad that it worked out for us to be

together.

When I learned about you and what you were doing and started to dive deep in your websites and your social media, I was like, Like this is someone that I need to be talking with.

This is someone I need to be friends with your tagline alone.

Bold women make the best wines naturally.

So let's start there.

Tell me where that came from and how that came to be the essence of who you are and what you're doing.

Oh, wow.

I guess I would say that it's kind of an amalgamation of all of these incredible women, winemakers that I've met really since I started importing wine in 2017, and that I continue to meet on this journey.

And now you're, you're another one of them.

I mean, you're a bold woman making amazing wine.

So.

Yeah.

So, I mean, I, I guess that's the best way to put it is that it was a way to encapsulate what these women are doing.

And because Iola Wines is a hundred percent focused on wines made by women, and they're all women that are farming their grapes in a conscientious way.

Way, whether that's certified organic or biodynamic or maybe they don't have the wherewithal to actually go out and get those certifications But they're following those methods and

for a lot of them, you know it's really just kind of going back to the past to a more traditional way of Farming and a more traditional way of making wine without additives Yeah,

these women and these wineries are to have you as an ambassador for them.

Can you tell me a little bit about?

Your wine journey in California and Washington.

We both call ourselves wine educators.

So how did that come to be?

Yeah.

So, so before Iola, I mean, wine's been in my life forever.

And, and Iola actually was my grandmother.

I named the company after her.

So family is a big part of my wine journey.

The start for me was maybe more like what you would expect for an Italian or a.

Or a French kid, not necessarily an American kid.

For me, it was being blessed to grow up with a dad who is a Cabernet Sauvignon man.

So one day, don't know why this happened, but I was about 10 or 11 years old and he, he grilled some gorgeous T bone steaks.

And I come from a farming family.

So, you know, our meat was always.

You know, from the farmer on the other hill, his cows were walking around.

Well, I grew up most of the time.

I actually went to school on the West side of Washington state in the Seattle area, but my family farm where a fourth generation family farm is in Southeast Washington, outside Walla Walla.

I have tons of family still in that area and we're still.

Growing wheat and barley over there.

So my dad grilled these steaks and he was pouring up some left bank Bordeaux.

And for some reason he decided I could have the tiniest taste, like 10 or 11.

And he didn't put any water in it or anything.

He just gave me this tiny taste.

And I still like, if I close my eyes, I can still see my plate in front of me.

And the glass next to it.

And, you know, it was just so exciting to get that I was going to get to taste this.

And, you know, of course I, I didn't have a palate for wine at that point, you know, I was more accustomed to orange juice or Capri Sun, you know, Capri Sun

exactly, you know, maybe every once in a while, but, but it's, for me, it was about what it meant and, you know, what it meant was that it was special.

And that it went with food and it went with togetherness and, and family.

And I knew it was from someplace far away that I really wanted to go.

And I mean, I was a kid that, you know, with lay in the grass, staring up at the sky, seeing airplanes and just dreaming about.

Being on a plane and wonder, I wonder where those people are going and what is the, the adventure they're going to go have.

So, so that was the start and fast forward along and I, you know, people ask me when they heard that story, Oh, well, it was just a regular thing.

Like, did you get to taste wine?

And I, nope.

That was it was a one and done.

It never happened again.

Yeah, so for me I I did eventually go to France for the first time when I was 18 and Completely fell in love with the country the culture, of course and

a big part of that culture is wine so When I went back and was living there during my university time, that was the first time I actually studied wine.

It was really informal and it wasn't about wine.

It was about an assignment I had to do for school.

And, and I just happened to decide to do it about wine.

So I ended up just doing a kind of a cursory.

Overview about the Beaujolais.

I met a woman Caviste in Grenoble where I was going to school and bought a few bottles.

And so I had some bottles lined up in my, in my room a long time ago when I was living there for a while.

And then when I came back, that's when I started working in the business here.

And that was just under a decade for a large company based in Washington that also had holdings in Northern California, which I mean, my dream was to be in Northern California.

Okay.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Never.

Okay.

It could still happen.

I have the spare room.

I mean, we're here.

We're here.

Be careful.

I might get on a plane.

beautiful place as well, right?

We're not that far apart from each other, from Seattle to Santa Rosa.

So was French wine really the introduction for you between the sip that dad gave you and then spending some time there?

French wine was your entry into wine.

It was, yeah, and then working in the business here in domestic wine and American wine, I, I got to taste so many great wines and I had the good fortune to meet and talk with winemakers regularly in the work that I did and, you know, I just, I didn't see a lot of women.

I mean, we didn't have any women.

We ended up, by the time I left, that was when we had our first woman head winemaker.

And, you know, Were you

working for a importer, a distributor, a particular winery?

What, what was your, Um,

yeah, for a large producer with multiple brands.

And you were not seeing women in the winemaking or ownership.

No.

Capacity.

Seeing them going for the positions, but not getting them women inside the business, going for the positions and the positions, you know, generally they would go to a man hired from outside the company rather than a woman.

And what

timeframe was this?

Are we talking 20 years ago, more?

Early

2000s, basically 20 years ago.

Yeah.

And you noticed that that was a big seed planted for the work that you do now?

I think it was.

And the funny thing is, you know, at that point it did not occur to me to question it.

It was more something I experienced on a personal level because I knew these women that wanted the jobs and I knew how hard they were trying and I was rooting for them and, you know, I believed in them.

I knew they could do great work.

And so it was more, it was personal in that way because it was just.

The connection I had with these women that were trying for these positions.

So yeah, that was definitely a seed planted and it took a long time to germinate, but then when it did, couldn't stop thinking about it.

Yeah.

Couldn't stop thinking about it.

I know a little bit about long

term germination, germinating of seeds.

I have, and some of them are still in there, but a lot of why I am where I am and what I'm doing and making wine in the podcast, even where, you know, Just being dripped and dripped and dripped on for a long time.

And sometimes those are the most powerful ones that take the slowest amount of.

Yeah, they are.

You know, I think they take root and then it just is about being able to listen into, to what's going on and taking those moments of quiet to listen.

That's not really something I'm great at.

So, um.

I'm probably slow.

I'm a late bloomer.

So we're talking about

seeds, just seeds.

So, okay.

So French wine was the entry, but then of course there's a huge passion for Italian wine.

You are not only a French wine ambassador, but an Italian wine ambassador.

You and I have both been guests with Cynthia on the Italian wine podcast.

I just did my interview with her a couple of weeks ago.

Our episode is not out yet, but we have that in common.

I clearly love Italian wine.

The two wines that I picked from your wonderful lineup are Italian that we're going to talk about, but how did that enter in?

And then why did you decide to focus on those two France and Italy specifically?

Yeah, so what happened for me was 2008, there was the point where I, I got really curious and I, I got to the point where I felt like, you know, I just, I need the origin story.

I got to go to the source here.

So I stopped drinking American wine and stopped buying American wine.

And I really, I know, I know, I know, especially like, you know, West coast, Washington, California, we Oregon, we had amazing wine here.

But.

I felt like, okay, there's amazing, let's just say Napa cab, amazing Napa cab available, but where was Cabernet Sauvignon actually born?

Where did it first show up on the planet?

So that turned into focusing my purchasing and my exploration was focused on France, Italy, and Spain.

France and Italy were the ones that really captivated me and they held on.

They did not let go.

I'm, I'm very interested in Spanish wine too, but logistically I can't.

Take that on just yet.

And then that turned into, you know, getting like acknowledging my inner wine geek and deciding to

have one of those too.

Oh my goodness.

Yeah.

Yes.

That's why we're sitting here on a Saturday doing this.

Right.

Yeah, absolutely.

Yeah.

So That became studying in more of what I call a scholarly way and then getting to the point in 2017 of deciding, you know what, this is a moment for women and what I know and what I'm passionate about is wine.

So this is, you know, from my little corner of the world, this is what I'm going to try to do to.

Make a little bit of a difference somewhere, it's just to highlight and spotlight what women are doing in the world of wine.

It's amazing.

Thank you for the work that you do.

I think I read this on your website, keep me honest.

Is it still only about 15 percent of women producing wine globally?

The,

the most recent stat I've read is about 18.

We're moving it.

Maybe

I'm, I'm one of those ones that took it from 15 to 18 in the last couple of years.

I'll take it.

Go Nikki.

Yep.

We need you.

We need you doing this.

But here's what's always so interesting to me.

The percentage of the pie of women who are producing or, or even in an ownership capacity, we can kind of lump those together, but women making wine purchases, that number is really high.

Okay.

Like.

80 percent or so, is that a fair number that you

see?

That's what I see in the research that I do.

And champagne, I think, is actually closer to, it's 85%.

Some say 86 percent of purchases of champagne are made by women.

Why aren't dudes buying champagne?

What's

going on dudes?

They're making a lot of it.

There's a lot of dudes making champagne, but

that's,

yeah, interesting.

Okay.

So this

leads me to my question, which is, how do you think?

And we're not going to talk about gender, men, women, men, women this whole time, right?

But this is very interesting to me.

How do you think that men and women approach wine differently?

We could talk a lot about this because there's so many ways we could approach it and come in.

But I'll just say one of the things that I noticed is when I am doing Private masterclasses, which is, you know, basically for private customers who do these private masterclasses.

And what I notice is that when I do a class that is co ed, around the table, tasting together, men talk louder.

If they are not sure about what they're talking about, it seems like what they have found, and this is probably part of their socialization, is just to use more volume and it conveys authority.

Women tend to, in, in these co ed settings, they hold back, they back off, they're quieter.

And then in the, the situations where it's only a group of women, it's amazing.

It's so collaborative and community oriented and, and they're sharing with each other and saying, Oh yeah, yeah.

Hey, I think I do smell that or, or no, I'm not getting that.

You know, it's just much fun to see women be a part.

of what wine is about and feel like they belong at the center of it just as much as men do.

The other thing we often talk about in research is men are more wired to buy like what we call vanity bottles.

They want a bottle that they can show off to their friends that says something about, you know, and I'm generalizing.

These are gross generalizations.

Of course we are.

Keep listening dudes.

We love you.

Yeah, we do.

We love you.

You're, I mean, but we're buying more wine than you.

I mean, let's Let's just face it.

Yeah.

Exactly.

Yeah.

Yeah.

So there, I mean, they're focused more on a vanity bottle and women are more focused on something that they're going to share.

And you know, a lot of times it's about what they're cooking and who's coming

over

or it could be a gift, you know, and they're thinking more about it from, from that perspective.

Like I said, those are big generalizations, but that's what I've run across.

So 2017 is when Iola Wines launches.

Technically, Iola didn't start till the pandemic.

And what does your day to day look like?

And can you share, especially as you were getting started and establishing these relationships, what did that actually look like to get it off the ground?

Yeah.

Well, of course, you know, there's all the boring stuff that involves licensing and, you know, Where you're going to have your storage facility and, you know, that stuff's kind of a yawner, but it's really, really important and necessary.

And there's things at the state level and there's things at the federal level.

So that was a big learning curve.

Just, you know, even finding people that I could ask questions of.

That was, it took some time.

Yeah.

Thankfully, I am stubborn and I wouldn't give up.

Mm-Hmm.

, because I, you know, really believe in this project.

I think

we have that in common.

And then are you, are you also driven by the mantra of just figure it out, like everything's figureoutable?

Exactly.

I'll ask and I'll Google exactly.

And I'll maybe make it up, but I'll figure it out.

There's an answer somewhere.

Yeah.

Because I found that even with.

Starting my own custom crush, tiny boutique label.

Like, yes, I've studied at UC Davis.

I've taken classes.

There's instructions in that, but in the logistical licensing, how do I do this?

Where do I store it?

There was no guidebook.

There's no manual.

In fact, I identified that.

And one day I'm like, I'm going to create that.

That's a great niche that actually needs like a how to, I don't have time for that.

Right.

That's a great idea.

But yeah, it was kind of like just flowing.

Fumbling.

Put it on the list on the list.

It was just fumbling through.

So we've, I think we have that in common, just that grit to figure it out and that stubbornness.

I

love that word grit.

And I think that is so much a part of women who are.

In the wine businesses, you know, certainly women, of course, that are selling wine, but what I think about women like you that are making wine, you've got to have some grit to persevere and to put one foot in front of the other every single day.

I mean, I tell people that, you know, when I'm having a rough day and, you know, things aren't going well, I pause and think about the women winemakers in Italy and France that I'm working with and then I think, okay, I'm sure their day is much more difficult than mine.

I can, you know, I can take a breath and get through this and, and I'm in this, you know, most of my, my customers are women and so I'm in this for them, you know, giving them the chance to drink wines.

Made by women that the grapes are cultivated in a thoughtful way and the wine is made in a thoughtful way.

And so, yeah, I mean, it's a mission for the two.

I just think of myself as a link between the two of them.

Another sort of phrase, subtitle that it came across, I think on your website is just increasing access to women winemakers.

So you just made me think of that.

It is your work to find these producers, to meet them, to taste their wine, and then to bring it all together in the super Easy user friendly site of Aola Wines where people can either join a club or do a single purchase or have a master class or have a tasting with you.

So you're just streamlining it and saying, okay, wine drinker, here you go.

I've vetted these for you.

Is that a fair purchase?

Statement.

Completely.

Yeah.

Boy, I might have

to, can I,

can I rip that off?

Cause

that was really good.

I think I ripped it off you.

So we're collaborating.

That's what we're doing.

We're just, we're just collaborating.

I think that's actually a perfect segue to maybe taste our first wine and do our first Sip Spotlight.

My guess is you want to do bubbles first.

Let's do the bubbles.

So I opened my white, but I specifically waited to open my bubbles because I wanted to capture.

The pop on the mic because there's no better Sound than that and while I'm getting this cage off.

Why don't you think Americans drink more?

Champagne sparkling.

Why do you think it's still for people that don't know we're in the know you and me

Okay,

why do think yeah wait for holidays and celebrations and anniversaries?

Yeah.

So, you know, this is, this is a great conversation to have because I think this happens because we've been basically taught as consumers that that's the purpose of sparkling wine is that it's for celebrating

at New Year's Eve or a holiday, or, you know, maybe, of course, you know, weddings, graduations, things like that, like there has to be a moment for it.

We've really been.

Taught as consumers to treat it that way.

And also to think about, you know, I think just if we're talking specifically about champagne, we haven't really been taught to think about champagne as a product.

Wine of terroir and it so is, and you know, this is one of the, the drums I beat is thinking about, you know, noticing and appreciating sparkling wine as being, these are wines of place.

I mean, this one that we're going to taste here in a minute is beautiful wine that represents it, the place where it's grown and lives.

Oh, there it is.

Yay.

Yeah.

I mean, it's comes from above the Amalfi coast in the Salernian hills of Campania, Italy.

And, and I mean, you taste that when you, when you taste this wine.

So I

have to tell you, when you gave me some options to choose for our recording today, and I was looking at them, this caught my eye for multiple reasons, but the Campania region is where my dad's side of the family is from.

So just outside of Sorrento, a little town called Grignano is where my great grandparents are from.

We were just there.

I was there in June and July of this year on an amazing trip.

We had an apartment in Sorrento.

I drank a lot of the village Grignano wine there, which is like a semi sweet sweet.

Semi frizzante red, but we did not have a lot of sparkling.

So when I saw this, I'm like, Oh, this is the wine of my people.

Maybe my distinct cousins, the sisters that we're going to talk about are making this wine, but the correct pronunciation.

So Oro de Bal.

Oro, Oro de Bal, B A A L.

And it's Casa de Bal is the winery.

I'm going to stop talking and sip this while you tell us all about this.

Okay.

Okay.

Well, we'll start with the fact that we were talking about where it's from, which is right near where your family is from, Nikki.

So in the Salernian Hills, one of the grapes that's native to this part of Italy is Fiano.

I'm a huge, I mean, this is one of the things I love about Italian wine is all of the native grapes that are, have been growing there for so long.

And so many native Italian grapes.

And so many.

I'm trying to learn them and I'm like scratching the surface.

Yeah, exactly.

Yeah.

So Fiano is one that's native to Campania and has been cultivated there for quite a long time.

And it's pretty unusual to find a sparkling Fiano.

There isn't a lot of it made.

So the sisters at Casa de Ball.

Do you want this, the backstory of the,

of the winery?

Because I want our listeners to get these wines.

So I want them to hear the backstory from you.

Cause you've been there and spent time with them, right?

I

do.

Yeah.

So if you're drinking a wine from Iola Wines, you can count on the fact that I've been there.

I've been in the vines.

I've been in the cellar.

I've spent time with the women.

I've relationships with these women.

And I, I love to say to people, you know, it might be just a bottle to you, but to me, there's a woman behind that bottle who, and you know how hard they're working because you're doing it too.

So Casa de Bal was started actually fairly recently, but they've been cultivating grapes for quite a while and just saving some for the family and then selling to the cooperative.

And it was started by Laura and Francesca's father.

Who's name is Anabalo and he is named after the great general Hannibal.

We call in English Hannibal, but Anabalo.

So that is why it's called Casa de Bal, which is an abbreviation of his name.

And this wine is called Oro de Bal because it's the gold and it is, these are golden, beautiful bubbles.

So, um, the, Silhouette on the

label.

A little gold elephant with bubbles.

A little gold elephant.

Elephants, ellies, as I call them, are my favorite.

My ring that I'm wearing right now is elephants.

Because in addition to my time in Italy, one of my favorite places on the planet to spend time, I've been to South Africa, Botswana, and Uganda multiple times.

And ellies, are my favorite.

I have had them surround my tent and been a part of the herd.

And that's like another story for another day.

But again, I just,

this is crazy,

Nikki,

because me too.

I've been to, yes, I've been to Botswana, to Zimbabwe, to Namibia, to Uganda, to Kenya multiple times.

Oh my gosh.

We have so

much to talk about.

All right.

This is going to be a three hour episode.

Do you, do you know why the elephant is on the label?

Is there a, I wish I could answer that question.

Can I ask my cousins, Laura and Francesca Salerno next time I'm there and I meet them.

Exactly.

And I've made them

my honorary cousins.

Oh my goodness.

And you know what will happen?

They'll reciprocate.

That's the kind of people they are.

Yeah.

I mean, when you go visit, it's just an amazing experience.

This is a family of five kids.

And only one of them doesn't live on the farm.

So Annabella and his wife, Anna, are basically, they're the head of the family.

And then four of their children, all they're all married.

They all have children of their own.

They all live together.

So there's a few different houses and the way they describe it is they've just figured out who, you know, lives well together.

So, you know, there's multiple families in one house.

So, and like I said, they all have children.

So there's, there's 10 cousins that are all growing up together and they love to be out in the vines.

Anna, Laura and Francesca's mother.

Absolutely loves being in the vine.

She's up at six in the morning.

She's out working.

And, um, then, you know, comes in at maybe a 10 and starts cooking.

And they basically grow pretty much everything they eat.

There are a few things they buy.

They buy coffee and sugar, and then they barter for things like cheese, but they, they also cultivate.

Olive trees for olive oil.

Of course they do.

This is some of the most incredible olive oil.

That's the bigger part of their business actually.

The wine side of the business is quite small.

It's only about 5 hectares.

And this wine in particular is fascinating because it's very small production and everything is done by hand.

So we're talking about hand riddling and hand disgorgement.

Which is very, very unusual.

I mean, for example, if you're buying champagne, all of that is done by machines and champagnes because they're making champagne in quantity.

Whereas this we're talking about a couple of thousand bottles a year maximum.

So, Oh my gosh, it makes me love it even more.

They're in the process of biodynamic certification right now.

The farm, there's so much biodiversity.

I mean, fig trees, lemon trees, of course, all the olive trees.

They have an enormous amount.

garden where they grow tons and tons of tomatoes, and then they prepare and can tomatoes and tomato sauce so that they have it year round.

They raise a few cows and pigs every year for meat.

I'm going to go stay there

with them.

Yeah.

Yeah.

They are incredible people.

Incredible people.

I would love an

introduction because it sounds amazing and I would just love to experience that whether it was for a week or in an indefinite amount of time.

I mean, you belong there.

I feel it in my heart just as you talk about it.

And one of the things that I love about your website, you know, in addition to obviously all the work you've done to curate this collection and make it accessible is your descriptions and your food pairings.

Cause I being the Italian that I am, it's all about the food and wine and the pairings together.

So first of all, your description on your website of this wine is a citrusy Fiano.

Don's a frothy, velvety.

Absolutely.

I mean, it is frothy and velvety and the, that the counterpoint to it is the minerality with this wine and the saline and the sapidity.

I mean, that's something that I find so often in Italian wines that, that sets them apart and makes them different.

The other thing I love to talk about with, with regard to Italian wines is the white wines of Italy.

Fiano is a wonderful example of a white Italian grape that makes incredible, beautiful, age worthy wines.

And that's, you know, a lot of times that's surprising to people.

It's easy for us to think about red wines from Italy.

And I think that for most consumers, that's just, you know, kind of where their, their mind goes is, Oh, Italy, red wine and pasta, but there's so much extraordinary white wine.

And this is, I think this is a wonderful example.

It's beautiful.

You said salinity.

And was there a second word that you said?

Let's talk about that word.

Yeah, sapidity.

This is a word I learned from Italians to describe wine.

And the way I experience it is, sorry, my mouth is watering after that wonderful sip.

I know, it literally is mouth

watering, lip smacking the acidity and the bubbles together.

Yeah.

Yeah, it's very lively.

So sapidity, it's very similar to the sensation of minerality that you get on the sides of your mouth, your tongue, but there's that salty mineral element is just present there.

And it's, it's fascinating to me because you know, it's, it's present here.

And then if you go all the way to the Northern part of Italy, you're still finding that sapid character in the wines.

Great word.

Great word.

I'm adding it to my

vocabulary right now.

It's,

yeah, it's a good wine word to learn.

And I find that fun to be an observer and a listener around Italians that really know their stuff about wine.

The fact that there's a verb in Italian for what they do when they pour you a glass of wine and the first thing they do when you're in a tasting situation is they, they turn With the wine in it, rinsing the entire inside of the glass with the wine, and then they pour it out.

And then they pour you a taste.

To coat the

glass, or season the glass.

And that word in Italian is?

Um, I think it's avrasare?

Yeah.

I'm not sure.

But just that, and then the way that they talk about wine and describe it, and talk, when they talk about, um, another one that's fascinating, uh, note that doesn't apply to these wines, but balsamic.

You know, we, it'll be interesting to see if we get any balsamic notes in, in the, the still wine from Piedmonte Arnese.

But getting to talk to Italians about what that descriptor balsamic means to them.

And that's not a word that we use too much when we talk about wine in America.

No.

We use it for its

literal application of the vinegar and my favorite vinegarette dressing, but not as a note that we can

pick up independently in a wine.

Yeah.

And when I talk to people about, oh, there's some balsamic notes.

They're immediately thinking of the vinegar, but that's not what the Italians mean when they use the tree,

right?

It's like more of an herbaceous note, right?

Oh my gosh.

Yep.

See another reason why I'm so glad we found each

other.

You were talking about salinity and then you were also talking about obviously this family that has olives on the property.

And so.

in your food and wine pairing recommendations on the website.

First of all, you said this is one of the most ideal aperitif wines that I've ever had the pleasure of sipping.

I would agree that it would be a wonderful start to a meal, almost like a palate cleanser and very exciting on the palate.

And then suggested pairings, you said mixed nuts, olives, or tavern yard.

Simple pasta dishes like linguine with clams.

I would kill for that right now.

And shelfless risotto.

So I have some olives here because Michael and I went out to dinner last night to a great new spot for us called the Sonoma Pizza Company.

In the little tiny town of Forestville here in Sonoma County.

And they had these beautiful citrus marinated olives with sprigs of thyme and garlic and all that.

And we didn't finish them.

So I'm like, I'm going to bring these home.

And now I think I want to try these with my.

Now I'm really jealous because those look gorgeous.

Whole clove of garlic I'm looking at.

And there was rind like orange peel, orange zest or rind slices.

I can't wait for you to taste this together.

Should I do wine first, then

a

bite?

Wine,

wine, food, wine.

Yeah, yeah.

Wine

sandwich, it's our favorite.

It is.

Oh my God.

Yum.

Mm.

Wow.

First of all, just without even going back to the wine yet, just having that little bit of wine.

And now that beautiful citrus and salinity and brininess of the olives.

Here comes the second step.

How much of a nerd out am I that that could like bring me to tears,

right?

And you know, I was gonna say sometimes like the really quiet response is the one that is so powerful like, you know that you're having something amazing go on in your mouth right now.

It took the sharpness, the angularity of the bubbles and the the acidity of the wine, which was beautiful.

I love all those things about it.

But after the olive, which they're kind of sitting in olive oil as well.

Yeah.

So having that fat and that brininess in the mouth, the wine changed and became softer in a beautiful way.

I want your, I want to be in the same room with you right now.

In my home office here in Sonoma County.

Yes.

Wow, what a great recommendation for olives for a pairing.

I love olives and one day I'm gonna make olive oil and Okay, I've been hearing about this.

I'll be your first customer.

In the meantime, you have to try Liz's olive oil So Liz and her husband Donald are gonna try it Between you and me in Corning, California.

So a couple hours north of me and they make beautiful California olive oil from American olive farmer.

And until I can figure out the finances of having an orchard and making my own, I will drink her olive oil as well as the oil from my people when I travel over to Italy and smuggle it all home in my suitcase, which I do.

But

yeah,

um, sometimes olives.

And briny things, and I love briny and pickled, it's like the older I get, I'm like, give me more acid, more sauerkraut, more vinegar based things.

Acid.

I just love it.

It can be tricky with wine pairing, and can throw off the wine.

But with this sparkling Fianno, just being like that clean slate, they're just, yeah.

Well, you know, sometimes it's, it's worked so well to just go back to the basics.

And we know one of the first things we learn in the food and wine pairing journey is what grows together, goes together.

Amen, sisters.

Say it again.

Say it again for the back row.

What grows together, goes together.

And you know, this Fianna was growing in right in all in a big olive grove.

So, and that's the, food that they're eating in this part of Italy.

So yeah, and the spaghetti with clams.

So this sparkling wine is actually going out in our November connoisseur club members are going to get this and our connoisseur club members with every allocation, they get a recipe from one of the producers featured in the allocation.

So this time they're getting Laura Salerno's spaghetti on my hands.

I love it.

Should we go on to the Arnais?

Yeah, we better.

Terra Elfiare Arnes from Caschina Vengore.

The only change is it's Caschina.

Caschina, not Caschina.

Caschina Vengore.

Caschina.

So San Rome is the biggest font on the label, so we'll start there.

Yeah, so San Rome is the area and it's actually was kind of a Roman crossroads.

So there was a Roman road through this area.

I, obviously that's a couple of thousand years ago.

And then the interesting thing is that the Terra Alfieri DOCG is, is relatively new.

It's the DOCG was formed and I think it was 2014.

So that's, you know, it's just a decade.

Granted, it takes a long time in Italy to actually, you know, they go through a long process of applying and proving that.

There really is a reason to create a DOCG.

Um, it takes quite some time to, to actually have that granted, but you know, the, the idea is that the wine grown from this DOCG, this Arnace is of the highest quality.

And this one is, it's such a fun wine.

This is another great example of Italian white wine.

That is.

It's so exciting.

And of course, once again, we got sisters.

We got sisters in Campania and sisters in Piemonte.

I am in the middle

of three sisters.

No surprise about the middle child part, I'm sure.

But I love that I gravitated towards one I knew, one I didn't know until I dug deeper, that these are made by sisters.

Do you know that song?

Sisters.

Oh yes I do.

We

sing it in my house all the time.

Especially at Christmas.

I don't know if I have to now pay rights because I sang it on the podcast.

I don't know.

We'll, we'll deal with that later.

I can't believe that you know that song.

Boy.

So this is not a sparkling.

This is now a still white wine.

Arnais is the grape and your description is bright, crisp and smile inducing.

Yeah.

I mean, I love this wine because it's multidimensional.

And it's easy to love.

The other thing that's, you know, wonderful about this wine is there's some foods that are particularly difficult to pair with, and I'm probably jumping

ahead now cause I'm already talking about food, but yeah, there's some foods that are difficult to pair with, and this is a wine that will do it.

A nice, really nice job with some of those more difficult things like, you know, artichokes or asparagus, you know, some of the greens, the greens exactly that can be complicated with wine.

And this is when that will, we'll get you there

growing up and doing weekends and holidays with my dad's side of the family who lived mostly in Brooklyn.

My grandma, Josephine, my aunt Vivian, who was a great cook, 88 years old this year.

Artichokes were always on the table.

And in the true sort of Italian American butchering of Italian, like menegut and rigut, they would say caciofala.

We're bringing caciofala.

And it's not until recently as an adult that I actually saw the Italian word for caciofala.

For artichoke.

And I was like, Oh, that's what they were saying.

It doesn't look like that at all, but we, and we still make them to this day stuffed with breadcrumbs and herbs and butter and baked, and you know, I was probably

scraping artichoke leaves as a 10 year old, like you were sipping Bordeaux a little different than our counterparts who were eating fruit roll ups, exactly.

Yes, exactly.

So I could see this pairing beautifully with that.

I'm going to bring this to Christmas when we have stuffed artichokes and introduce the family to the pairing.

Yay.

Arnace is a grape that I know of just from wine studies, but have not enjoyed a lot of.

And it's from the Piedmont, right?

Piedmont region, which people know of course Barolo and Barbaresco and the Nebbiolo grape.

Which are some of my favorite Italian wines outside of Chianti and Tuscany.

But

this is from that region.

Also the region of truffles.

Also the region of truffles.

I haven't been to

Piedmont yet because I keep going back to Campania and to Tuscany.

So it's, it's happening.

Nikki, let's go.

Let's go.

I think we need to go.

Well,

I would love to go visit this family.

So tell me a little bit about, besides just knowing that they're sisters, what have you picked up from your time with this family?

So one of the things I love, Lucrezia is the one that she's really the leader, and she is particularly fascinating because she has been a vegan since the age of 12, growing up in an Italian family.

Wow, that's tricky to do in Italy.

Yes.

Very, very.

And so that was one of the, you know, when I, she told me that, I was like, wait a minute, this is fascinating.

And she didn't get kicked

out of the

family?

No.

No.

Yeah.

She said it took a while, you know, for people to get used to it, but that is why this wine has on the back of the label, you'll see it's has a certified vegan emblem on it.

And that's very, it was very important to her.

Things that, that they're doing in their vineyard that I love.

They've created frog habitat and they've got solar cells out there and they're using that to help them keep track of things like temperatures in the vineyard.

They just use the solar power to do that.

The other thing that I really love, and you mentioned truffles, so I have to talk about this.

They've decided to plant a big grove of hazelnut trees.

And, you know, hazelnuts are a big part of the food culture in Piemonte.

As a result of planting this grove of hazelnut trees, now they have truffles.

Because they just

naturally propagate around where hazelnut trees are growing.

Yeah.

Wow.

Okay.

Now I'm really going to go visit them on the same trip.

I'll

go south.

A little side benefit.

I know.

I would love to spend months in Italy just visiting these, these places that are really extraordinary and places, you know, you go and you just don't forget.

You just don't forget it.

The images.

that show up in my mind when I, you know, when I'm smelling the wine and tasting the wine.

Just, they're indelible.

They're ever present.

Yes, I one day hope to live there and make wine and make olive oil in Italy.

That's the goal.

Where, do you want to be in Campania?

Yes, until this summer we visited Sicily for the first time.

Oh.

And I left a piece of my heart in Sicily.

Yeah.

Uh, just Mount Etna.

I got

some Sicilian wine I really want you to taste.

Wine grown on Etna.

That's not Etna, Etna Bianca, a different one.

I

would love to taste it.

Obscure.

I was mesmerized with our time in Sicily.

We did a wine tasting.

I have to give a shout out to Maurizio.

He was our tour guide for a day and he listens to the podcast in Sicily and he's going to be a guest one day.

Well, this wine is beautiful.

Beautiful.

And I need to drink more Arnais.

And I think that I am now dying to try this with some artichokes and even grilled asparagus with olive oil and salt, right?

Like a little char on the asparagus.

So again, I'm going to put the link in the show notes.

For both of these wines on the Iola site so people can find them, but they also need to read about your great wine clubs that you have because you have different

themes, different assortment, different amounts, different frequency, and even have a champagne club and like who doesn't want to be a champagne club, right?

I'm telling you, there are so many women in champagne.

I keep meeting amazing women in champagne.

So it had to be, it started out as sparkling wine club, but it had to become all champagne Women are doing incredible, incredible things.

What do you want our listeners to know about what you do, what you're giving them access to, just what's happening in the world, maybe that we haven't touched on?

Yeah.

I think the most important thing is for people to feel that they are welcome in the world of wine.

It doesn't matter who you are or where you came from.

If you're curious and interested, then you are welcome.

And what I'm trying to do is in any way that I can is just democratize the world of wine so that everyone feels like they're welcome and belong.

And if they're curious and there's so much to learn and experience, all you have to do is show up with a little curiosity and you will be so richly rewarded, both in the people that you meet and the places you go, but also just The sensory experience is fantastic.

And the other thing I'll say is a big part of the masterclasses that I teach are making sure that people who struggle with, you know, naming aromas and getting

into sensory analysis of wine, people that struggle with that, it can be a barrier and make them feel like they're on kind of like they're on the outside looking in.

So what I love to do is find other ways to help them engage with wine.

So.

Rather than thinking about aromas, I have people, you know, I have bring in little pieces of fabric and have people touch the fabric while they taste so that they're engaging with texture.

I have people, you know, when they taste, close their eyes and see what comes to them.

Sometimes it's shapes, colors, and I actually work with a woman in Champaign who, this is how she approaches tasting as well.

And it was.

Fascinating when we got into this conversation about describing wine in terms of shapes and colors and, you know, notes from, from high to low.

I mean, actually just listening to, uh, like music.

And that's a big part of how I do it.

I talk about higher notes and lower notes rather than just getting stuck in, you know, Pins of citrus

and beeswax and cardamom.

Like what the heck is cardamom anyway?

Yeah.

Yeah.

And, you know, and making sure people know that, Hey, if you smell it, then it's there because this wine is personal in the same way that, you know, that books and films and music are personal food.

You know, we all have our taste that we grew up with and then kind of eventually evolved it.

Right.

And two on our own.

And, and wine is personal that way too.

It's just, it doesn't have any purpose other than our enjoyment.

It's joy.

It

is literally joy in a bottle.

What you reminded me of when you were talking about just thinking about wine as textures and colors and shapes and music.

If you haven't yet listened and if listener you are listening right now and have not listened to episode 13 from the first season with Dr.

Hobie Wedler.

Dr.

Hobie is a PhD in organic chemistry and was born blind and Hobie is, he's done multiple episodes now.

He's a good friend.

But in that first episode 13, he really talks about how he quote, sees wine like art and how tasting wine is the closest thing he can experience to a piece of art on the wall.

And it's brilliant and touching and emotional.

And I hope that everyone goes back and listens to that.

Honestly, if listeners, if you have not listened to it, please listen to this episode.

I was dancing around listening to this and thinking, you know, if there, if I ever had the cha the chance to meet this man, I, oh, it's gonna happen.

I can imagine it's gonna happen.

The important thing is to listen to that episode.

Yeah.

And listen to the way that he approaches wine and, you know, let it sink in.

And it's powerful, real, as I sat with this Barnes.

While we were talking and it's got a very long finish, especially for a white wine It's like hanging out in my mouth when you were talking about music and I grew up playing the piano So the little nerdiness is going to show here thinking about the notes in this wine.

Do you know chopsticks?

Where you start in the middle.

Especially if you're a fan of Big in the movie where he's jumping on the, uh, piano for those of you who, who don't know the reference of chopsticks.

This wine does that because it's like the end of chopsticks where your fingers on the piano are now like an octave apart.

There's a higher note.

and a lower note, and they're happening at the same time in my mouth, which is very interesting and not always common in a wine.

I'm getting the high tone and the acidity, a little beeswaxy citrusy, but then there's like a, a low tone, which is almost like tannin, but it's not, but a, a, a deepness of the flavor that is hanging on.

through the finish.

So I guess I'm saying this wine is like chopsticks in my mouth.

I love it.

I love it.

Yeah.

I love the way you're describing a higher note and a lower note happening concurrently.

And this is what makes wine so exciting.

I mean, yeah.

And I mean, I, the other thing I tell people is it's a living thing.

It's food.

We, you know, it's easy to forget that this is food and it's a living, evolving thing.

thing that, you know, sometimes it has a bad hair day, doesn't mean it's, you know, it's a bad wine.

You got to just come back to it another day, you know, maybe it didn't have a good night of sleep or something.

That's why it's so exciting to open a new bottle because you're like, what is she going to be telling me today?

Right?

Oh my

gosh.

I love this.

See, that's part of how I taste too.

As I'm talking to him, like, what do you want?

What do you want me to know about you?

You know, when I'm first tasting a wine.

Yeah,

you have a story to tell.

Go ahead and tell me.

I'm here.

It's like a game of hide and seek.

Well, and the story, I think that's a great close there.

The wine is telling a story in the glass of its character and what we're noticing in the glass.

But the wine is telling the story of the people that made it and in this situation of these beautiful collections of wines that you are making accessible

to us you and the wines are telling the story of strong women, bold women who are farmers and And who are breaking barriers and making beautiful wine.

So thank you so much for the work that you do and for bringing these stories and these wines to all of us.

Oh my goodness.

You know what?

It's an honor.

I feel so grateful to have the chance to do this and, you know, to be on this mission for women and on this mission for wine.

It's, it's really great.

Like I said, it's just an honor.

So thank you.

These wines are beautiful.

I'm happy to do a virtual cheers.

Ready?

One, two, three.

Thank you so much.

Oh my goodness.

Thank you so much for inviting me.

It's been so much fun.

So I just keep thinking, gosh, how lucky are all of us to have Merrilee as an ambassador for these small French Italian women led wine brands as winemakers.

We appreciate her work, but also.

Just as wine drinkers.

I mean, how awesome for all of us that she is finding these places, meeting the people, creating the relationships, and bringing back these wonderful bottles for all of us, making them accessible so we can drink and enjoy.

So I very much thank her, not only for her time for our interview, but the work that she's doing.

If you visit her Iola wines, Iola is IOLA, iola wines.com.

You can make a purchase, especially I highly recommend both of the wines that we tasted today.

The link will be in the show notes and she's been kind enough to create a coupon code Nikki 20.

N I K K I 2 0 to give you 20 flat rate shipping anywhere in the U.

S.

on any number of bottles.

Thank you, Marilee, for that.

And also, I'm going to encourage you to sign up for her newsletter, which has a lot of great tips about wine, but also comes with a free 10 minute masterclass to help you discover your perfect bottle.

If you're enjoying Sip with Nikki, make sure to leave us a rating and a review wherever you listen to your podcasts.

And if you're listening on YouTube, be sure to like and subscribe.

Thank you so much for listening.

And if you'd like to be an angel, subscribe.

And support the podcast.

I would be ever so grateful and you could buy me a glass of wine and get yourself a shout out.

Link in the show notes to do so.

Whatever you do between now and the next time we catch up together, I hope, as always, that you sip well.

Bah, bah dum buh da ba da da dum Bah, bah dum buh da da da dum

Do

Music (2): do do do do do

do do do do do do

Music (2): do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do

do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do

Music (2): Wow, wow, wow La la la la la La la la la la la La la la la la Um, uh, Uh, Um, Uh, Uh, Oh Vodafone.

Vodafone.

Vodafone.