I offer you something new: a micro story in several episodes linked to each other by the love for wine and more. I’ve never had a diary. That’s why I’m writing this. The first part is across borders. There may be the risk of running into the walls of raw nostalgia and elliptical digressions, but it's bearable. It amuses me. Because there will be no lack of portentous coincidences.
In the summer of 1988, with the company of two dear friends (the first one today is a scientist that teaches in the USA; the other one is a prestigious Emilian lawyer), I went to poke around the Romania of Nicolae Ceausescu trying to understand if the hunger of the country could eventually turn into an explosive fuse. You could feel a corruptive estrangement, a humiliating and liberticide smuggling. But..
1989 would have been fatal: Berlin Wall fell in November, a month and a half later there was the execution of the old leader maximo impotent and depressed. Everything happened so fast that Nicolae didn’t even noticed it, ending his human affair in a grim way.
I didn’t write any reportage at the time, but when the revolution happened in 1989 a TV show asked me for an interview to tell the sensations after my borderline trip.
Neptun
That summer we stopped in Neptun too, a seaside resort for the rich on the Mar Nero, a bit spooky, that made pair with the pop Mamaia, it was dotted in the hinterland with dachas and large villas, property of Nomenklatura party’s Mcducks.
We drove around the country with a «Mini de Tommaso» a three-cylinder, tiny citycar that We mistreated a lot during that adventure. As monstrous counterpart, in the vortex of desolation surrounding us, the roaring, funereal and deafening whiz, on slippery and fearsome road, of a black «Lamborghini Countach». Driven by a pimp, a knitter? Or who else?
Showing and then disappearing on our paths like a tumefaction of reality, a violent and fast paradox. A Hallucinogen in a scenery of poverty in its pure state: I will never forget the look of an elderly woman that, secretly (she was wearing a black scarf to hide her face), in the corner of a high wall of periphery, was trying to sell a couple of eggplants and a spoiled cucumber.
Printed in my mind the drunk proposal of a guy – He said He worked at the customhouse of the capitol on the behalf of the Big Boss - that wanted to trade his wife (sic!) in exchange for a dinner on us, with boiled chicken entrails and fake champagne, a mixture poorly sparkling and slightly alcoholic , filled in a jug with the bottleneck wrapped in tinfoil golden and luminescent. What a scene! Thinking back at it, it reminds of a middle age French fabliau.
Nino Benvenuti vince le Olimpiadi di Roma
I will never forget – in Bucharest – the tire dealer that pumped our flat spare wheel by hand. The wheel was in a bad shape and We were desperate: We couldn’t find any spare part. In the workshop there was no compressor, a tool for artificial heavens. Only his arms and muscles not yet mummified by fatigue. He was a big man with Polish origin, he used to be a boxer, youthful cheekbones of a rocky fighter and the stomach of an aged heavyweight. He told me, exited and a bit blushed, that he fought in Switzerland- and I thought I understood that happened in Lucerne- during a meeting in which Nino Benvenuti also attempted, absolute idol of our Boxe. He expressed himself pretty well with the universal language of pride and sadness, smiling at us Italians, compatriots of the magnificent Nino from Istria island, while handing over the wheel fixed and back in shape.
Of that short chat in that foggy workshop, between universal gestures and improvised Esperanto, I was left with a doubt: It wasn’t clear to me if the two of them – tire dealer and Nino- fought each other.
Today, writing this story, I have a certainty. Main and our savior has a name and surname: Henryk Dampc. He was between the protagonists of European Championships for amateur boxer that took place in the Swiss city, and was defeated in the Superwelterweight final by the very Benvenuti, which was captain of the national Italian team. The date? 31 May 1959. Nino won the Olympic Games in Rome the following year.
Generally speaking, I have a ridiculous memory, almost none, but this cluster of events didn’t want to fade into the oblivion. Internet gave me a hand connecting the dots, polishing a silver medal swallowed into the void of the boxing gloves.
Murfatlar Cabernet-Sauvignon
And then? One night, recklessly, I went into a coastal grove and I found a spot in an outdoor dinner. It was a gypsy party, I overcame the fear of approach with the help of some glasses of intense purple and lovely peasant blend (maybe it was «Fetească Neagră» from Vracea and maritime surroundings), the sensational orchestra and a lamb steak slightly burned by the grill. I finally had something good to eat after days of uncertain food, dysenteric and exhausting contractions: wastepaper as dollars, surviving through sacrifice. With American dollars however , in two sad and swampy hotel restaurants covered in glorious dust , We bought two enormous bottles of a dry Merlot and Cabernet Sauvignon from Murfaltar from ’86 that the waiters tried to hide from us: that was a trump of liquid joy in a realty where finding alcohol was impossible, a toast to our good luck. The region of Dobrogea preserved a millennial wine culture. Try asking Ovidio, poet and expert elated for the same reasons. Ah, ah.
And now a time jump for further pleasure.
One day, after some time, I lingered to summon that winy Balkan discover with none other than Gianni Mura: his eyes sparkled, He got curious, nodding with his head over my stories of drinking and shenanigans. We met, Gianni and I, in a very special place.
Corrado D'Ambra al ristorante La Parracina
When? By any chance it was summer 1994. We had agreed to meet at «Parracina» the restaurant that the late father Corrado D’Ambra had just opened in Casa D’Ambra Wines in Panza, for and with a couple of unique talent: Giovanni Iovine and Libera Esposito, He’s a sommelier and selector of gourmet products; She’s a brilliant chef known for her unrivaled simplicity. The terrace was their forte. The special menu of that authentical desco far from cliché featured, also, a trip uphill towards the mount Epomeo at Frassitelli estate; sometimes even a monorail panoramic ride and a visit to the farmer’s museum.
Libera and Giovanni, after that experience (lasted two years) which had permanently relocated their lives in a double and genetic destiny forged into the insularity of Ischia and Procida of both their families, at the end of March 1996 they opened “Il Melograno”: and there was light, over our local food.
In the backstage of house D’Ambra had been set up a huge transportable kitchen with professional burners. That night in Panza, there was another magnificent Guest using the kitchen, the starred experimenter and visionary chef Moreno Cedroni from “La Madonnina del Pescatore” in Senigallia. Meanwhile Libera, chef resident, was supervising the team. Moreno prepared prawns with white polenta served in an aluminum pan, a dish that is still part of his personal top-twenty.
We could never have imagined that that very huge kitchen would have served for a sublime event: it was moved for one day in the garden of the episcope in Ischia Ponte so that the kids of the “hotel management School” could prepare the lunch for John Paul II, in the occasion of his visit that putted Ischia under the spotlight. It was May the 5th 2002. I Was there. Karol Wojtyla was polish like my savior in Bucarest. Am I exaggerating?
Andrea D'Ambra
Let’s get back down to earth.
In the meantime, in the internal room of the company the master of ceremony was Giovanni, and he kept on uncork wines produced by Andrea D’Ambra, with this, many infantile and juvenile emotions came along that I have already synthetized in afterword to his (four-handed with Antonella Monaco) <Storia del vino d’Ischia. La viticoltura nell’isola verde dai greci a Salvatore D’Ambra». I’ll be back at it. Andrea today is building an exemplary hereditary path, sharing his business with His daughters Sara and Marina. That fills me with joy.
Anyway, the historical dinner with Cedroni and Mura requires the disclosure of other details. Gianni Mura accepted the invitation from Corrado without delay. He was already living on the island in summer together with his wife, as a “buen retiro” showing, for this land in the middle of Tyrrhenian, a pure love that in 2012 made possible the writing of a noir novel published by Feltrinelli (Ischia 2012): I presented it in Ischia Ponte the next year.
There was a spectacular mix of souls that night in Panza.
The aperitif started with «Kalmera brut» masterfully signed by Andrea, champenois of my hearth and part of the legendary wines which I wish to taste again.
Per e palummo d'annata
Then we moved to «Frassitelli» a sacred hymn to the heroic green tuff from the nearly extreme heights. Lastly, we changed color and range. Ad libitum. At 2 AM, while more and more empty bottles were stacking up, Paola e Gianni stayed stolid; Corrado was relaxed and Andrea was discussing with apprehension the judgment regarding his wines. Paola was tougher than Gianni. As for me, rightly tipsy, was boldly quoting mythical Spanish runners from the Tour de France, Giro d’Italia and Vuelta a Espana: Vicente Lòpez Carril, Gonzàlez Linares, Domingo Perurena.
A mini-list of athletes that certified my discrete knowledge on sports and seemed miraculous.
How did I remember those? Credit goes to «Per’ e’ palummo», with that artistic label, unmistakable typical complicated personality of a red wine, impossible to replicate because too insular and personal to challenge the market for too long. Memories materialized in front of the famous journalist - the greatest in Italy in the last decades – that the cursed 2020 took away all of the sudden.
Mura was the core of cycling, lived and narrated. And food. And Wine. And words. I made a good impression, Gianni was surprised, He wasn’t expecting it, but was ready to point out vices and virtues of the Iberian runners I listed. In any case I was noted by the Romanian Murflatar and that was enough. After a while, after the last bottle of the night was uncorked, Gianni said: <You know -speaking lucidly to Andrea- this “Per’’e palummo” is younger and different from the other that have a mount more of refinement!> knocking us all out. What a champion. At that point , the moon called us home and we said goodbye.
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