The Italian drinking culture, with Tasca d’Almerita and Nonino, “on stage” in San Francisco

The great Italian forerunners of drinking and culture have been great protagonists in the USA for many years: in the glasses of Americans, in their aspirations, in their events. This will also be the case on January 27th, in San Francisco, when the Palace of Fine Arts will host the grand gala of the “Wine Star Award” of “Wine Enthusiast”, one of the most prestigious awards given in America, at the 20th edition.
On stage, of course, there will be made in Italy, thanks to Tasca d’Almerita, one of the wineries that under the guidance of the Tasca family, with Lucio before and Alberto today, is among the creators of the “renaissance” of Sicilian wine, which, thanks to the quality of its wines and the many investments, over the years, on the theme of sustainability, has won the title of “European Winery of the Year”. And thanks to the historic Nonino distillery in Friuli, “Spirit Brand of the Year”, led by “Signora della Grappa” Gianola Nonino, her daughters Cristina, Antonella and Elisabetta, and her granddaughter Francesca, who symbolizes the entry of the new generations of the family into the company, in Los Angeles, to celebrate the award, together with neuroscientist Professor Antonio Damasio, Chairman of the Jury of the famous Nonino Prize, one of the most authoritative cultural awards related to the world of good drinking, and that several times, among other things, has anticipated over the years the choice of Nobel Prize winners. The appointment that, historically, falls at the end of January, when the family, as said, will be in the U.S. to receive the important prize of Wine Enthusiast. And “for this reason the Nonino Forty-Fifth Year Prize will be awarded on January 30, 2021, in the presence of the Jury chaired by Antonio Damasio and made up of Adonis, John Banville, Ulderico Bernardi, Peter Brook, Luca Cendali, Le Roy Ladurie, James Lovelock, Claudio Magris, Norman Manea and Edgar Morin”, explain from the distillery that, in the 1970s, revolutionized the world of grappa, inventing, in fact, the single-variety grappa.
A prize, that of Wine Enthusiast which, explains Giannola Nonino, “is the consecration of the idea that my husband Benito and I had more than 40 years ago, when grappa was the drink against the cold, to believe in the Italian distillate and give this product the same dignity and charisma as the distillates of the world. I remember the first time I went to New York with Picolit grappa. It was 1981, my story was a success, and our grappa made its way into the restaurants of the Big Apple”. A bond with the United States also built through the Nonino Prize: “in 1989,” he recalls, “to everyone’s great surprise, at the suggestion of Ermanno Olmi, then President of the Prize, to look to the future, was awarded at “Time” for having “elected” character of the year the Earth, dedicating the prestigious No. 1 cover to our planet wrapped in barbed wire, admonishing, already 30 years ago, how it was dying.