By The Glass

62. Texas Report with Valerie Trasatti & Drew Gimma

Valerie Trasatti worked as a pastry chef for nearly a decade in Houston and Las Vegas at hotels and restaurants. She now works as a private chef and culinary consultant. Drew Gimma has spent his career baking bread, most notably at Per Se in New York City. After opening Common Bond, BLT, and Squable in Houston, he took on the Director of Operations Role at Breadman Baking Company, the city's top bread wholesaler.
Valerie and Drew give Chris a full report on what's been going on in Houston since he moved to France. They discuss regressive politics of the Texas State Legislature, rising cases of the delta variant, vaccine-mandates in hospitality establishments, as well as the labor shortage in restaurants.
If you're looking to support the fight against SB8, below are a couple of organizations worth supporting:
I'll Have What She's Having
Lilith Fund
Planned Parenthood Gulf Coast

61. The Human Scale of Winemaking & Importing with Stephen Bitterolf

Stephen Bitterolf is the founder of Vom Boden, one of the top importers of German wine in the USA. The company began as a curated selection of Mosel bottlings but now is synonymous with minimal intervention wine from lesser-known regions like Baden, Franken, and the Obermosel.
 
Stephen talks with Chris about planning Vom Boden's summer camp, organizing Rieslingfrier, supporting the Ahr wine region after the July flooding, finding beauty in asymmetry, pairing Riesling with pizza, defining Sylvaner for American consumers, exploring Saale-Unstrut, championing varieties like Portugieser and Elbling, reevaluating the trajectory of German winemaking, and never losing sight of the big picture.
 
For information about Vom Boden's efforts to support the Ahr wine region, follow the link below.
https://www.vomboden.com/help-the-flood-ravaged-ahr-valley/
 
Wines Tasted in Today's Episode:
Hild Trocken Elbling  
Julian Haart 1000L Riesling  
Keller Limestone Kabinett Riesling 
Stefan Vetter Steinterrassen 'Schale, Stiel und Stengel' Sylvaner 
Enderle & Moll Liaison Spätburgunder
 
Today's episode was made in partnership with Wines of Germany. Learn more about German Wine by visiting their website or Instagram account.
 
 

60. The Versatility of Riesling: Part 2 with Julie Dalton

In the second half of this deep dive into the role of Riesling on a restaurant wine list, Chris speaks to Julie Dalton of Mastro's Steakhouse about pairing the wines of Germany with everything beefy: from dry-aged new york strips to marbled ribeyes to steak tartare. Julie also breaks down the complex concept of dry extract and recounts the time she convinced a couple of German winemakers to buy Lucchese cowboy boots.
 
Julie is a Master Sommelier candidate with a master's degree in Biotechnology from Johns Hopkins University. Before moving to Houston as the head sommelier for the crown jewel of the Landry's Restaurant Group, Julie helped Raj Parr and Michael Mina open Wit & Wisdom, the restaurant inside the Four Seasons in Baltimore. She also worked for Terry Thiese, and her time on the import side informed the way she tells the story of German wine. 
 
Wines tasted during this episode:
2017 Josef Spreitzer Oestricher Doosberg Alte Reben Trocken
2019 Dönnhoff Oberhäuser Leistenberg Kabinett
2019 J.J. Prüm Graacher Himmelreich Spätlese
 
Thanks to our sponsor for today's episode, Wines of Germany. To learn more about German wine, visit www.germanwineusa.com.
 
 

59. The Versatility of Riesling in Restaurants with Andres Blanco & Dale Ellington

Sommeliers around the world love to pair food with Riesling. In this two-part episode, Chris sits down with various wine professionals in Houston to discuss different styles of Riesling. In the first half, Chris chats with Andres Blanco and Dale Ellington about their experiences serving both dry and sweet Riesling in their respective restaurants.
 
Andres Blanco passed the Advanced Sommelier exam in 2019 and won the TexSom competition for Best Sommelier in Texas in 2017. Born in Mexico, Andres spent years working for James Beard Award-winner Chef Hugo Ortega at the coastal Mexican restaurant Caracol. Dale Ellington has poured wine at Houston's top two Japanese restaurants -- after tending bar at Uchi, he oversaw the wine program for sushi mecca Kata Robata. Chris, Andres, and Dale discuss getting guests out of their comfort zones, upending people's expectations with dry Riesling, and pairing oysters and unagi with wine.
 
Wines tasted during this episode:
2017 Josef Spreitzer Oestricher Doosberg Alte Reben Trocken
2019 Dönnhoff Oberhäuser Leistenberg Kabinett
2019 J.J. Prüm Graacher Himmelreich Spätlese
 
Thanks to our sponsor for today's episode, Wines of Germany. To learn more about German wine, visit www.germanwineusa.com.
 
 
 

58. Japanese Whiskey & Asahikawa Ramen with Christopher Huang

Christopher Huang is the founder and owner of Ninja Ramen, a ramen shop that specializes in Japanese and Taiwanese whiskey. Christopher chats with Chris about late-night guests, TABC quandaries,  bathroom signs, Hanoi vs Saigon-style pho, whiskey dilution, tonkotsu broth-hacks, and the secret to a good Asian perm. Christopher also goes on the record for the first time about his new bar, which will open later this year. 

57. Foraging for Cali Herbs with Birk O'Halloran

Birk O’Halloran is the founder of Iconic Wine and Rockwell Vermouth. He started Iconic Wine in 2011 while running a NY-based distributor that supported the New California wine movement. Recently, he created Rockwell: a project focused producing classic vermouth with American ingredients. For this episode of BTG, Birk chatted with Chris about foraging for Artemisia Californica, getting inspired by Dan Petroski, and navigating wine score submissions for Iconic Wines.

56. Get the Bag(uette) with Otto Sanchez

Otto Sanchez is the chef and founder of Magnol French Baking in Houston. He has served as pastry chef for Alain Ducasse and Joël Robuchon and worked in kitchens in Yountville and Dubai. In this episode, Otto and Chris discuss working service on Mother’s Day, leading the pastry team at the Burj Al Arab, building a wholesale bread program, coming to the USA from El Salvador, and perfecting pastries like the canelé and baba au rum.
 
Follow Magnol Bakery on Instagram at @magnolfrenchbaking 

55. Piquette & Pick Dates with The Austin Winery

Adrienne Ash and Cooper Anderson are winemakers at The Austin Winery. Cooper co-founded the winery seven years ago, and Adrienne also makes amphorae-matured wine under her own label, Ash Wines. They speak with Chris about learning from mistakes, deciding whether to can or bottle certain cuvées, fermenting in concrete, and championing Texas grape growers. 
 
Learn more about Cooper's personal wine label -- LØNG LIVE -- by following him on Instagram at @Long_Live_Wines.
 
Adrienne's traditional method sangiovese-picpoul sparkling rosé can be purchased on The Austin Winery's website. 

54. Tariff Troubles in a Three-Tier System

The tariffs on European wine went into effect back in October 2019 and created problems for importers, distributors, and sommeliers. Even once the tariffs were suspended in March of 2021, the wine industry is still dealing with their consequences. In this triple-decker episode, Chris chats with different wine professionals about the way their businesses handled this transatlantic clusterfuck.
 
First, Chris speaks with importer Pierre Gastaldello of Bobo Selections about the vulnerability of natural wine in this moment. Then, Chris gets the perspective of a mid-sized distributor by talking to Britania Perez of Victory Wine Group. Finally, Steven McDonald of Pappas Steakhouse discusses how the tariff-pandemmy combo changed the way he builds his BTG program and Burgundy verticals.
 
If you wanna listen to this episode in medias res, below are the time-stamps for each guest:
01:20 Pierre Gastaldello 
33:15 Britania Perez
56:08 Steven McDonald

53. One Year Later with Adele Corrigan & Alta Marfa

We've made it one year, gang! To celebrate the BTG Poddiversary, Chris checks in with Adele Corrigan of 13 Celsius wine bar and Ricky Taylor of Alta Marfa winery. Both Adele and Ricky fill us in about the turbulence of the past twelve months. It's a double-guest episode for you double-vaxxed listeners out there. Cheers!

52. Braai, Beer, & Bush vines with Mick Craven

Mick Craven is a brash Aussie making vineyard-designated wine under his eponymous label to showcase the potential of old vines in Stellenbosch. He met his wife while working harvest in Sonoma, and they proceeded to travel from Domaine Dujac to Syria to South America to the Golan Heights before settling down in coastal South Africa. In this episode, Mick drinks a lot of beer and talks to Chris about skin-fermenting Pinot Gris and Clairette Blanche, contextualizing South African winemaking, and comparing braai to barbecue.

51. Perfecting Fajitas with Nick Wong

Nick Wong is the Chef de Cuisine of UB Preserv, one of Houston's most celebrated restaurants. Before moving to Houston in 2018, Nick worked in NYC and SF at restaurants like Gramercy Tavern, Momofuku Ssäm Bar, and Incanto. For his BTG convo, Nick talks about staffing a kitchen amidst capacity reductions, adding rice cakes to his Szechuan-style crawfish boils, sourcing local produce after February's winter storm, exploring EDM TikTok, supporting Chinatown, and navigating Asian-American stereotypes in a kitchen. 
 
To learn more about the organizations Nick references in the episode, use the links below:
 
Chow Down in Chinatown
https://www.facebook.com/groups/chowdownhouston/ 
https://www.instagram.com/chowdownhtx/ 
 
Food is Love HTX
https://burgerchanhtx.com/food-is-love
https://www.instagram.com/foodislovehtx/