Food & Wine February 2020

NV LINI 910 LABRUSCA ROSSO LAMBRUSCO ($18) Forget everything you know about Lambrusco. This dry sparkling red—almost purple—wine is made by a fourth-generation producer in the tiny Italian town of Canolo. Full of dark berry fruit, it’s one of my favorite winter dinner-party pours. 2018 CLOUDLINE PINOT NOIR ($20) I used this Willamette Valley wine for a Today show appearance about holiday wines, but even if the holidays are done, a Pinot Noir at this price with this level of complexity and deliciousness is impossible to argue with. It’s a great by-the-case buy for winter. 2018 VILLA GEMMA CERASUOLO D’ABRUZZO ($20) I tasted this full-bodied, citrusy, transparently ruby Cerasuolo—the classic rosé of Italy’s Abruzzo region—just a bit too late for my winter rosé column in this issue (see p. 53). But it was too good…

Keep at It IT’S EASY TO THINK THAT PEOPLE at the apex of their careers have it made, but the journey to the top—and every step after—requires constant innovation and grit. I was reminded of this last summer at the 37th annual Food & Wine Classic in Aspen, the most fun and important weekend of every year for F&W. While I love watching Jacques Pépin cook and Martha Stewart dispense entertaining wisdom to our guests, for me, some of the best moments happen off-stage, in impromptu conversations with all of the pros strolling around the tiny mountain town, which, for that weekend, feels like summer camp for some of the biggest names in food and drink. Last summer, we surveyed some of those chefs and food personalities, asking them to share a…

WHEN HANG TRUONG’S HUSBAND PASSED AWAY two years after she moved to San Francisco, she suddenly found herself in need of a way to support herself and her young daughter in the most expensive city in America. As a Vietnamese immigrant with some culinary training, Truong thought she might start a restaurant. But she was scared: “I didn’t grow up here, so there’s a lot I don’t know [about business], plus there’s the language barrier.” She worried that they would have to move. After spending a year and a half at La Cocina, a culinary incubator that provides low-income immigrant women and women of color in the Bay Area with the educational, financial, and marketing support to launch their own businesses, things looked very different for Truong. In 2017, she launched…

IT’S A RARE SUNNY DAY during Zanzibar’s rainy season, and the island is luminous with emerald forests and sodden, spongy ocher paths. The air is thick with the fragrance of cinnamon. Welcome to Ethan Frisch’s office for the day. “There’s this perception that I’m machete-ing my way through a jungle,” says Frisch, cofounder of single-origin spice purveyor Burlap & Barrel. Apart from the machete, everything checks out: As he follows farmers deep into the woods to inspect nutmeg, peppercorns, and cinnamon, his palms evoke a Pollockian tableau, blotched yellow and red from turmeric and teak saplings. Frisch has, in past lives, been a pastry chef in New York and a humanitarian aid worker in Jordan and Afghanistan, which is when he had the initial idea for the company. Burlap & Barrel officially…

The new class of blenders can detect container sizes, churn out steaming-hot soups without the use of a stove, and whip even the gnarliest greens and roots into submission with ease. We pitted some of the category’s newest offerings against one another in a smoothie taste test and took note of noise levels, ease of cleaning, and, of course, the blended results. THE STRAIGHT SHOOTER KitchenAid K400 ($250, kitchenaid.com) Although this blender was the loudest option we tested, the adjustable knob makes for a straight-forward user experience (no touch screens here!). The smoothie was also refreshingly chilled after blending. That, plus the very efficient 13-second self-clean cycle that requires minimal follow-up rinsing, made this blender our favorite overall. THE HIGH-TECH TREAT Vitamix A3500 ($620, vitamix.com) The newest addition to the Vitamix family comes with…

ESTEEMED MEAT PURVEYOR Pat LaFrieda has put his name behind a heavy-duty grill with top burners that reach 1,500°F in three minutes, cooking meat quickly and with an even sear. Slightly larger than a toaster oven, the Otto Grill ($1,195, ottogrills.com) is steak house technology adapted for the home. In this spirit, brands are developing innovative kitchen tools for the competent home cook. Signature Kitchen Suite’s 48-inch Dual Fuel Pro Range ($14,499, signaturekitchensuite.com) is the first range with a built-in sous vide. It also offers both induction and gas burners, providing ultrahigh heat for searing and ultralow for melting chocolate without even needing a double boiler. In another first, the 30-inch Smart Double Wall Oven from GE’s Café line ($3,849, cafeappliances.com) includes an air-frying setting, which reduces the need for oil by…