Following the Scent

A fated meeting in the Veneto with Alberto Buratti

While Diego Sorba was driving towards me from somewhere in the Veneto a bottle I never sipped was on my mind. “Tastes like an Auvergne gamay,” that friend had said to me as she showed me a shot of the bottle.

She added that it had been low alcohol and vibrant. After a Google, I found the name of the winemaker, Alberto Buratti. He was from the Colli Euganei, the volcanic hills in the region of Padua, known for merlot and cabernet franc and sweet moscato. Barely anyone I knew paid much attention to the area and wines. I texted the shot to Diego, who knew about everyone and everything, and asked him, “Have you ever had this?” He answered, “Last night!” I was convinced this was a coincidence of galactic proportions.

“Did you like it?” I asked.

He loved it. Then I heard a rapid pinging of a fierce hailstorm. “If I don’t crash on the road here, should we try to visit on the way to Parma?”

When Diego picked me up in Montebello, he told me he had called this man Alberto, but there was no answer. Not willing to accept this as a failure, I hit Alberto’s number on my American phone, “Try this.” Within seconds, Diego was feverishly chatting away in Italian.

No vineyard visit; we swapped that out for lunch at a macellaria—a butcher shop with a resto attached. “Here’s another coincidence,” he said. “The place we are going? The owner of Tolin is Andrea. He is the brother of Silvia, who owns Osteria Nova. And that’s where I had the wine last night!”