Joe Fattorini | IN CONVERSATION WITH
Joe Fattorini
Joe Fattorini is a wine expert and host of ITV’s The Wine Show. He recently collaborated with Britannia to create several fi lms about how to pair wine with food. Vicki Evans talks to him about the best ways to store wine at home
Q & A
Q: How did you get started in the wine industry? A: As a young child, I was fascinated with wine and how it becomes part of meals and history. In Britannia’s fi lms, we talk about wine and bring in a story to relate it to the broader world around us. I had always loved the correlation between wine and history. I became a wine presenter because I was fi lmed in a bath of wine on my phone in Argentina. My producer saw the clip and offered me the job.
Q: What is the new project you are working on with Britannia? A: Britannia got in touch and said they wanted a series of videos about wine and food using Britannia appliances. They contacted me as they had seen the Wine Show. In the videos for Britannia, I try to tell a story about the wine. It is all about giving wine recommendations in the context of particular food. The meal experience is a combination of food, wine, and the ambience, which can be about the space and beautifully designed kitchen and part of it can be about the stories that you tell.
Q: What is the best practice for storing wine? A: Anything that you want to store for more than a year, you really shouldn’t have in your own home. You should go to someone who can look after it properly, somewhere the humidity and temperature are right. If you ever think about selling it, it shouldn’t be in the home at all. When the wine is in the house, it needs to be kept in a cool, dry place. When it comes to the kitchen, you need to be careful, as the temperature varies much more. There are three tiers: more than a year, put them somewhere else; within a year, set in a cool part of the home; for wine that will be drunk in the next week or so, it can be stored in a wine fridge.
Q: What is your biggest wine- related irritation in kitchen design? A: One of the biggest bugbears as a wine expert is when people put wine racks in kitchens near hot stuff. Often wine racks are near the cooker or the
December 2019 · kbbreview
“In the videos for Britannia, I try to tell a story about the wine. It is all about giving
wine recommendations in the context of particular food”
fridge. The thing wine never wants to be is warm or be subjected to varying temperatures. It needs to be kept kind of cool. I see people who are pleased about the wine they have kept for years, but they have stored it next to an oven and it is just ruined and the cork is bursting out. Wine racks in kitchens are for very short- term use only and not for storing for a long period. Wine should be stored somewhere cool with consistent temperatures – a downstairs lavatory is possibly the best place to put it in many houses.
Q: How is a wine fridge best used? A: I do put red and white into a wine fridge the week before I want to use them. The general rule for serving is, if you have room-temperature red wine, bring it into the fridge half-an- hour before you want to serve it, and bring white wine out of the fridge half-an-hour before you serve it.
Q: What advice would you give about wine cellars? A: Cellars are hugely aspirational
My design bugbear is wine racks put next to an oven or fridge
and we would all love to have one. Wine should always be horizontal, and there are almost no exceptions to this. The caveat for wine cellars for me is that if you want to sell the property, you really shouldn’t put it in the house. If you are a big wine lover, having it underground is always best, so those cellars with the large spiral staircase going down are ideal.
Q: Why do you think that wine storage and people drinking at home has had a resurgence in the past couple of years? A: Wine is a window into our shared history. When you have a group of people around for dinner, you are not talking about the taste of berries. What you are talking about is history,
emotions and the things that bring people together. We fi gured out while I was making The Wine Show that when we talk about wine, we discuss the people and the history of the wine more. Wine puts us in touch with stories. We know that people are drinking less, but they are drinking better quality wines and ones that have a story to them.
Q: Why is there a trend for people staying in rather than going out? A: What we see in the wine industry is an increase in the sale of magnums and the larger-scale bottles. The interesting point about bigger bottles is that you share from the same bottle. There is something special when someone cooks, you eat the same thing – it’s the same thing with wine, but takes it to the next level. When I
recommend a wine for
dinner parties, it is best to go for a wine that lots of people will enjoy. In the fi lms that we have made with Britannia, I made sure that I chose wines that you could open and have all your friends like them.
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