Corti Brothers Newsletter for Fall 2005   Page 4 

The monks of the Abbey of Our Lady of New Clairvaux at Vina in Tehama County--at the northern end of California’s Great Central Valley--have resuscitated grape growing and winemaking on their property which in 1889 was the largest vineyard and winery in the world. It was owned by Leland Stanford, who, with the mentality of the 19th century magnates, wanted to produce wine, but on an enormous scale.

The Vina Ranch, as the property was called, was also the site of the first viticulture in this part of California, where the early California pioneer, Peter Lassen, grew grapes and produced wine in the 1840s, as did the property’s second owner, Henry Gerke, in the early 1860s.

The Trappist monks who work the now 586 acre ranch which has been a monastic foundation for 50 years, have returned to the original winery building, a double thick brick walled edifice covering two acres of ground. In one corner of it, Aimee Sunseri, a fourth generation California winemaker (from the Napa Valley Nichelini family) produces the wines from Abbey grapes.

Stanford planted varieties which were typical for his period, but found to be completely useless. Instead, the monks have planted, with drip irrigation, varieties such as petite sirah, syrah, tempranillo, albariño and viognier that do well in warm areas.

For the 2005 harvest, the first viognier from young vines was crushed on 20 August, the feast day of St. Bernard of Clairvaux, the founder of the Cistercian order of which the Trappists are a branch. As of this writing, the 2005 Viognier, Albariño, and New Zinfandel will be out for November 11, the feast of St. Martin of Tours, patron saint of wine merchants.

2003 is the first vintage of New Clairvaux wines. For this inaugural offering, we have the four red wines--petite sirah, syrah, tempranillo, and zinfandel. Well worth your tasting, these wines represent a new epoch in the almost 125 year (interrupted) viticultural history of the ranch.

Under the direction of Abbot Thomas Davis, the Abbey is also reconstructing a 12th century Spanish Cistercian monastery chapterhouse, from the monastery of Santa Maria de Ovila, the stones for which were purchased and shipped in 1931by William Randolph Hearst, who never used them. They languished in San Francisco for more than 60 years until the City finally gave them to the Abbey.

With this reconstruction, using master stone cutters to cut new stones for the missing ones, and donations to the Sacred Stones project, (which still needs money!) the oldest building on the West Coast is rising in the midst of walnut trees at New Clairvaux Abbey.

Whether or not you are interested in wine, the Sacred Stones project is marvelous in itself. The Abbey wines are a new chapter--and the only one in the Americas--in Cistercian wine history responsible for such European wine sites such as Clos Vougeot and Kloster Eberbach.

Abbey of New Clairvaux 2003 Petite Sirah Wine, Poor Soul's Block  750ml (#1112) Sold out.

Abbey of New Clairvaux Syrah Wine, St. James Block  750 ml (#1113) Sold out.

Abbey of New Clairvaux Tempranillo Wine, St. James Block   750 ml (#1114) Sold out.

Abbey of New Clairvaux Zinfandel Wine   750 ml (#1115) Sold out.

We are approaching fall and winter and food preparations which take some time to produce full flavored dishes rather than the fresher, flowery dishes of summer. I like to offer stockfish at this time of year since you just might be intrigued enough to try it and enjoy a taste which goes back centuries. Since it is dried cod, stockfish is concentrated protein.

A lot of people know salt cod (baccalà, bacalao, bacalhau) which has long been a staple on the East Coast and Mid West. Stockfish is not the same: it is not salted cod, but merely split codfish which is dried in the cold Arctic air of Norway’s Lofoten Islands.

Today, its preparation is a specialty of Italy and its adjacent lands– the south of France and Croatia– and Norway. In Norway, the treatment of soaking stockfish with lye water produces the famous Lutefisk. Rehydration by just soaking stockfish in daily changes of cold water, is the method used in southern Europe for its preparation.

Stockfish is not “fast food.” It is “slow food” at its best since the soaking process takes about 10-12 days and only then is the fish cooked. The Dalmatian coast of Croatia traditionally prepares stockfish as a hold over from the days when it formed part of the Venetian Republic. There it is called “bacalar” from the Venetian term for stockfish which is “bacalà” with only one “c.” (Written with two c’s, baccalà, means “salt cod.”)

Stockfish is used throughout Italy, but only two regions, Liguria and Veneto, specialize in stockfish dishes. The Veneto is famous for bacalà alla vicentina and bacalà mantecato; Liguria for stoccafisso accomodato. There are dishes throughout Italy that use stockfish, but these three are the most famous and most likely to be encountered. A type of brandade of Provence also uses stockfish in a recipe where it is called “brandacujun.”

I can confidently say that Corti Brothers sells the best stockfish available in the U.S. It is the quality called “RAGNO,” which is the word branded on the fish skin signifying the highest quality, due to size and thickness. Ragno is the most expensive stockfish. The least expensive commonly traded is called “West Africa.” We offer two types of RAGNO stockfish: one, beaten for the Venetian dishes and the other, whole for the Ligurian ones.

Good Italian cookbooks will have recipes for stockfish. Corti Brothers can also send recipes for two preparations, mantecato and accomodato from Colman Andrews, editor of Saveur magazine and a great fan of stoccafisso.  Please ask us for them.

Stockfish“ Ragno” Whole Fish (Avg. 2 lbs)  Beaten.(#1116) Whole (#1117)

This is a early recipe for Bacala a la Visentina I have translated from the Andrich family cookbook of 1800. A noble family from Belluno, this is the earliest recipe for this dish I have seen. For 6 servings.

300 g of soaked, beaten stockfish, ½ cup of grated parmigiano, ½ cup of flour, 1 cup of light fruity extra virgin oil, 3 thinly sliced onions, 3-4 cleaned, salted anchovies, 1 cup of chopped parsley, milk, salt and pepper to taste.

Put stockfish into a pan of boiling water, cover and remove from heat. Let sit about 15 minutes. Skin and de-bone fish. Cut into smallish pieces. Mix parmigiano and flour together on a plate and dredge each of the fish pieces well.

Sauté onions, parsley, and anchovies until the onions are soft. Do not let brown. In a heavy bottomed pot, put in a layer of onion mixture, then a layer of fish, then onions until everything is used up. Salt and pepper each layer. Pour milk over everything to cover. Put on a low flame covered, with a heat guard to cook for no less than 3 hours, shaking slightly from time to time so nothing sticks. At the end of this time, put the fish under the broiler to brown the top. (Serve with slices of grilled white polenta.) A tola co i nostri veci. M. Salvatori de Zuliani. Bon appetit!

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