Modo di Bere

For the Boot in 20 series, an expert brings an Italian wine region to life, talking grapes, wines, climate and tradition–and advice for planning a visit! For the Marche, Rose Thomas interviews Tiziana Forni, a native of Ancona and a wine professional who specializes in Italian wines.

Tiziana explains the etymology of the plural region name "Le Marche." She shares sayings about and from Marche, and goes over the major and minor grap...

Angela and Marianna Velenosi discuss the local wine grapes of Marche and Abruzzo, describing the history, flavors and names of white grapes like Verdicchio, Pecorino, and Trebbiano, and red grapes like Montepulciano and Lacrima. Hear some local sayings from Abruzzo, where Angela is from, and Marche, where her daughter Marianna grew up, and learn why Marianna describes the Marche region as “a gem that has not been discovered yet" in...

Travel creator Penelope aka The Flyaway Girl shares the romantic story of how she came home to Gibraltar. From the sound of Llanito, the local language, to the flavor of frozen Sun Cola in a sawed-off carton, Penelope paints a delicious picture of the territory built on a historic rock.  This is especially impressive given that Penelope is a photographer with aphantasia, the inability to visualize images in her mind. Penelope didn...

When Abe Zarate chose sobriety during the pandemic, he returned to his restaurant career with a new reality. Abe shares the logistics of working around alcohol without consuming it. This episode is a frank discussion about what it's like for wine professionals who decide to consume less alcohol. 

Is Dry January a threat to the industry? Does neo-prohibition truly loom? The two sommeliers discuss recent news around alcohol and healt...

Brian Gelletly is a barista trainer with a sensitivity to caffeine. Brian and Rose Thomas share the secrets of beverage professionals who spend their days spitting out their favorite drinks In Modo di Bere's first episode about coffee. They divulge specific spitting techniques, from spittoon styles to mustache technique, along with general advice for avoiding machismo and protecting your health as a student of liquids.

Brian and RT...

When the waiter pours a taste of wine for you and it's your job to inspect that wine for flaws, while the sommelier and your fellow dinner guests look on, this episode is your guide to how to taste that wine with confidence. Wine flavor scientist Dr. Rachel B. Allison and Rose Thomas go over the different smells and tastes that answer the question "How do you know if a wine has gone off?" once and for all. Even better, Dr. Allison ...

Blind tasting—deducing the grape, age and geographic origin of a wine based on sensory analysis alone—can seem like the wine world’s most mystical practice. Wine flavor scientist Dr. Rachel B. Allison came on the Modo di Bere podcast to break down exactly how it’s done. You can watch Dr. Allison blind taste a wine in the video version of the podcast, and maybe even start to learn how to blind taste wine yourself.

Dr. Alliso...

You can wash a donkey’s head, but you’ll waste your water, your soap, and your time. If you have a woman, a drum, and a duck, you have a revolution. You’ve got more horns than a chariot full of snails. Do you want to know what these sayings mean? Do you think donkeys are cute? Do you like history, music or Sicily? This episode is for you!

The conversation between Modo di Bere host Rose Thomas and Sicilian American singer and folklo...

This is just a preview of our Patreon-exclusive bonus episode. You can listen to the entire episode, and watch the full video, by becoming a supporter at the Podcast Lover level. Just visit the link patreon.com/mododibere in your web browser to sign up and unlock this bonus content.  "Under Construction" is a memoir essay about building a home out of food, in the projects of East New York and at the International Culinary Center. ...

Michele Thomas is a writer, sommelier and the manager and buyer at a neighborhood wine shop in Brooklyn. RT and Michele are old friends from RT's wine rep days. They get together to dish about the purpose of tasting notes, the art of wine writing, and how to welcome new drinkers into the world of wine. Also: pairing Italian wine with jerk chicken, wine as a second or third act career, Cynar and tonic with a lime as the perfect "s...

Calabrian rhyming toasts. A drinking song from Padua. Kinetic toasts from France and Spain. Taiwanese dialect for “Bottoms up!” Modo di Bere host Rose Thomas shares funny drinking sayings from around the world in the Season Three trailer for the podcast about local drinks and local sayings. Never stop learning how to say cheers, wherever you go, whatever you like to drink. 

Video podcast now available! Watch this episode on YouTube...

Rose Thomas spills the prosecco on Italian swears, her favorite Italian gesture, the ultimate spritz recipe, and the bartender travel advice that could cure your ennui. This travel story episode reveals more background about the name "Modo di Bere" and RT's frame of mind as she claimed permission to enjoy her first visit to Venice. Referenced in the episode:  Bele Casel Prosecco from Asolo DOCG Ca' Nigra Lagoon Resort 

Sam Bail was feeling better. So much better that two months into her sobriety experiment, she knew she wasn’t going back to drinking alcohol. But she missed her softball team, and all the other relationships she made at her local watering hole—her “third place,” where she socialized when not at work or at home in a tiny apartment. And this is New York. In a city that has everything, was nursing a seltzer all night rea...

The gustatory glory of multicultural NYC has been food writer Giulia Álvarez-Katz's stomping ground for as long as she can remember. Rose Thomas dusts off her mixology skills with a custom Third Place cocktail in honor of Giulia's video series about the places where New Yorkers loiter, shoot the shit and congregate. RT and Giulia discuss the process, if any, of becoming a New Yorker. Giulia dishes on: Her favorite takeout. Breaking...

In her literary memoir The Rye Bread Marriage, author and food writer Michaele Weissman turns her skills with history, psychology and adventure to her own family story. This interview begins with the travel story that led to Michaele's seminal book on specialty coffee. It goes on to describe the Latvian poetry and the loaves of bread that opened up Michaele's understanding in ways that surprised her as a writer and as a human being...

As an advocate for small growers with her company Wine Soul, Alessandra Caroni educates us about Trento DOC, a sparkling wine made in the classic method from grapes grown in the Dolomite Mountains. Maso Martis is the organic brand she represents in Trento DOC. These wines from the Northern Italian region of Trentino area fantastic value for sparkling wine fans who are shopping outside the champagne box.

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Culinary historian and bakery manager Avery Robinson works with a nonprofit called Rye Revival, encouraging people to plant and enjoy more rye. Avery explains what’s special about rye for ecology, distillation, nutrition and cultural connection. He shares Yiddish drinking sayings and thoughts on drinking as an agricultural act while he and Rose Thomas taste Balcones rye whiskey and enjoy three types of rye bread from Black Rooster ...

Susannah Gold returns as the expert on Lombardia for the Modo di Bere series The Boot in 20. For each of Italy's 20 wine regions, Rose Thomas asks an expert to bring the map to life, identifying major grapes, wines, soils and microclimates. Susannah tells stories about the region's history, considers the future in terms of climate change, and shares advice about planning a visit!  What's the smallest DOCG in Italy? What do they ca...