Of the many things I like about being alive, wine with cardoons is one of them.
     For you new to the subject, wine is fermented grape juice. You don’t ask the juice to ferment. It wants to. Fermentation is the work of yeasts that turn sugar into alcohol. Let’s stop for a moment to simply say, Thank you, Mother Nature! Way to go! Too cool!
     And cardoons, I now grow my own, because the fresher the better, and you don’t often see them for sale. The plant can easily be mistaken for an artichoke, but we humans only eat artichokes’ flower buds and cardoons’ stalks. I have read that cardoons are difficult to prepare. Not true, thankfully, because getting bogged down in the kitchen bugs me. If you know how to de-string celery branches, that’s exactly what you do with cardoons. True, a cardoon rib resists being de-strung more than celery does. Not a big deal, I promise. So, with a paring knife, pull off the tough strings, then cut the ribs into bite-sized slices and boil them until your knife’s point glides right on through. Is that so difficult? Pull strings; boil ’til tender. All this verbiage is designed to acquaint you with cardoons so that when you find some to prepare, you’ll feel like you already know them.
     My favorite renditions have been in Piedmont at the Osteria del Boccondivino in Bra, between Turin and Alba. They often serve cardoons with a bagna cauda, because cardoons and anchovies go together like a horse and carriage. Last night, I put the boiled stalks into a gratin dish and poured an anchoïade over them. Then I drizzled some cream over that. After baking it for about thirty minutes at 380°, I sprinkled the surface with Parmesan and returned it to the oven for another fifteen minutes.
     The ultimate cardoon preparation exists only during Piedmont’s white truffle season, and long may it live, but I’ll bet black truffles would work as well. Bake boiled cardoons in a blend of cream and pecorino cheese. While the gratin is still good and hot, at table it is showered with thinly sliced white truffles. The resulting perfume is one of the best things in the world. I mean, I get a kick from what van Gogh can do with a cypress tree, and Beethoven’s last piano sonata recorded by Arturo Benedetti Michelangeli is divine, but don’t knock this cardoon/white truffle gratin. Imagine all that occurring at once. Your eyes are filled with one of van Gogh’s cypresses, your ears with late Beethoven, your nose and palate with the explosive majesty of the gratin!
     What’s missing from this Fireworks for the Senses? Well, at home or in Piedmont, I always drink either Nebbiolo or Barbera with said gratin, so last night I pulled out a 1997 Barbaresco from Silvio Giamello. His under-the-house winery perched above his steep, amphitheater-shaped vineyard is on the outskirts of the village, Barbaresco, where his wife works delivering mail for the post office. It was a remarkable marriage, and I don’t mean Silvio and Marina. I am not privy to that information. No, I’m talking about the way the cardoons made the Barbaresco taste better and vice versa.