Robert V. Camuto

Individualistic and sometimes iconoclastic, these winemakers look to the past for clues on making distinctive wines

By Robert Camuto - Wine Spectator May 31, 2012

For a new wave of Italian winemakers, great wine is about mixing modern wine knowledge with old-fashioned know-how. In the past 10 years, some young Italians have returned to the land, leaving city life behind and often taking radical steps to shift winemaking back toward its local, small-scale roots.Though many are armed with university degrees having nothing to do with agriculture or enology, they are returning to their ancestral soils to work for themselves. And they are looking to the past, making boutique wines using artigianale (artisanal) methods and green farming, bolstered by a minimum of modern enology. Read full article in the Wine Spectator

A Mediterranean island that has it all: sea, sun, mountains, great food and an exciting wine scene

By Robert Camuto - Wine Spectator April 30, 2012

There are long stretches of Corsica's coastline so stunningly beautiful and wild they make you feel like you could be in one of the Mediterranean's most legendary spots-like the Amalfi Coast or the French Riviera-of a hundred years ago.

As you drive miles and miles of narrow and often rutted two-lane roads through knuckle-whitening turns, it's difficult not to be awed by the scene. Corsica's west coast is nearly devoid of mankind's influence-it's just you and steep, granite cliffs in shades of red and gold that plunge to a pristine sea.....read the full article in the Wine Spectator.

France's Roussillon region is known for dessert wines—to the extent that it's known at all. Yet it's becoming a source for bottlings that compare to the world's best reds, thanks to visionary winemakers like California's Dave Phinney.

By Robert Camuto

"Can we buy this?" Dave Phinney asked, pointing to a Grenache vineyard clinging to soil so dense that it looked more like rock....read more in Food & Wine Magazine.

By Robert V. Camuto

Special to the Washington Post

Our group landed at the Agadir airport at dusk and drove south for more than two hours along two-lane roads, through tiny Moroccan towns filled with mud puddles after recent rains. At Mirleft, we turned off the coastal road into the town — a grid of a few dirt streets lined with low white- and turquoise-painted cinder-block buildings.

Men cloaked in Jedi-like robes — traditional North African djellabas — sipped hot mint tea on the terraces of small cafes. Women veiled in brightly colored, patterned Saharan fabrics walked home from evening errands. Children played and fought in the street alongside lost-looking dogs. Meat hung out in the open in front of butcher stalls; Berber music blared from a few shops showing off silver and stone trinkets, brightly colored soccer balls, woven baskets, fabrics and other household goods.

Robert Camuto @ The Wine Bottega from Stephanie Najor on Vimeo.

ROBERT V. CAMUTO Special to Newsday 

A funny thing happened on the way to 21st century: Berlin became cool.

Since the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989, the German capital has been rebuilt with an extraordinary mix of modern architecture, frankness about its past and an abundance of artistic energy.

Once neglected, war-damaged areas in the heart of Berlin have sprouted new museums, art galleries and design houses. Art and...read more in Newsday