My new Wine Cellar
I started collecting wine in 1987, it was sort of a novelty at the time for me, which in turn grew to become my passion. The hardest part of starting my wine collection was the first fifty bottles. I would reach about twenty bottles of wine, have a dinner party, invite friends over and then I’d be back to fifteen bottles. When I first started dabbling in collecting, I would buy my wine one or two bottles of each particular wine at a time. Unfortunately, when I would then drink one of the two bottles, I never wanted to drink the second one for fear I could never replace it.
Fast forward to 2009, I now have a sizable wine collection, featuring about ninety percent Italian Wine. I store my wine in a climate controlled wine cellar and love entertaining and sharing my special wines with friends. The best part of having great wine is enjoying it with great food and friends. It’s funny how when I entertain, I plan meals around the wine I want to drink, not pick wines to go with the food I prepare.
This passion of Italian Food and Wine is what drove me to open Varano’s in 2000, there really weren’t many options for Italian dining in Southern Maine, and definitely not any options for good Italian Wine Lists. When I opened Varano’s, I made a conscientious decision to have an all Italian Wine List. Varano’s started with about seventy five wines and purchased a climate control armoire to store our nicer wines. Each year I increase the size of our wine list, staying true to our “Only Italian Wines on our list.” We currently have about two hundred and ten selections, feature a ten vintage vertical of Sassicaia and numerous selections from every region in Italy. The culmination of this passion is the unveiling of our new twenty-five hundred bottle climate control wine cellar. Our new custom mahogany racking was installed on March 27, and we will be spending the next several weeks reorganizing and transferring our wine.
We look forward to featuring a Chef’s Table in our new cellar, complete with faux fur wraps for the ladies. We don’t want them to be cold while enjoying their delicious meal. We also have the ability to lay down even more great wines and feature them with special wine dinners, which has become a great way to introduce some amazing wines to our guests. The highlight of these events is meeting the winemaker or owner of the vineyard. Our dinners always feature someone from the winery in Italy. Which gives our dinners an authenticity our guests enjoy.
From novelty to passion, the transformation in my life has been a twenty plus year story. I feel like the best is yet to come and I certainly will keep my new wine cellar in mind when I travel to Vin Italy in three days. I’m searching for new wines to share with my all my friends and customers. Every year for the past nine years, our wine sales have increased, this is probably one of the most satisfying accomplishments for me personally. I have met so many wonderful people in the Italian Wine Industry who have supported my efforts every step of the way.
The new goal for our restaurant is to try and import our own wine. This will give us the ability to find some amazing wines that might never be available to the United States. This is a cumbersome process, I feel it’s worth the effort and that our customers deserve only the best.
Dick Varano
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