...with apologies to Amerigo Vespucci.

If Signore Vespucci knew what this American Troglodyte was going to do to his country's amazing cuisine he'd roll over in his grave - though to many, 'american' and 'troglodyte' are redundant. Here's why.

I had a hankering for meatballs and tomato sauce, so I made meatballs and tomato sauce. Standard meatballs, but with spinach added. Feta would have been good in them. And a curried tomato sauce: onion, jalapeno, garlic, ginger with a basic curry powder plus anise and red pepper flakes. The sauce was amazing! Served over spaghetti squash. (It counts, it has the word 'spaghetti' in it.)

I topped the squash with some Podere Cogno olive oil from Tuscany, home to the world's greatest olive oils. I also opened a 2000 Elio Altare Barolo wine, which, though geographically not Chianti-esque, is still more in the ball park than the curry in the sauce. There's a grape named Nebbiolo? This one had eleven years to work out its thing, and I assure you, it did so swimmingly. Nice medium bodied red wine, nice fruit and spice things, not at all too tannic, very pleasant.

"Tutti a tavola a mangiare!" Loosely translated: Dig in, dem's good eats.