A Modena awakening, a Chicago tasting, and one very unexpected obsession

By: Brenda Storch

We sort of slipped into Casa Maria Luigia like we had wandered behind the velvet rope of someone else’s dream. Massimo Bottura and his wife, Lara Gilmore, have built a place that is half country estate, half art installation and entirely its own universe. After a small trip through winding roads, we were welcomed at the gates and escorted in through a patio. We saw celebrated chef Jessica Rosval cooking. She waved at us! Someone pinch me, please, and tell me I am not watching a cool travel show on Netflix. Then we were inside Al Gatto Verde, standing in a space that manages to feel both curated and  lived in.

We came for the food. Of course we did. I mean, Bottura is Bottura. And we had already been to Osteria Francescana, so the bar was high. But the meals here were something else. We enjoyed this experience so deeply. I have not had a chance to fully download it, partly because when I approach it, the light of the memory is so bright the longing is a little blinding. Food aside, and there is a point to this preamble, I promise, this is where I fell in love with vinegar.

Not the supermarket drizzle-in-a-salad kind. That is heresy. Like the idea of a taco in a hard shell.

I am talking about aceto balsamico tradizionale di Modena, simultaneously a living time capsule, a work of art and a chemical feat. And someone tells you, almost offhand, “These lines? In Modena, they get passed down as heirlooms.”

I learned that in Modena, traditional families start a new battery of barrels when a child is born. The vinegar ages with the child, who in turn becomes the custodian of the line. The practice carries both family memory and local identity.

Maybe it was the realization that people had been tending to these lines for generations. They believed in the slow work, the invisible work, the kind of work that pays off only if you are willing to think beyond your own lifespan. It reminded me of the love and dedication that winemakers pour into wine. I was moved.

The best vinegar is given as gifts and brought out for special celebrations. It’s as if vinegar here is part of the family, it’s not produced, it’s  raised.

At Casa Maria Luigia, the barrels in the attic, where they are kept to benefit from the weather shifts, resting in winter and breathing through the summer months, enjoy music and art. They get personal visits from Massimo Bottura as if he is checking in on old friends.

This is not a new obsession. Balsamico has been working its way through history with steady determination. The Romans were already cooking grape must down to syrup and drizzling it on anything that held still. By the Renaissance, it was an elixir, used for childbirth and treasured by the elites. Fast forward a few centuries and what we now call Balsamic Vinegar of Modena PGI is a global phenomenon. It moves through 130 countries and reaches nearly 95 million liters a year. It is a billion-euro heartbeat powered by grapes and time. A gift from Modena to the world.

Behind all of that is the Conzorsio Tutela Aceto Balsamico di Modena, which represents 83 percent of the producers in Modena. They protect the real thing, the PGI bottles with proper grapes, proper rules and a serious certification process. They keep the knockoffs out of your grocery cart and guard a tradition older than half the countries on modern maps.

So when they called, the Consortium, and asked if I wanted to taste balsamic across a handful of dishes, I said yes before they finished the sentence. We met at Avec in River North, landing a spot right next to none other than Cesare Mazzetti, the Consortium’s president, to learn first hand about the organization’s mission and the tests that aceto balsamico di Modena candidates are subjected to in order to acquire their certification seal.

Dish after dish landed perfectly and showcased the beauty and versatility of the product, elevating vegetables, fish, meat, even gelato with a slow, dark ribbon of balsamico. It was proof that this luxurious liquid is not only history in a bottle. It is a shape-shifter. A mood. A way of making ordinary things speak in ways that make you listen and remember.

Dishes at Avec, all prepared with aceto balsamico di Modena:

So yes, Casa Maria Luigia was spectacular. The food at Al Gatto Verde was unreal. The whole place felt like a secret garden that likes contemporary art and listens to vinyl. But in the end, it was all about the vinegar.

And honestly, I  can’t wait to go back.

Wondering if your aceto balsamico is the real deal?  Check out our guide!