The Wines of Bin 26

Babak
and his sister Azita Bina-Seibel are equal partners in the
restaurants and wines; she is the executive chef for both
places. She was actually in the kitchen at Bin 26 when I had
lunch that day: a gently autocratic presence with long,
straight salt and pepper hair, and a true concern about her
food and her customers. The siblings have a hands-on
partnership in the two restaurants.

Babak and I are sitting by
the window in the wine bar: a long narrow room, brown, woody
and spare. Casual enough to attract a local upscale
clientele as well as tourists for lunch, and a bar crowd of
young professionals after work. My first question: with two
busy restaurants, why take on a huge project like making
wine in Italy, importing it and marketing it here? Babak
replies with remarkably introspective honesty: “For several
reasons. For us, to keep life interesting. For a human being
– at least for me – as soon as we achieve something, we want
to up it by a level.” This is classic entrepreneurial
thinking.

Babak and Azita’s wine
project had a long history. And it required the patience to
weather false starts as well as the experience to keep it on
track. When they began the project some years ago, Babak and
his sister Azita had been involved with Italian cuisine for
some time, having owned Toscano and Azita restaurants in
Boston. You might know that Lala Rokh’s “Eastern
Mediterranean” food is based on Babak and Azita’s Persian
heritage. So why did the sister and brother start out in
Italian food? Babak relates: “I got into it because one of
my best friends was Italian.” He started working in Italian
restaurants in 1981. “I just wanted to fit in with all the
other kids,” he admits. “So I started asking all my friends,
‘What do you do? What do you do for the summer?” Babak’s
father owned several (non-restaurant) businesses and thought
Babak was crazy, but told his son “Go ahead if that’s what
you really want to do.”

A few years later, Azita
wanted to fill a void by opening a Northern Italian
restaurant because there wasn’t one in Boston – in 1983.
Both of their original restaurants were quite successful. By
the time they began thinking about their own wines, “we
obviously truly knew Italian food and Italian wine,” Babak
concludes – and this background is important. Deciding that
Pinot Grigio would complement the food at Lala Rokh, they
looked to one of the premier producers of this wine, Italy’s
far northeastern province of Friuli. There they found
winemaker Alessandro Furlan who created his namesake “Al
Furlan” wine for them. The 2OO6 is 1OO% pinot grigio,
hand-harvested. Furlan allows a medium amount of skin
contact, says, Babak. “That’s where the beautiful golden
color comes in.” He made only 27O cases, described by Babak
as “small production, high quality, well rounded, with a
good balance of acidity and fruit.”

When Babak and Azita
decided to delve more deeply into the wine business, they
thought about establishing a wine bar and perhaps even their
own wine shop or retail line. With their Italian connections
they found another winemaker they liked, in Umbria. They
began tasting, eventually decided on a blend, and contracted
with quality vineyards and with a winemaker to make a vino
da tavola type Umbrian IGT wine – quality controlled, but
for everyday drinking. They created a distinctive label with
a bright yellow color inspired by the sunflowers near the
vineyards, and brown accents which give the very modern
design a slightly retro feel.

Babak says, “Those who know
us thought it would be [a]; natural [next
step].” Apparently these siblings have a ton of extra
energy, I’m thinking, as Babak admits, “Dealing with another
country – it is crazy.” Unfortunately, their first vintage
of Solare didn’t come out the way they wanted. Concerned
with quality, they realized they couldn’t serve this wine at
their restaurants, and they made a difficult choice. “We had
to dump the 2OO5,” Babak states simply. Still, he and his
sister persisted, moving their projects forward. They opened
their wine bar, Bin 26 Enoteca, in September 2OO6. Its menu
is Italian, and their new wine was meant to complement this
food. Back in Italy, they went forward with the wine,
commissioning a new vintage.

In Umbria, Azita and Babak
are currently working with Maurilio Chioccia, a well-known
winemaker/consultant in the area. Their vineyards are near
Orvieto in the southern part of Umbria. This is in central
Italy, where, according to Babak, the volcanic, gravelly
soil contributes to the chosen flavor profile of their
wines. It’s a pastoral area, dotted with farms, olive trees
and woods. Still rural, it is a vacation area for Italians,
and is gradually being discovered by outsiders. Here, the
grapes are also hand harvested: Sangiovese and Merlot for
the red, with the white a blend of local Trebbiano called
Procanico, along with Grachetto, Malvasia and a little
Sauvignon Blanc. And they use no oak barrels to age either
the red or the white wine.

A few months later – very
early in the following year – Babak and Azita tasted the
2OO6 vintage wine and it worked. They had it bottled and
began shipping it over, a few hundred cases at a time,
cleared by Boston-based M.S. Walker. It’s still small
production: 5OO cases of Solare Rosso (red) and 66O of
Solare Bianco (white). When it first arrived last January
“it was very angry,” Babak recalls. In a few months it had
settled down (which is not uncommon) and people have been
enjoying it for some time. Babak says the Rosso is very good
now, and will age for some years. The Bianco is for more
immediate enjoyment; it has a plastic cork, which is
appropriate when a wine is meant to be consumed within a
year or so of release. They are selling it by the glass,
taste, carafe and bottle at Bin 26 and also by the bottle at
a couple of wine shops such as BRIX Wine Shop in the South
End and nearby Charles Street Liquors. Daniel Edwards, one
of the managers at BRIX, told me they began selling Solare
wines in the summer. The white sold well then, and it has
only fallen off as the red picked up during the
fall.

Babak and Azita are also
working toward another release: a higher end, higher priced
wine, possibly a SuperTuscan – a rich, full, bodied and
ageable wine. They may also produce more wines in the
future, “possibly only for retail,” Babak says. “We will
perfect this process. If everything goes smoothly we will
expand the idea,” he explains. This is a good template for
any ongoing business, a guiding philosophy which – along
with a lot of hard work – has allowed Babak and Azita to
become successful in their various ventures.

Is there perhaps another
new venture in the works, possibly also dealing with Italian
food? Without getting into detail, Babak admits, “We’re
working hard to bring to fruition a gourmet food shop as
well as a new restaurant.” Stayed tuned for Babak and Azita,
vintage 2OO8.