If you have plans next Tuesday, cancel them. And if you don't have plans, here's what you're going to do. You're going to get your favorite bottle of wine (high quality, I hope) or something special that you've been waiting to drink, and you're going to bring it down to Emporio Rulli in the Marina. After being seated, you're going to have the bottle opened and you're going to share a taste with the chef. And then the chef will go back in his kitchen and create the best pairing you could ever have imagined with that wine.

This only works, of course, because said chef is no ordinary chef. It's been well-documented that Angelo Auriana, the former culinary master behind LA's Valentino (which for many was the best Italian restaurant in the country under his stewardship), has been pulling shifts for a while now at Rulli, especially on weekends, where he creates the menu. (Auriana moved up north a few years ago to head up a restaurant in the Sierra foothills, but eventually moved out here.) But it's less well known that Tuesdays are his "experimental" days and that he invites anyone in to have him cook toward the wine. And after the meal I had, I can attest to two things--Auriana's wine knowledge is vast (especially for a chef) and his palate is superb. The dishes he concocted for our meal--centered around the wines of Dalla Terra Imports--were as spectacular as the wines (which were themselves amazing, especially for the prices on such bottles as Adami Prosecco, Lageder "Benefizium Porer" Pinot Grigio, Selvapiana Chianti, Aviognese Vino Nobile, etc . . . check the Dalla Terra website for the entire portfolio; most of the wines will be familiar to you).

So, go, wine in hand to Rulli on a Tuesday night. And be prepared to be dazzled. And full, because you've got to also save some room for Gary Rulli's Cannoli and other assorted delicacies.