Tag Archives: italy

Thirsty Thursday: Il Poggione, Brunello di Montalcino, Riserva, Italy 2006

Posted on May 29, 2014 by waywardwine

This Thirsty Thursday, Wayward Wine splurges and satisfies its Europhilia with a bottle from Italy. Box Chianti this ain’t. No, within Tuscany, within Chianti, within Brunello di Montalcino, within Il Poggione’s 309 acres, sits a single vineyard called Vigna Paganelli. These … Continue reading →

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged Archaeology, Brunello, Brunello di Montalcino, il poggione, italy, Sangiovese, travel, wine | 3 Comments

Thirsty Thursday: Mother’s Day Rosé Cliché

Posted on May 8, 2014 by waywardwine

Mother’s Day is at bay. Now you could get creative and buy her Single Malt Whiskey (could work). But honestly, Spring is also here (well, mostly). Flowers bloom. These warm-ish, sunny-ish days call from something fresh, fruity, and friendly. A bellowing cabernet might distract from those lovely conversations about why you haven’t had kids yet.

So embrace that marketed cliché: buy rosé for Mother’s Day!

But since you might drink it as well, why not stretch her and your boundaries with a region too often lost in the pink sea of white zin and Provence: Bardolino Chiaretto Continue reading →

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged Bardolino Chiaretto, Corvina, italy, Mollinara, Mothers Day, Rondinella, Rosé, Santi | 1 Comment

Thirsty Thursday: Nebbiolo, Nino Negri, Quadrio, Valtellina Superiore DOCG, Italy 2010

Posted on May 1, 2014 by waywardwine

Think Nebbiolo and hopefully your heart flies to Barbaresco or Barolo: famed homes devoted to the grape. Their wines range from light yet tannic, austere yet floral, to rich, dark, and chewy. They are usually complex and deservedly expensive.

But unknown to a world before DNA, Nebbiolo spread its fingers up valleys, reaching into the Italian Alps. It crept into land-locked Lombardy, rooting in the canyon valley of Valtellina. Continue reading →

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged DOCG, italy, nebbiolo, Nino Negri, Quadrio, Valtellina Superiore | 3 Comments

Thirsty Thursday: Nero d’Avola, COS, Nero di Lupo, Sicilia IGT 2011

Posted on April 3, 2014 by waywardwine

For Christmas we suggested a wild Sicilian red aged in pithoi (read here). This Thirsty Thursday, we revisit Azienda Agricola COS in Southeastern Sicily (because we can’t help ourselves).

Again, the grape is Nero d’Avola. Again, wild yeasts did the work, biodynamic principles reigned supreme, and nothing beyond a dash of sulfur was added to the wine.

Yet this time, instead of those gloriously anochronistic pithoi (ceramic jugs), modernism creeps in with two years of cellaring in cement tanks under temp control.

The result? Continue reading →

Posted in Nero D'Avola, Red | Tagged Azienda Agricola COS, COS, Italian wine, italy, Nero D'Avola, Nero di Lupo, Sicily, wine | 7 Comments

Thirsty Thursday: Nino Franco, Faìve, Spumante Brut Rosé, Valdobbiadene, Italy 2011

Posted on February 20, 2014 by waywardwine

This Thirsty Thursday takes us to Italy. Just above Venice is Valdobbiadene: cradle of Prosecco.

But today’s wine is weird. It looks neither pale green, sweet, nor made from Glera (Prosecco’s only grape). It is pink:

But not just any pink. This glinting, copper flame lives up to its name: Faìve (FieEEve): poetically Italian for those sparks and tongues whipping about at the top of a fire.

So what goes in it?

Around 2000, Primo Franco got bored with perfecting fantastic, dry, single-vineyard Prosecco that was changing the world. So he went to buddy Brandino Brandolini, who grows red grapes. But they broke with Champagne’s (and the world’s) Pinot-hegemony. Heck, they also left red Italian varietals behind. Instead, they used Merlot and Cabernet: grapes that rarely see the light of bubbly. But this ain’t a red Bordeaux. Continue reading →