More Distinctive Reds from Il Bel Paese

When I am invited to the tasting dinners hosted by Paolo Milani and the Consorzio Selezione Vini Italiani, with New York importer Chris Rudney of Great Sunsan Wine Imports, I always take the subway to the event.  And a taxi home. It's a dinner.  No spit buckets. 

You eat.  You drink. (<--This is a wine link.) You sniff and twirl and sip (<--this too) and do the mouthwash thing (<--and this) and, finally, because it's been a hard long day and you're starved, you eat and drink.  (<--Get the idea?) And drink and eat.  And drink and drink because the stuff's so interesting and, well, wholesome. 

Hence the splurge on the taxi afterwards.  Else you'd be reading about a smiling grey-haired man sliding onto the tracks in front of the B train.  Or, nearly as bad, I'd find myself at a Kingdom Hall in Canarsie at 4 AM. 

At the tasting dinner ten days ago, I tasted (if my joyful guzzling can be called tasting) De Tarczal's Pinot Bianco and Marzemino for the first time, and I wrote about them soon after.

I wanted to call out a couple of other distinctive and authentic reds.  One is from my almost buddies, the Trevisani brothers of the Lake Garda area, and the other is from a young vignaiolo with a famous and ancient name: Andrea Doria.

 

The Trevisanis were well represented at the tasting dinner -- their Bali' Chardonnay/Sauvignon Blanc was the standout of the evening's whites -- but it was their Diana that captured my imagination.  This is an intriguing blend of Rebo (80%), a rather rangy local variety smoothed and softened by a judicious percentage of Merlot. It develops briefly with six months in oak and three in bottle, and it is faintly spicy and brambly-fruity up front, with a finish made longer and a little plush by the Merlot.  Like a rugged farmer wearing a Sunday suit with an expensive tie.  It is, as they say, compulsively drinkable.

Old School Barbera

The standout wine by Andrea Doria, in the Oltrepo' Pavese, was his family firm's Barbera aged in chestnut casks.  As you might imagine, this Barbera had a "wilder", more countrified tang, with the chestnut lending an almost horsy quality to the wine.  The wood tamed those tannins and held this strong  2003 in a sort of exuberant balance.  Something new and wild for me, and I would love to have more.

That would be a hint, gentlemen.

Comments

[Alfonso]

countrified tang? that's right up there with chiming acid.
right on!

[Terry Hughes]

Alfonso, you beat Fredric to it! ;))

[Fredric Koeppel]

and the countried farmer in his suit and expensive tie aint bad either! I'll have to use that one (with due credit of course)...

[Terry Hughes]

I blush.