This high-end Valpolicella, which until recently was labelled as IGT Veronese, contains the well known Veneto varieties of Corvina and Rondinella together with rare, Masi-rediscovered variety Oseleta. Toar refers to the…
Riecene Chianti Classico and IGT Toscana
It’s fair to say that I am not the biggest Sangiovese fan out there. But when I come across great wines, I don’t mind what they are made from or…
Eugenio Collavini Refosco ‘Pucino’ 2013 Friuli Colli Orientali, Italy
This is interesting. And we like ‘interesting’ here. [And I’m not using ‘interesting’ in the typical British sense, which is when a grower shows you a bad wine you politely…
Barraco Vignammare 2013, an incredible Sicilian white
Dear readers, I hope you don’t tire of my hyperbolic descriptors. ‘Remarkable’, ‘Sensational’, ‘Incredible’. I’m beginning to sound like a Daily Mail wine critic. After all, one route to success…
Massolino Barolo 2010
One of my many themes of 2014 was an attempt to get to grips with Nebbiolo, which I’ve always found one of the trickiest of grape varieties to love, as…
Monsanto Il Poggio Chianti Classico Riserva 2009
Chianti. I’ve struggled a bit with it. It can be great, but often it’s a bit difficult and surly. It’s like a moody friend: you have to wait for the…
Ageno la Stoppa, a distinctive orange wine from Italy
This is one of those distinctive skin contact white wines that I think I liked quite a lot. But I wasn’t totally sure. If you’ve never tried Brettanomyces in white…
Don’t spit great wine!
In the wine trade, we taste. And then we spit. Have to, really, otherwise we’d all be permanently drunk and would die young. Sometimes, though, a wine is too good…
Cascina Degli Ulivi A Demua – a lovely natural white from Piedmont
This natural Piedmont white is really interesting. It’s a blend of several local varieties, fermented on skins for a month using native yeasts in barrel. Then the wine is pressed…