The perfect complement to a clear blue sky, we take a look at some of Italy’s best rosé wines, with something special to suit every budget With rosé, as with red and white, Italy has a large variety of wines, and their respective styles vary tremendously, reflecting the diversity of grape variety, soil type, climate […]
There’s a delicious diversity to the wines of Veneto, thanks to the varying types of terrain and soil in this region. Here we explore some of its best reds… Although not vast in size, Veneto is one of the largest-producing regions of DOC wines in Italy. The variety of wine styles offered by Veneto are […]
Italy’s two largest islands produce sumptuous red wines of great quality and international renown, with prices to suit any budget. Our experts have chosen six examples to try… Sardinia and Sicily have a proud and long-lived history of wine production, dating from colonisation by the Greeks, whose presence dominated the islands from around 800 to […]
We asked our wine buyers to recommend good-value Italian red wines to enjoy this spring and beyond. Here are six we think will become favourites for 2018… Even if you have your ‘go-to’ wines, one of the joys of wine appreciation is finding a new bottle that surprises you and goes on to become a favourite. […]
From ‘Super Tuscan’ to Brunello, there are plenty of fine Tuscan non-Chianti reds, and they’re not all super-expensive either. Here’s a selection of Tuscan reds your wallet will love… Traditionally in Tuscany, if you were making red wine, you used indigenous Italian grape varieties like Sangiovese and that was that. During the late 1960s and […]
Sangiovese is the only grape permitted in the Brunello di Montalcino DOCG, where the people of the town make one of Italy’s best wines. But eight years ago, they nearly lost it all… In 2008, a scandal broke in Montalcino. It was said that certain people in this small but highly prestigious DOCG region had […]
Montepulciano D’Abruzzo: Reliable, mass produced and very drinkable, Hannah Bellis says there is life beyond house red for this southern grape… Anyone who has had more than a few glasses of red in their lifetime will have drunk Montepulciano d’Abruzzo. It is a famous name in that it is so widely available – it is […]
The red wines of Tuscany are many and varied – it’s not all about the Big Three. Paul Pettengale explores deeper into the region and picks some gems from off the beaten track… Although Tuscany is as well-known for its wines as for its rolling landscape and incredible sunlight, it’s actually a relatively small producer […]
Italian red wine: Dolcetto D’Alba Hannah Bellis goes beyond the famous and expensive Barolo and Barbaresco wines to discover Dolcetto, a great value, easy drinking red wine from Piedmont Piedmont was the first region I visited when I was old enough to appreciate wine. I was still too young to afford the legendary Barolos of […]
It is often mistaken for being from Abruzzo, but this lesser-known Italian red wine from a village in Tuscany is an absolute gem, as Paul Pettengale discovers… Tuscany is, as any wine lover will attest, one of the most important of Italy’s wine-producing zones, especially when it comes to the reds. The various Chianti wines […]