When I visited Celli in Italy’s Romagna, for a media tasting of some of the sub-area’s best wines, it was hot. And I don’t mean equatorial-Africa hot (I’ve been there, and it’s pretty hot). I mean more like Houston-in-early-August levels of hot. Like, 3rd ring of the 7th Circle of Hell hot. The heat wave…
Category: kick-ass wines
Is Predappio Ready for Prime Time? (A Deep Dive Into Romagna’s Top-Tier Sangiovese Reds)
There’s a movement afoot in Italy’s Romagna to get Predappio Sangiovese—long the jewel in the crown of the region’s top reds, thanks to the diverse ochre and brown calcareous clay and yellow sand soils of its vineyards (thought to impart the wines with their distinct minerality—its own DOCG status. It’s a bit nascent for the…
Etna Flexes Its Premium Muscles (Palmento Costanzo Recent Releases)
Etna has spent the better part of a decade becoming the wine media’s darling, with many of us waxing poetic about the quality of “volcanic wines” (guilty!). And Etna is finally capitalizing on it. The Consorzio Tutela Vini Etna DOC has (as of early November 2023) voted unanimously to pursue “DOCG recognition for the entire…
Towering Pillars of Fresh (Torre Rosazza Friuli Recent Releases)
You gotta love an Italian’s sense of historical perspective. In the case of Torre Rosazza (whose wares I sampled during a virtual media tasting earlier this year), they’re named after the “Tower of Roses” (Palazzo De Marchi, near Oleis di Manzano), which was originally a fortress, but was converted to a dwelling… in 1550. So…