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Friulano - Friuli, Italy and Goriška Brda, Slovenia 


Sparkling Nebbiolo and Nebbiolo Bianco - Piemonte and Lombardy, Italy At some point in the next few hours, Fringe Wine will pass the 50,000 page view mark.  When I first started writing this blog, I had no idea if anyone would care about these grapes and wines and, further, I didn't know if anybody would care what I had to say about them.  The first full month that the blog was online I got a total of 21 pageviews.  The next month was somehow worse as there was only  a total of 20 pageviews.  I kept plugging away at it and slowly but surely traffic started to rise.  It has taken 19 months to get to 50,000 views, but if traffic holds steady, it will only take about another 7 to get 50,000 more (and if it continues to increase as it has, we'll get there in about half that time).  I've learned so much in the course of writing this blog and have gotten to meet many interesting and amazing people.  I'm blown away every day to see how many people are reading the things that I've written and am grateful to everyone who takes the time to check it out.

In celebration of reaching this milestone I'd like to write about a couple of really interesting wines I've had recently that were made from the Nebbiolo grape.  Nebbiolo is one of the world's great grapes, forming the base of two of the world's most spectacular wines, Barolo and Barbaresco.  I wouldn't ordinarily write about wines made from it, but these two wines were made in very unique styles.  One of them was a white table wine, similar in style to the Blanc de Franc I took at look at a few months back, while the other was a fully sparkling metodo classico rosé wine made by four young winemakers in Piemonte who became friends while attending oenology school together.  But before we get to those wines, let's take a look at the Nebbiolo grape and see if we can learn a bit more about it.

Nebbiolo's name is thought to come from the Italian word nebbia, which means fog and is a reference to the dense fog that tends to form in the Langhe river around harvest time each year.  To be as widely esteemed as it is, plantings of Nebbiolo are shockingly low and not geographically widespread at all.  It is planted on only about 5,000 hectares (about 12,700 acres) of land, which places it well outside of the top 20 most widely planted grapes in Italy (Aglianico sits at number 20 with just over 18,000 acres planted as of 2000).  For comparison's sake, Catarratto is planted on over 100,000 acres of land in Italy, but you'd have a much more difficult time finding a wine made from Catarratto at your local wineshop than you would one from Nebbiolo.  Nebbiolo is planted almost exclusively in northwestern Italy in various parts of Piemonte, the Valle d'Aosta and Lombardia.  There are plantings scattered in other areas of the world, but the grape just doesn't seem to do well outside of very selected areas in Italy.  It is a unique grape in that it seems to perform well in a few very specific, very small places and nowhere else.  Of all of the great wine grapes in the world, Nebbiolo is far and away the most scarce and prices for the best wines made from it definitely show it.

There are three main Nebbiolo clones that make up most of the plantings of the grape: Lampia, Michet and Rosé.  Nebbiolo Lampia is the most common of the three and is the vine we are generally referring to when we talk about Nebbiolo.  The Nebbiolo vine is particularly susceptible to viral infections and Nebbiolo Michet is essentially a Nebbiolo Lampia vine that has been infected with a particular virus which causes the vine's canes to fork.  In a presentation (link is currently dead...similar paper can be found here, in Italian) given at the Nebbiolo Grapes conference in 2004 (in Italian), a team of scientists reported that Nebbiolo Rosé is actually a genetically distinct variety, though it does have a parent-offspring relationship with Nebbiolo Lampia (though we don't know which way the arrow is pointing).  This team also found that Nebbiolo Lampia was very closely related to Freisa and to Vespolina, among a handful of other Piemontese obscuranda.  Decanter filed a report based on this presentation later that year where they claim that Nebbiolo is related to Viognier, though close reading of the article shows that they are overstating the case.  Since Freisa is related to Nebbiolo, then grapes that Freisa are related to are also grapes that Nebbiolo is related to.  The research team found that Freisa had a lot of genetic similarities to Viognier, but they stopped short of saying that there was any provable familial relationship and I've not been able to find any publications since that time which were able to comment on the case with any certainty.  It seems likely that there's some kind of relationship, but we just don't have enough evidence at this point to say one way or the other. The first of the two wines that I'd like to talk about was the 2010 Pietro Nera "La Novella" from the Terrazze Retiche di Sondrio IGT, which I believe is in the Valtellina area of Lombardia.  The wine is made from 80% Nebbiolo and 20% Chardonnay and, as mentioned above, is a white wine.  I picked this bottle up from my friends at the Gypsy Kitchen for about $21.  In the glass the wine was a very pale silvery lemon color with some greenish tints to it.  The nose was moderately intense with aromas of pears and ripe red apples.  On the palate the wine was on the lighter side of medium with high acidity.  There were flavors of green apple and meyer lemon with some ripe pear and white peach.  It was sharp and zippy but had a bitter, pithy kind of finish.  From the nose you'd expect a broad, ripe flavor profile, but it's actually fairly lean and little bit tart.  It's a really cool wine and it's good, but the price is a little high for what you get.  It's an interesting novelty but it's hard to imagine buying a case of something like this. The second wine that I tried was the 2006 Erpacrife sparkling Nebbiolo which I picked up from my friends at the Wine Bottega for $75.  This wine is made by four young winemakers who met in oenology school and decided to make a sparkling Nebbiolo for their thesis project.  They continued to make it after they graduated by using the fruit from some of the younger Nebbiolo vines on their properties.  The name "Erpacrife" is a combination of the first syllable of each of their names: Erik, Paolo, Cristian and Federico.  It's a traditional method sparkler with no added dosage.  In the glass this wine was a medium pink color with vigorous bubble.  The nose was strikingly intense with candied strawberry and rose petal aromas.  On the palate the wine was light bodied with very high acid and intense bubbles.  The flavor was very floral with rosewater, dried strawberries and something a little bit tarry.  There wasn't a great deal of depth to the wine but the flavors were pure and intense.  $75 is a lot of money to pay for wine but this was so unique and so tasty that I wouldn't have any problem at all paying that amount again for another bottle.  It's really just a fantastic wine.
Posted by Rob Tebeau at 3:25 PM 4 comments: Labels: Italy, Lombardy, Nebbiolo, Piemonte, Rosé Wine, Sparkling Wine, White Wine


Favorita and DNA Microsatellite Analysis - La Morra, Piemonte, Italy What is one to do with a grape like Favorita?  According to the Italian wine authorities, Favorita is a distinct grape variety, but according to the scientists, it is genetically identical to both Vermentino and Pigato.  What are those of us who are fanatical about classification to do with Favorita, Pigato and Vermentino?

Those of you who are familiar with this blog are aware that this is an issue that has caused me to spill a considerable amount of ink.  My most complete treatment of the issue can be found in the Roter Traminer article, though I do touch on the issue in my Malvasia Nera post as well as my Pigato post.  The question I'm wrestling with in all of those posts concerns the point at which a clonal variant becomes differentiated enough to be considered a separate grape variety.  Where do we draw that line?  How different is different enough to be considered separate?

Believe it or not, this question was actually much easier to answer before the arrival and widespread use of DNA testing for grapes.  Ampelography was (and technically still is, I suppose, though there are precious few ampelographers in the traditional sense of the word anymore) the science of grapevine identification and differentiation using the physical characteristics of the vine itself.  Leaf shape and size was perhaps the most widely used measure for ampelographers, but other factors such as grape size and color and bunch size and shape were used not only to identify unknown vines in the vineyard but also to differentiate grape varieties from one another.  This was not a perfect system by any means and there have been some fairly famous gaffes made by ampelographers in the past (like the mistaking of Carmenere with Merlot or of Sauvignon Blanc with Friulano in Chile, for example, though to be fair both of those cases were also eventually sorted out by ampelographers), but there's a certain kind of elegance and intuitive sense to classifying plants this way.

The areas where ampelography has been found the most wanting, especially in recent years, concern those cases of vines that are likely clonally descended from a common ancestor, but which have been spread out geographically over a long period of time and have developed mutations along the way. All of the mutations that happen to grapevines which have an effect on the physical appearance of the plant are called somatic mutations.  These mutations can affect everything from leaf shape to bunch size to grape size.  Some are subtle while others are dramatic, though most of the dramatic mutations probably started out subtle and were exaggerated over time through clonal selection.  The most famous somatic mutations involve Pinot Noir and its tendency to mutate into vines that produce white berries, which are known as Pinot Blanc, or pink berries, which are known as Pinot Gris.  These somatic mutations cannot be picked up with current DNA analysis techniques because those techniques do not analyze the entire DNA string of a grape.  I've mentioned DNA analysis enough on this site that I really should take some time to try to explain exactly what it is and how it works so buckle up because there's some serious science ahead.

As I'm sure you already know, DNA is one of the basic building blocks of life.  It is composed of two strands of molecules which run parallel (technically anti-parallel, but let's not quibble) to one another in a twisting design known as the double helix.  These strands are made up of four different nucleobases, each of which has its own unique partner on the opposite strand that it is connected to by sugar or phosphate molecules.  The nucleobases are Guanine (G) which pairs with Cytosine (C) and Adenine (A) which pairs with Thymine (T).   Some of the arrangements of nucleobases are involved in synthesizing proteins, and these areas are known as genes, but some of the sections of DNA are just filler or what I like to call Junk DNA.  It turns out that there are a lot of Junk DNA sites throughout the entire DNA sequence of an organism, but the ones that we're interested in are called microsatellite sequences. Microsatellite sequences are repetitions of between one and six nucelobases that are scattered randomly throughout an organism's DNA.  So a typical bit of DNA might look something like this:


That bit in the middle where AG repeats is a microsatellite site, and it turns out that there are between 1,000 and 10,000 of these sites scattered throughout the genomes of most complex multi-cellular organisms (not all of them are repeats of just two nucleobases...it could just be one [AAAAAAAA] or as many as six [GATCACGATCACGATCACGATCAC]).  It also turns out that some of these sites are highly variable between individuals and are inherited in very specific ways.  What scientists have done is to find where these sites are in humans as well as in grapes and they have pinpointed the areas that are the most variable between individuals.  These sites are given names like VVS1, ZAG64, and VVMD28 among others and they are the regions that scientists look at when they are trying to differentiate between different grape varieties or confirm synonymities between differently named grapes that are genetically identical.  All individuals have microsatellite sites in the same places on their genome, but the size of the site will be different between individuals, so the number of base pairs in the repeat are counted up and compared across subjects to see which are identical and which are different (this is not very important in humans because humans are obviously distinctive from one another and are not propagated clonally as grapes are...see my Ciliegiolo post for a discussion of this issue).  Most studies use between 6 and 10 different microsatellite sites in their analyses in order to differentiate between individual varieties because fewer sites don't give enough discriminatory power while more sites don't give you any added benefit.  Parentage studies use the same technique, but look at different microsatellite sites which have been found to be directly inherited from each parent.  This is the same technology, incidentally, used in paternity tests in humans and made famous by such trash-talk heavyweights as Jerry Springer.

It's important to remember that these microsatellite sites are Junk DNA that are essentially just taking up space.  They don't encode for any proteins and don't have any effect on the physical appearance of the plant.  Remember for a moment what we said about somatic mutations: they are mutations that have an effect on the physical appearance of the plant, which means that they are mutations that occur in areas of the plant's DNA that are actually doing some kind of work.  The kinds of mutations that affect berry skin color are happening in areas of the plant's DNA outside of the areas that microsatellite site analysis is looking at, so these mutations are essentially undetectable with this kind of technology.  This can be a good thing, as it allows us to trace the clonal history of grapes like Pigato, Favorita and Vermentino, which are geographically dispersed, to a single grape ancestor, but it can also possibly lead us to overly reductionistic conclusions.  Pigato, Favorita and Vermentino are genetically identical according to the microsatellite analysis, but does that mean they're the same grape?

The case of Pinot Noir is significant here, I think.  Pinot Noir, Pinot Blanc and Pinot Gris are genetically identical, but are considered to be different grape varieties by virtually every expert on earth, while grapes like Nielluccio, Sangiovese and Prugnolo Gentile are considered to be clonal variants of the same grape, Sangiovese.  The difference in the two cases is obvious: the Pinot mutation has an obvious physical manifestation, namely the color of the grape skin.  But it's more than just that.  The color of the grape skin has a direct effect not only on the wines that are made from that grape, but also in the kinds of wines that can be made from it and the methods that one must employ to make those wines.  The physiological difference entails a different approach to making wines from that grape, while the physiological differences between the Sangiovese clones are much more subtle.  One could mistake wines made from the Sangiovese clones with one another while it would be much more difficult to make that mistake with wines made from the Pinot varieties.

The situation with Pigato, Favorita and Vermentino is, unfortunately, not so clear cut.  There are obvious physical differences: Pigato has a characteristic splotchiness on the grape skins that Favorita and Vermentino lack while the leaves, clusters and buds of Favorita are different enough from those of Vermentino that the Italian Ministry of Agriculture decided that it was a separate grape in 1964, stating unequivocally that "Favorita and Vermentino must be considered as two distinct cultivars," but given the new information that DNA analysis has provided, can we still say the same thing today with the same amount of confidence?  The splotchiness of the skins of Pigato has no real effect on the wines made from the grape or on the range of wines that could possibly be made from it, and the physiological differences between Favorita and Vermentino seem to be merely cosmetic.  One could argue that wines made from each of the three grapes are distinctive from one another, but one would expect that anyway given the range of places and climates where each is primarily found (Pigato in Liguria, Vermentino in Sardinia and Liguria and Favorita in Piemonte).  Wines made from Chablis are much different from those made in Pugliny-Montrachet, for example, but Chardonnay is the grape in both wines.

So what are we to do?  It would be ideal if the genomes of Pigato, Favorita and Vermentino were completely sequenced so that an analysis could be done to see where the differences are in their DNA and to see just how widespread they are.  We know that they're ultimately descended from the same plant and have mutated independently over time to the extent that they are visually distinguishable from one another, but we just don't know how significant the mutations have been on a molecular level and we can't know unless we have the entire DNA sequence of each grape.  Sequencing an individual grape variety is no small task, though, and I doubt seriously that there's much clamor for that kind of work on any of these three grapes. Given the standards that are currently used to differentiate grape varieties, I don't see any way to consider Pigato, Favorita and Vermentino as separate cultivars.  The differences just don't seem significant enough to me to merit differentiation.  If any readers have any thoughts, please share in the comments section as I'm very interested to see how others might feel about this (if anyone other than me ever thinks about this kind of stuff).

The grape we call Favorita is grown exclusively in Piemonte around the Roero region and is thought to have arrived in this area over 300 years ago via Ligurian oil merchants.  The grape is known for having large berries and has been a popular table grape in Piemonte for many years.  It is thought that moniker "Favorita" was bestowed as a result of its prowess and esteem as a table grape and not as a wine grape.  When it was used for wine, historically it was blended with Nebbiolo in an effort to smooth over some of Nebbiolo's rough edges.  Varietal wines made from Favorita have enjoyed some success recently, but plantings lag well behind those of Arneis and Chardonnay in the Langhe.  Many examples that we find here in the US are slightly spritzy, though I'm not sure how prevalent that style is elsewhere. I was able to find a bottle of the 2009 Gianni Gagliardo "fallegro" Favorita at Bauer Wine and Spirits for about $17.  In the glass the wine was a medium lemon gold color.  The salesperson at Bauer told me this wine was supposed to be a little fizzy, but mine was completely flat.  The nose was a total blank with maybe a suggestion of lemon or apple, but it was really a total cipher.  This is apparently a characteristic of the grape itself, as Nicolas Belfrage in his Barolo to Valpolicella refers to the grape as "non-aromatic [with] any scented character it may have coming by illicit blending."  On the palate the wine was medium bodied with medium acidity.  It was somewhat cidery with ripe apple and apple peel fruit along with a touch of pear and melon as well.  The wine was bottled with a synthetic cork so I wonder if perhaps there was a faulty seal which may have caused my bottle to go flat and take on a bit of oxygen.  I haven't had a chance to try another Favorita-based wine, so I'm really not sure how representative my bottle is. This bottling is supposedly the benchmark for Favorita wines, but it didn't do much for me.
Posted by Rob Tebeau at 4:00 PM 2 comments: Labels: Favorita, Italy, La Morra, Piemonte, SCIENCE, Vermentino, White Wine


Corvina - Veneto, Italy 


Xarel-lo - Penedès, Catalonia, Spain 

Xarel-lo is one of the three traditional grapes used in the production of the Spanish traditional method sparkling wine known as Cava.  Cava is made in the same way as Champagne and at one time was known as Spanish Champagne, though that practice had to be abandoned when Spain joined the EU in 1986 (it is still known locally as champán, champaña or xampany depending on where you are in Spain).  The other two grapes are Parellada, which we'll get to in a future post, and Macabeo, which is perhaps better known as Viura, the great white grape of Rioja.  Most Cavas are blends of some or all of these grapes, but the producers aren't under any obligation to inform the consumers about which grapes are used and in what proportions.  Most Cava bottles that you'll find in your local shops are mute about the components of their blend and it seems that most consumers really aren't that worried about it.

Those Cavas that are made from the three traditional Cava grapes are usually at least half Macabeo with Xarel-lo making up more of the remainder than Parellada.  Individual producers all have their own blends, though, and there are some varietal Cavas made from one of the three grapes, though these tend to be 100% Macabeo.  Xarel-lo is prized for its intense aroma and flavor profile which many believe is the ultimate source of Cava's unique character.  This uniqueness has also encouraged some producers to experiment with making varietal table wines from Xarel-lo which are generally being met with good reviews.  Cava production is really dominated by two producers and many smaller producers or growers are getting creative in order to find a niche in the marketplace for their grapes and wines.  Xarel-lo is rapidly establishing itself as a very good table wine grape and while table wines made from the grape aren't absolutely everywhere right now, they are slowly starting to show up more and more. The only way to tell if the hype over Xarel-lo is genuine is to try some wines made from the grape and I was able to find two different still table wines made from 100% Xarel-lo grapes.  The first was the 2008 Albet i Noya "Classic" from the Penedes region of Spain.  I picked this up for about $14 from Marty's Fine Wines in Newton.  In the glass this wine was a medium lemon gold color.  The nose was reserved with green apple, lemon and pear aromas along with something a bit nutty, suggesting that this may be on the decline.  On the palate the wine was on the lighter side of medium with high acid.  It was really citrusy showing a lot of lemon flavors with a touch of lime and some tart green apple.  The fruit flavors were a bit washed out but they were definitely still there.  The flavor profile was simple and straightforward but the acidity kept it interesting and probably kept it alive in the bottle.  I enjoyed it, but I probably wouldn't go out of my way to pick this up again. I couldn't help but wonder what a younger wine made from Xarel-lo might be like so when I came across the Pares Balta "Calcari" Xarel-lo at Curtis Liquors in Weymouth for about $15, I picked a bottle up for comparison's sake.  In the glass this wine was a fairly deep lemon gold color.  The nose was moderately aromatic with with a lot of green apple and candy apple flavors along with ripe pear and a touch of lime.  On the palate the wine was on the lighter side of medium with medium acidity.  There were flavors of green apple, lime, pineapple candy and a touch of apple cider.  It finished with a subtle, chalky kind of minerality.  Right out of the fridge, this wine was tight, simple and kind of boring.  It opened up a lot at room temperature and was more interesting, but still couldn't really rise above average.  It was definitely more interesting and more lively than the prior wine but I didn't really find either of them all that interesting.  I'd probably rather just drink a bottle of sparkling Cava to get my Xarel-lo fix and save myself $5 in the process.
Posted by Rob Tebeau at 7:31 PM No comments: Labels: Catalonia, Penedès, Spain, White Wine, Xarel-lo
 


Free Wine Friday - Sagrantino Redux - San Clemente "Ilucis," Umbria, Italy Over the past few weeks I've been profiling a series of wines that were given to me by Paul Turina of Turina Italian Wines.  I've recently written about a series of Groppello-based wines, a Vespaiola-based wine and a Grechetto-based wine which Paul was generous enough to share with me.  All of those wines were made with grapes that I'd not yet written about, but this final bottle was made from the Sagrantino grape, which I wrote about way back in January 2011.  Since I've already covered quite a bit of ground about the Sagrantino grape in that post, I've decided to feature this wine in my sporadic "Free Wine Friday" series and try to cover some of the ground that I may have missed in my previous post.

Though Sagrantino has been around since at least 1879 (when it was first mentioned in an Ampelographic Commission report), it isn't a particularly well known grape for a few reasons.  The first reason is that there just isn't that much of it.  There are only a few hundred acres planted to the grape (nearly all of them around the town of Montefalco in Umbria) and only a couple dozen producers who make any wine from it.  Further, wines made from Sagrantino were traditionally sweet dessert wines made from partially dried grapes.  The market for dessert wines hasn't been that great over the past few decades so very little of these wines were exported.  Table wine production has been on the rise over the past few decades, but the quality of these wines has been uneven since many producers have been unable or unwilling to invest in newer technology and/or techniques in their vineyards and in their wineries.

Most of the table wines that we see are bottled under the Sagrantino di Montefalco DOCG which covers both dry table wine production (secco) and dessert wine production (passito).  In order to qualify for the secco designation, the wine must be made from 100% Sagrantino grapes and must be aged for at least 12 months in oak barrels and at least 30 months altogether prior to release.  Why such a long time?  Sagrantino is an incredibly tannic grape and it typically requires several years of oak aging as well as some time in bottle before it is approachable.  Many producers actually exceed the minimum aging time prior to releasing their wines because of just how ferocious young, untamed Sagrantino can be.  Sagrantino is also allowed in the Montefalco Rosso DOC wines, but is only allowed to make up 15% of the blend at the most (the majority of these wines are made from Sangiovese grapes).

What was really interesting to me about the wine that Paul brought for me was that it was a 100% Sagrantino wine from the Montefalco region, but it was bottled as an Umbria IGT because it wasn't aged for the required period of time to qualify for the DOCG label.  The producer, San Clemente, makes a Sagrantino di Montefalco (and makes an excellent Grechetto which I reviewed in my post on that grape), but for some reason they also make this wine called "Ilucis" which is only aged for 9 months in barrel before release.  The bottle that Paul provided to me was from the 2009 vintage, which is apparently the first year that this winery has made this wine.  My best guess is that they've got some young vines that aren't yet mature enough to meet their quality standards for their DOCG level wine, but that's total speculation. This wine was provided to me as a free sample so I'm not sure what the retail price for it is.  I believe it would be somewhere in the $20 range, which is significantly lower than you'd be able to find a Sagrantino di Montefalco for.  As usual I have not been compensated in any way for reviewing this wine other than by receipt of the bottle.  I do not have any business affiliation with Paul Turina, Turina Italian Wines, or any of their business associates.  In the glass this wine was a medium purple ruby color, which was a bit unusual since Sagrantino based wines are usually inky black due to the amount of time that the juice is left in contact with the skins after crushing.  For their DOCG Sagrantino di Montefalco, this particular winery leaves the juice on the skins for a whopping 21 days.  They don't specify how long the maceration period is for this wine, but you can bet it's nowhere near that long.  The nose was fairly intense with smoky, savory, meaty aromas along with black cherry and blackberry fruits.  On the palate the wine was on the fuller side of medium with fairly high acidity and fairly high tannins.  I was expecting to have the inside of my mouth ripped apart by this but the tannins were kept somewhat in check.  It was a big, brawny wine with black cherry and blackberry fruit with a hint of raspberry as well.  There was a distinct smoky, meaty, almost bacon-y kind of taste to it as well which did blow off somewhat as the wine opened up.  It was a bit harsh and probably could have used a bit more time in the bottle, but it was pretty nice overall.  It's certainly not as deep or complex as a DOCG Sagrantino di Montefalco, but it's a reasonable substitute for the money and is a good introduction for those curious about the grape but unwilling to shell out $50-$100 for a taste.  The high acidity and intense tannins demand food and I would lean towards grilled red meats to soak up some of those tannins. Labels: Free Wine Friday, Italy, Red Wine, Sagrantino, Umbria


Vespaiola - Breganze, Veneto, Italy Over the course of several posts last week (about the Grechetto and Groppello grapes), I sought to introduce you to Paul Turina and the wines that he imports.  Today's post is on another interesting grape that Paul brought to my attention called Vespaiola.  I had not heard of Vespaiola prior to Paul's email and certainly hadn't come across any in my local shops so I was grateful to him for the opportunity to try the grape.  He and his client (Villa Angarano) call the grape Vespaiolo, which is an accepted synonym, but the official name for the grape does appear to be Vespaiola.  Those of you who are into European modes of transportation may notice a similarity between this grape's name and a certain Italian scooter brand.  Both names are based on the Latin word vespa which means wasp.  The scooter is so named because of the buzzing sound the engine makes while the grape is so named because the grapes are naturally very high in sugar and wasps are attracted to them when they are fully ripe (for photographic evidence, check out this picture from the Wikipedia page).  Those of you who are really up on your obscure Italian grapes may also note that the name Vespaiola is very similar to the name Vespolina, a red grape found in the Piedmont region of Italy.  The two grapes are unrelated and the source of the name Vespolina is unknown, but it is not thought to be derived from any kind of a relationship with wasps.

Vespaiola is thought to be native to the Veneto region and there are references to it in publications dating back at least to 1825.  It it grown in a few areas in the Veneto (covering about 432 hectares of land in total) but its most important area of cultivation is undoubtedly the Breganze region in the foothills of the Alps.  Breganze has the unfortunate distinction of being the place where phylloxera was first discovered in Italy in the late 19th Century.  The scourge decimated the vineyards of the area and many producers opted to plant many of the so-called "international varieties" like Pinot Blanc, Pinot Noir, Merlot, Sauvignon Blanc and the Cabernets rather than the native grapes that were popular prior to the outbreak.  Luckily there were a few who hung on to some of the traditional grapes and continued to cultivate them and we have them to thank for the existence of Vespaiola today.

The DOC regulations for Breganze stipulate that any blended white wine from the region must contain at least 85% Friulano and up to 15% of Vespaiola, Pinot Bianco, Pinot Grigio, Riesling or Sauvignon Blanc.  All other DOC white table wines from Breganze must be pure varietal wines and these varietal wines must meet more stringent yield requirements and minimum alcohol levels.  Most Breganze wines are dry table wines, but the DOC also allows for the production of sweet wines either from partially dried grapes or grapes affected by botrytis.  These sweet wines are called Torcolato and in his Grapes and Wines Oz Clarke offers the opinion that Torcolato is "one of Italy's finest sweet wines."  Torcolato is made primarily from Vespaiola grapes but there is often some Garganega and Friulano in there as well (this picture shows how the grapes are hung for the passito style wines). I believe Paul has a sweet wine made from Vespaiola in his portfolio, but what he brought for me was the 2010 Villa Angarano dry table wine.  Oz Clarke isn't quite as enthusiastic about this style of wine, saying "make Vespaiolo dry and you get attractive, quite characterful white wine, light and startlingly acidic but with no particular aroma."  I figured the only way to see if he was right or not was to pull the cork.  In the glass this wine was a pale silvery lemon color.  The nose was fairly reserved with some green apple, white pear and lime aromas.  On the palate the wine was on the lighter side of medium with fairly high acidity.  There were flavors of tart green apple, pineapple, lemon-lime citrus, green melon and ripe pear.  It was a lean, hard wine with serious acidity that was partially softened by some of the rounder pear and melon flavors, but was overall tight and sharp.  I happen to really like this style of wine, but it definitely needs food to show its best (I didn't have a chance to try this pairing but I'm imagining that seared scallops would be dynamite with this).  It's not a front-porch sipper but it is very well made and is very tasty under the right circumstances.  Again, if you're interested in this wine I encourage you to check out Paul's website and maybe send him an email to see how you may be able to help him make this wine available in your area. Paul was recently able to get a bottle of the 2008 Villa Angarano "San Biagio" Torcolato for me as well.   As mentioned above, Torcolato is a sweet wine made predominately from dried Vespaiola grapes.  In the glass this wine was a fairly deep lemon gold color with bronze tints.  The nose was intense with lifted aromatics of honey, apricot, pineapple and marmalade.  On the palate the wine was full bodied  with medium acidity.  It was lusciously sweet with rich honey and pineapple flavors.  There was also some orange marmalade, burnt sugar and baked green apple.  I'm generally not a fan of passito style sweet wines, as I find that they lack the depth and complexity of botrytis-based dessert wines and tend to be just sweet and little more.  While this wine certainly wasn't as complex as a fine Sauternes, it was very enjoyable and fairly well balanced.  It could use a touch more acid, but long-time readers will note that that's a pretty common complaint from me and probably says more about my tastes than it does about this wine.  Those  interested in tracking a bottle of this down are encouraged to contact Paul through his website.

These wines were given to me as samples from Paul himself.  I have not been compensated in any way for writing about these wines other than with the bottles themselves.  I do not have any business affiliation with Paul Turina, Turina Italian Wines or any of their associates.
Posted by Rob Tebeau at 4:24 PM 2 comments: Labels: Breganze, Italy, Sweet Wine, Veneto, Vespaiola, White Wine

