Let me say this straight away – I love everything Italian, especially a great wine list, great food, great people, and most important of all, fabulous wine. Apart from being responsible for some of the greatest wines made, they have also been a contributing factor in the spread of wine popularity worldwide.
Good Italian wines are flooding into the country, whereas 20 years ago you would have been lucky to find the odd bottle of cheap Chianti in an Italian restaurant, now serious Italian wines with real personality, and most importantly for every budget, are everywhere.
And that is the great thing about Italian wines, they have great charm and character, and you don’t have to pay the earth. While an Italian wine may not have the impact of a full bodied Shiraz from the Barossa Valley, it compensates nicely with a tonne of rich savoury fruit flavours and diversity.
Of course when matching to food, you can’t go past a great Italian wine to go with a nice bowl of spaghetti or dish of lasagne.
If you want to start getting into Italian wine, try your local independent wine shop or one of the many Dan Murphy’s or Vintage Cellars and hopefully they can help out. But here are a few tips to start:
Italian wines are normally labelled after regions rather than grapes. For example Chianti is a region is Tuscany that makes red wine largely from the Sangiovese grape.
While many Italian wines don’t have rich oaky and fruit tastes as Australian wines, you get the opportunity to taste the grape’s actual flavour and the region from where it comes. The white wines are normally quite delicate in flavour while the reds are often savoury and rustic.
The best list has wines from the following regions: Barolo, Barbaresco, Valpolicella Classico, Soave Classico, Alto Adige, Collio, Chianti Classico, Brunello di Montalcino, Primitivo di Manduria, Sagrantino di Montefalco, and Sicily.
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