Vin Santo – holy wine?

There is Vin Santo not only in Tuscany, but also in Umbria, Emilia Romagna, Veneto and Trentino. However, the first Vin Santo in Italy is said to originate from Tuscany – a wine of legendary origin. There are several different versions of the name origin. One version is, that it should have been the healing effect of the wine on plague sufferers in the Siena of the 14th century, another one, the misinterpretation of the exclamation of a … Read more ...

Foaming sweetness – Moscato from Veneto

Nearly 20 DOC or DOCG sparkling wines of different Moscato varieties are available in Italy. Almost all are sweet. Among the best known are the Moscato d’Asti DOCG and the Asti Spumante DOCG. In addition to the Moscato sparkling wines originating from controlled areas of origin, there are a variety of sparkling wines from Moscato, which are marketed as land wines from Italy.

We tasted three different Moscato sparkling wines from the Veneto, one of which, the Fior d’Arancio Colli … Read more ...

Ligurian Ambrosia – Moscatello di Taggia

ligurischer-weinbauThe Moscatello di Taggia has been a welcome guest at the English and Flemish royal courts as well as at least some papal tables since the 14th century. For a long time, this wine was considered a symbol of Ligurian viticulture, until in the 19th century the phylloxera decimated the existence of this variety to the point of insignificance and thus the grape variety was forgotten. It was only in 2003 that around 20 plants of this grape variety were … Read more ...

Verduzzo – typically Friulan

Zitronen-Ricotta-Mandel-KuchenIt is said in Friuli that the Verduzzo was drunk by the farmers at the time of the fiefs, while the landed gentry drank the aristocratic sweet Picolit. Even today, the Picolit coming from the Collio orientale del Friuli, outside Friuli, the better known of the two. The Verduzzo is however the typical sweet wine from Friuli. It is made from the grape Verduzzo Friulano as a sweet (amabile or dolce) DOC wine in the Friulian wine regions … Read more ...

Moscato di Scanzo from Bergamo

Moscato di Scanzo II
“É un regalo” said Gabriele, when I asked him about the price of the bottle Moscato di Scanzo. In his restaurant Sali e Tabacchi in Maggiana on Lake Como we had celebrated the wedding of a friendly couple this weekend and he had noticed that I had searched in vain for this wine in the surrounding wine shops. Overnight, he organized a Moscato di Scanzo from a winemaker friend. It was from the neighboring community of Scanzorosciate and thus a … Read more ...

Sardinian red sweetness

Rotweinreben auf SardinienIn the northeast of Sardinia there is the Gallura, which is a region and a wine-growing area at the same time. Gallura is best known for the Costa Smeralda and the Vermentino di Gallura, Sardinia’s only DOCG (Denominazione di Origine Controllata e Garantita) wine.

About five kilometers from the sea, the Vigne Surrau winery cultivates about 50 hectares of vines in the easternmost part of the Gallura, predominantly Vermentino and Cannonau, but in smaller proportions also Carignano, Read more ...

Feinherb to sweet Muscat wines

Moscato Weine

… and all priced below 10 €. We tasted three different muscat wines, two sweet wines: a gold muscatel from the winery Erste + Neue from South Tyrol and a Moscato from Gallo from California, plus a feinherb muscatel from the winery Kesselring from the Palatinate.

All are muscat wines, but of at least two different varieties: Gold Muskateller and Muscat Blanc à Petits Grains, provided that the feinherb wine from Palatinate has been made from yellow muscatel.

For quick … Read more ...

Aleatico dell‘ Elba with Schiaccia Briaca

Traditionelle Weinerziehung ElbaAleatico is an indigenous red variety of Central and Southern Italy, mainly of Latium, Umbria, Tuscany and Puglia. The DOC or DOCG wines produced from Aleatico are mainly amabile or dolce, that means semi-sweet or sweet. There is sweet Aleatico mostly in two different forms: as Passito and as alcohol-fortified Liquoroso.
In most regions with Aleatico it is prohibited to use this aromatic muscat-like tasting grapes for dry red wines . There are dry IGT wines, however, produced from … Read more ...