Vino Nobile di Montepulciano occupies a special place in the history of Italian winemaking. It was the first appellation in Italy to be awarded DOCG status, thereby setting early standards for quality and provenance. Nevertheless, Montepulciano long remained in the shadow of some of its more famous neighbours. Today, the region is undergoing a remarkable transformation that is bringing the...

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Brunello is not a wine for the impatient. Four years of aging are required, and five for the Riserva. No other dry wine in Italy requires so much time before it even comes onto the market. So when a Brunello appears, it has already passed its most important test: patience. Now this special phase in the Brunello lover’s calendar begins again. The first Brunello Annata 2021 and Riserva...

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The guide to optimal wine storage at home Buying a fine Barolo or a mature Brunello rarity is a celebration. But how do you store this treasure properly? Whether cellar, climate-controlled cabinet or shelf: in this guide, you will learn how to store wine properly – especially Italian wine – and what you should bear in mind in order to realise the full potential of each drop. Does...

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Anyone who thinks that no prickly pears grow in the north of Italy has never been to the Valtellina. The Veltlin – as it is called in German – lies on the border to Switzerland in northern Lombardy and looks back on a wine-growing tradition that is over 2,000 years old. Sheltered by the Rhaetian Alps, the vines here thrive in an optimally sunny southern exposure and benefit from the warm...

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Let’s get straight to the point: The Barolo of the 2021 vintage is highly praised by almost all wine critics. These Barolos are strikingly expressive, with a nose that tends towards openness rather than austerity. These wines show the power and ageing potential of great red wines, but without the ponderous extraction of previous years. Compared to the more vertical 2019 vintage, the 2021 is...

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It is clear that the 2024 vintage cannot be described in just a few words, as Italy is a surprisingly diverse wine country! The harvest volume has developed positively after the challenging 2023 wine year. The Italian winegrowers' association Coldiretti reports an increase of 8% compared to the previous year – this corresponds to a harvest volume of around 42 million hectolitres – with...

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Monica Larner, Antonio Galloni, James Suckling and other renowned wine critics have impressively described in their vintage reports that the entire region has been on the move since the 2020 Brunello vintage at the latest. An awakening that is partly due to the fact that there were few distractions in the first year of coronavirus and the winemakers' entire focus was on working in nature....

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After the Montalcino dream year of 2016, things quietened down around the famous appellation for a while, even though some winemakers bottled amazingly good Brunellos in 2017 and 2018, which the dedicated Brunello community will enjoy for a long time to come. These two vintages will possibly be like the 1998, which initially caused disillusionment immediately after the proclaimed dream year of...

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After a monumental 2019 vintage that produced wines that, for reasons of common sense, need to disappear into the cellar for a few years to develop their full power, intensity and class, most of the Barolo 2020s are now on the market. It is an almost cheerful vintage, the wines are generally more accessible and fresher. They have everything that makes a Barolo, but they are less austere in...

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UGA stands for Unità Geografiche Aggiuntive (supplementary geographical unit). It describes the specific vineyard designations in Chianti Classico. The area is located in the centre of Tuscany and, at 70,000 hectares, covers around a third of the region. The boundaries of the growing area, which stretches between Florence and Siena, were established as early as 1716. The Sangiovese grape...

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The wine-growing region of Sicily is characterised by boundless expanses and contrasts such as the damp, foggy coolness of Erice and the hellish heat of Randazzo at the foot of Mount Etna. Which brings us to today’s topic: The Etna region has probably held the most exciting position within Sicily for some years now. The wines are often less opulent, have a very special texture, acidity and...

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When Eric Guido (Vinous.com) talks about the current status of the Veneto wine region, he rightly calls it “a constant process of development”. He writes: “Whether it is Valpolicella, Soave or one of the smaller production areas in the region, Veneto has undergone an enormous change in a seemingly very short period of time – mostly in a positive direction. However, in a region like...

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“You never turn your back on challenges." - This quote from Wladimir Klitschko is the best way to describe the commitment and the results achieved by our winegrowers in 2023, which was not always an easy year. The 2023 grape harvest in Italy and elsewhere in the world showed that farmers, and winegrowers in particular, face considerable challenges in times of climate change. The more...

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If there is one Italian wine region where red wine lovers will find everything their heart desires, then it is the Valpolicella zone in Veneto, located east of Lake Garda near the Soave area between the towns of Bardolino and Verona. The name Valpolicella itself is derived from the Latin term “Vallis Poli Cellae” and translates as “the valley of many cellars”, whose growing area hides a rich...

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Even if the (Vino) Nobile is not exactly one of the best-known of Italian red wines, it deserves the glamour and reputation of the historic noble wine with which high society, popes and even presidents have filled their wine cellars since the 16th century. In recent years, there seems to be a joyful return to a classic and pure Sangiovese style. Many winemakers are producing an increasingly...

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Dott. Daniele Cernilli, internationally renowned Italian wine journalist, co-founder and long-standing editor-in-chief of the renowned Italian wine guide Gambero Rosso, has had a new project close to his heart for a few years now: “Doctor Wine” - a very active and successful online platform about Italian wine, which is also published in English. In October 2014, his 550-page “Guida...

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At the end of February, Monica Larner published for Robert Parker’s Wine Advocate her first ratings of the Brunello di Montalcino 2017 and Riserva 2016 that came on the market this year. She rightly asks in her article and also immediately gives the answer: “And what is the soul of Brunello? The ideal is elegance. Few wine regions in the world have the potential to produce wines with such...

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“It is a vintage full of strength and purity, the result of a long growing season without extreme events. One that was warmer than 2014 and with much less rain, yet the water reserves were high due to the rainfall during the winter months. These reserves helped the vines through the dry, warm and sunny summer months, supplemented by cool night temperatures and just the right amount of rainfall...

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The Italian wine quality levels explained IGT, DOC and DOCG are signposts through Italy’s systems of origin Italy is bursting with a diverse wine world and is home to some of the world’s most renowned vintages. Anyone who buys an Amarone, Chianti, Barolo, Lugana or Primitivo will inevitably come across abbreviations such as IGT, DOC or DOCG on the label. But what exactly do these...

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