VinItaly or bust…Day one
Our first day at VinItaly started with the cool, calm, collected train ride into Verona from Desenzano. Why stay in the city of Verona? Fighting crowds and traffic, struggling for parking and/or a taxi. No way, José. The smart money stays in Desenzano, a small resort town just on the southern tip of Lake Garda that is considered something of a Milanese Monaco, but with a lot of Germans. Everything is walking distance, you have three or four excellent restaurants and you tend to get a little more room for your buck out here, with substantially less ‘scalping’ going on. It’s a 20 minute train ride and it drops you about a 5 euro taxi ride form the fair. Perfect. The other night the owner of one of the restaurants we ate at literally drove us home after we closed the place down. That ain’t happening in Verona, my friends.
It’s funny; every time we arrive through the CanGrande gates at the entrance to the show we are always amazed at the size. It never gets old. Basically 11 huge airplane hangars filled with Italy’s greatest wines. Just ridiculous. This year I brought along a couple of newbies, Tristen decided to hang out after our Bordeaux gauntlet, glutton for punishment that he is, and Steve Jarvis, from www.thewinerychannel.tv was along to film all of our escapades. They were both a bit taken aback walking through the gates of the old ‘chocolate factory’, and me, doing my best Willy Wonka, decided to head straight towards the Brunello Consorzio tasting; Sangiovese Grosso for breakfast anyone?
This is going to be a hoot. Rifling through 70-80 of Brunello’s top wines over the course of the next two hours has the old adrenalin going. I get the list and begin to check off almost everything on it, much to the consternation of the slightly inconvenienced young lady responsible for our table. Sorry darlin’, you’re working for the next two hours…What ensues is a race against the clock to taste as many offerings from the 5 star 2004 vintage as we possibly can. While we could bore you with the minutiae we won’t. All we’ll say is that the wines showed much better as a group here than in SF two months previous. These actually tasted like potential ‘legendary vintage’ Brunello wines, with 15-20 really catching our attention, though there were numerous wines which we wouldn’t mind having a tall, frosty mug ‘o. Without a doubt a vintage to buy. You can find our latest offer here. Or go to www.winex.com and rummage around for yourself.
Here are the hits:
THE NO-BRAINERS (in no particular order but you’ll glean our favorites)
Campogiovanni- Sweet, big middle, classic, yummy
Ciacci Piccolomini Vigna Pianrosso- Tannic, ripely persistent, elegant
Casanuova delle Cerbaie- Herb, stones, perfumy, rich, tastes like it smells. A star.
Fanti- More refined than previous Fanti wines but still powerful, modern, smart…
Il Poggione- The value of the vintage? Cool, complete, soulful, textbook. Me like.
La Serena- Closed aromatically but a big mid-palate, delicious. Serious wine.
La Rasina- Modern yet with classic dried cherry, balsamic flavors. Aromatic.
La Lecciaia Manapetra- Finally a single vineyard cuvee worth the money. Great.
Pertimali- For me, the wine of the vintage thus far. Real OMG moment…
Antinori Pian delle Vigne- Best version yet of this, top aromas, no slouch
Poggio Il Castellare- Real good, sneaky long, keeps you thinking…which is a good thing.
San Filippo La Lucere- Provencal garrigue notes, rich, with cocoa accents.
Poggio di Sotto- Killer wine, medium weight but compelling, complete, soulful. 2nd best?
Siro Pacenti- Surprisingly cool customer, has its act together. Restrained for these guys.
Uccelliera- Great in SF, great again, easily one of the top three wines of the vintage.
THE VALUE PLAYS (Cool wines for less money)
Casanova di Neri Normale- A real value star. Not the Tenuta Nuova, much cheaper.
Lazzeretti- Value star. As good as the ripping 2001
La Lecciaia- Dense but cool (north side?), nice slow build. Long.
Talenti- For my money the finest Talenti yet. Usually inexpensive
Val di Suga- Like the ’97 but more structured. This could be a real sleeper.
And there you have it. The rest of the day was spent hitting a few booths at the show, in particular on a quest for some real value wines from the south of Italy where some recent investment is starting to pay off in the winemaking. Dinner that night was back in Desenzano at Bagatta alla Lepre, a real cool place in the center of town. Five courses, 42 euro, and a tasty bottle of ’97 Rocche dei Manzoni Cappellano Barolo for 68 euro, got to love those Italian wine lists…
Tags: Brunello, Brunello Consorzio, European Grand Tour 2009, Verona, VinItaly
