The plate lands with a thud on a table that’s as bulky as a fallen tree. At first glance it doesn’t look so bad: a neat pile of shredded, cured meat on a bed of arugula, with a few lemon wedges to squeeze on top. But this is horse meat. Even a die-hard carnivore might draw the line at horse, although no one in this particular osteria—a medieval-looking tavern in Verona called Al Carro Armato—is giving it a second thought. Listed on the blackboard are a variety of horse dishes: the aforementioned sfilacci (“strands,” which are dried and sometimes smoked); bistecca di cavallo (horse steak); and a rich braise called pastisada. This is standard fare all over Verona, but the rustic confines of Al Carro Armato definitely enhance the horse-eating experience; it looks like a place where someone might walk in any minute with a hind leg of something slung over his shoulder.
Still, it seems odd that Italians would eat horse. It’s hardly a delicacy, and throughout Italian history horses held relatively exalted positions among animals. The Etruscans were reputedly great horse trainers, and the ancient Veneti were, too. The Greeks wrote the first treatises on horse breeding. Roman emperors treated their chariot horses better than they did most people.
But in times of need, even the Romans may have eaten horses. The Roman army was nearly all cavalry in its later incarnations, the better to match up against the mounted armies of the Longobards and Attila the Hun. So it’s not hard to imagine a felled horse being used for food amid the ravages of war. Most Italians, however, pin the horse-eating tradition on the Longobards, or Lombards, who ruled what is now the Veneto, Lombardy, and much of north-central Italy from the sixth to the eighth centuries.
These days, cavallo and sometimes asino (donkey) are specialties in a number of mostly northern Italian cities, including Brescia, Milan, Verona, and Trieste. There are butchers who specialize in horse (macellerie equine), and their cuts have an eerily familiar ring to them: flank steak, rump roast, and so on.
Horse cookery has become most readily associated with Verona, although it’s hard to say exactly why that is. If it was the Longobards who bequeathed the tradition, it would seem that the area near Milan would be the epicenter—the town of Monza, near Milan, was the historic Longobard capital. There are, in fact, several large horse butchers in Milan. But it’s much easier to find horse on a menu in Verona or Vicenza; maybe this is because Verona was such an important market town in ancient times, thanks to its strategic positioning on the Adige River.
Whatever the reasons, the communal table at Al Carro Armato is now loaded with horse, as a group of young men at the other end start in on their own plates of sfilacci. Of the various ways in which horse is served, this is probably the best way for the uninitiated to get started: Flavor-wise, sfilacci is like a cross between bacon and beef jerky, savory and chewy and a little bit smoky.
In steak form, horse can be a jaw-buster. For an entrée, it’s better to go with preparations like pastisada, which involves several hours of slow cooking in liquid (usually wine) to soften up the sometimes stringy meat. It is decidedly gamier than beef. Ultimately it is not an especially great addition to the Italian table; its role seems more symbolic than anything else, a reminder of how Italian cuisine was so often born out of desperation.
As exemplified by horse steaks, there’s a weightiness to Veronese cooking that belies the city’s elegant façade. Verona’s main contribution to Italian cuisine is the humble bollito misto (mixed boiled meats), served with a bone-marrow-and-bread-crumb sauce called pearà. In Venice, too, the food is simple—rice and peas, liver and onions—but there’s much more style and variety to the cooking there. It’s not just the added dimension of seafood, which Verona sees very little of, but the Venetian attitude that makes the difference. As Waverly Root described eating in Venice in The Food of Italy, “Nowhere else has liver with onions become so refined, nowhere else has rice been treated with such subtlety … nowhere else has polenta been made with such fine grain.”
This Venetian sense of style—its “fascination with the façade,” as Root put it—is what defines the Veneto region in most visitors’ minds. Where Verona is tidy and statuesque, Venice is chaotic and ornate, fancily dressed but with a shirttail always hanging out. Where Verona is the industrious winemaker, Venice is the charismatic rabble-rouser and sometime salesman. Where Verona is Veneto’s principal source of wine, Venice is its principal source of wine style.
Sometimes, style has won out over substance in the Veneto—with mixed results. By mastering the process of semi-drying grapes, the region’s winemakers took a ho-hum blend of local varieties and created Amarone, one of the most unique red wines in the world. On the other hand, the Veneto has become one of Italy’s biggest mass-marketers, creating wines that are simple, consistent, and well-priced, if rarely memorable.
Plenty of other wine regions have a similar mix of industrial and artisan producers. But in the Veneto, the contrasts may be the most dramatic. The region is home to most of the largest commercial producers in Italy, including Bolla, Santa Margherita, Zonin, and Gruppo Italiano Vini (GIV). The latter, in fact, is the largest wine company in Italy, turning out 60 million bottles a year from a number of estates, including the Folonari, Lamberti, and Santi properties in the Veneto. It’s not that these wines are bad (in fact, some are very good), but like any mass-market products they’ve fixed a certain image in the collective consciousness. When someone says “Soave” or “Valpolicella” to you, what comes to mind?
Over the last few years, the Veneto pulled even with, and then passed, both Puglia and Sicily to become the most prolific wine-producing region in Italy. And whereas both Puglia and Sicily have sharply reduced the amount of bulk wine they produce in favor of more DOC-classified wine, Veneto has seen production increase while the percentage of that production classified as DOC(G) decreased. Which is not to say that the Veneto is defined by bargain-rack wine. Soave can be a rich, aromatic, mouth-filling white. Valpolicella can be a luscious, ageworthy red. Even Prosecco, the wine for carefree nights in Venice, can be a serious sparkler. And Amarone, of course, is Amarone: There’s nothing quite like it.
“This region has such incredible potential,” says Stefano Inama, an outspoken producer of high-end Soave and of cabernet sauvignon from the Colli Berici DOC zone. “The problem is, we’re not oriented toward high quality. The province of Verona is the most productive winemaking province in all of Europe. I suppose there are some people who are happy about that, but not me.”
Prosecco may be the best example of a classic Veneto wine: simple and refreshing, a great wine to sip absentmindedly on a Venetian terrace with some tramezzini (finger sandwiches) on the side. Although there are a handful of proseccos with the power and structure of more serious sparklers, the hallmark style is light and easy.
The prosecco grape, historically a late-ripening variety, is thought to be a native of neighboring Friuli, where there is a town called Prosecco not far from Trieste. Before the advent of modern technology, prosecco wines, like most farmhouse whites, were at least lightly fizzy: the often overripe grapes, picked very late in the growing season, would stop fermenting in the cold winter months but then recommence in the spring, creating carbon dioxide bubbles in the wine. Often the wines had some residual sugar left in them because of the fits and starts of these natural fermentations, and for generations this became the prevailing style in the area.
The modern era of prosecco began with chemist/enologist Antonio Carpenè, who founded his Carpenè Malvolti firm in 1868 and an enology school at Conegliano in 1873 (the school is still one of Italy’s best). Carpenè was the first in Italy to develop the “tank method” of making sparkling wine, in which the secondary fermentation that gives the wine bubbles is done in a large pressure tank, rather than in individual bottles. This method, called Charmat after its French inventor, was the foundation on which the prosecco industry was built. In typical Veneto fashion, this industry has ballooned into a giant: More than 250 million bottles of wine were produced in the Prosecco di Conegliano-Valdobbiadene DOC zone in 2000.
This industrial-scale production tends to obscure the fact that the Colli Trevigiani, as the hills between the communes of Valdobbiadene and Conegliano are called, are not only beautiful and tourist-friendly but well-suited to the making of sparkling wine: The often steep slopes are well-drained and within striking distance of the Alps. An interplay of cool Alpine breezes sweeping down from Belluno and warmer air blowing off the Adriatic creates a similar environment to that in neighboring Friuli, which is ideal for preserving acidity and aromas in the grapes.
The principal difference is that prosecco is a little less giving than many of the classic Friuli grapes; it’s late-ripening and not especially aromatic. The better prosecco wines have a peachy softness, which is a little more pronounced in the lower-lying vineyards near Conegliano and checked with more minerality and acidity in the higher reaches of Valdobbiadene. Some of the better examples of the Conegliano style are made by Carpenè Malvotti and Zardetto, while on the Valdobbiadene side look for Nino Franco, Ruggeri & C., Desiderio Bisol, Mionetto, and Col Vetoraz.
Of the massive amounts of prosecco produced every year, roughly 8 million bottles are labeled with the denomination Cartizze, meant to indicate a wine from a select cluster of vineyards just north and east of Valdobbiadene. Extremely steep and low-yielding, the Cartizze vineyards—which total only about 250 acres—are considered the top crus of the DOC, and there are a number of wines from the zone that show off the firmer, broader, more powerful side of the prosecco grape.
On balance, however, prosecco is best as a light apéritif, whether it’s from Conegliano, Valdobbiadene, or Cartizze. Although a number of producers are striving for more, these are still celebration wines, wines of the moment—usually the kind of moment you don’t want to spoil by thinking too much.
The Veneto is the largest producer of DOC wine in Italy, which is not to say that it makes the highest percentage of DOC relative to its total: That distinction goes to Trentino–Alto Adige, and there are many other regions ahead of the Veneto on that front. But the Veneto does produce the most total bottles of DOC wine. That’s what’s called a dubious achievement.
There are twenty-three DOCs in the Veneto, yet almost 30 percent of the region’s classified wine comes from just one zone: Soave. Without exaggeration, this is the most maligned, misunderstood, and polarized wine district in Italy. Everything about the Soave production discipline has been debated and adjusted so much—from where the vineyards can be planted and how much production is allowed to what grapes can be used in the blend—that the Soave designation has lost much of whatever prestige it may have started with.
“Soave could be the Chablis of Italy,” says Stefano Inama with a sigh. “But this is a zone where cooperatives handle the majority of production. Everything about this region is geared toward mass production.”
The Soave zone was originally mapped out in 1927, and consisted of a narrow band of hills between the communes of Soave and Monteforte d’Alpone, due east of Verona. The Soave hills include remnants of ancient volcanoes, with elevations ranging from 500 to 1,100 feet. Although the soils vary, the basic profile is mineral-rich basaltic rock mixed with calcareous clays. In this poor but well-drained mixture, vines send down deep roots in search of nutrients—an ideal situation for growing flavorful, well-balanced wine grapes.
Not long after the Soave DOC was created, in 1968, there was pressure from large producers to make the zone bigger. The success of the Bolla family in the U.S. market inspired a raft of imitators, and the DOC zone was dramatically expanded: Vineyards spread into the more fertile plains south and west of Soave, adding more than 10,000 acres of vines to the zone. Moreover, many producers looked to cash in on the Soave boom by planting vineyards in the tendone style, in which the vines were trained onto high, flat trellises: This not only facilitated mechanical harvesting but pushed production as far as it could go in the richer alluvial soils of the plains.
Then some producers started toying with the ingredients. The classic recipe for Soave called for a predominance of garganega, a fleshy, fruity variety, and trebbiano di Soave, an aromatic local variant of the ubiquitous trebbiano. Over time, however, the DOC formula has been adjusted to include the more productive (and less interesting) trebbiano toscano, and as much as 30 percent chardonnay. While it’s true that chardonnay is one of the world’s great white grapes, it’s also very productive and easy to grow. It serves a valuable role around the world as filler, and this is mostly how it has been used in the Veneto.
In the seventies, Soave became more of a brand than a distinctive style of wine. This is a familiar story in many parts of Italy, but in Soave there’s one fundamental difference: Nothing much has changed. Of the nearly 6 million bottles of Soave produced each year, fewer than a quarter are produced in the original zone, which is now known as the “Classico.” The number of producers making genuinely interesting wines is very small, but they are out there, and they’re worth looking for.
“Garganega can be something special if you treat it with care,” says Claudio Gini, who runs the highly regarded Gini winery with his brother, Sandro. The family’s vineyard holdings include parcels on Monte Froscà and Monte Foscarino, two of the best-known hillside sites in the Classico zone, and the Gini wines have power and flavor not typically associated with Soave. “On Foscarino, which has more volcanic material, we get good structure. On Froscà, which has more clay and limestone, we get more finesse and aroma. But the important thing is that garganega is the right grape for this area.”
Indeed, what Gini and other producers note is that garganega, like so many other native Italian grapes, matures later in the season. The elevations in Soave are far from dizzying, and despite being in northern Italy, the climate is quite hot. “It is too low and too hot here for good chardonnay, even in the Classico,” Gini asserts. “We have vineyards at higher elevations that do well with chardonnay, but in general it’s not a good grape for the Soave area.”
In actuality, there are some strong similarities between garganega and chardonnay, as grapes if not as wines. Both are durable, vigorous, semiaromatic varieties, and both are highly variable in their expression. The garganega most people know is flinty, lightly appley, and high in acid—not unlike, say, a midlevel Chablis. But when crop levels are held back and the grape is allowed to fully ripen, it balloons into a juicier, more tropical-tasting wine, with ripe flavors of green melon and pear. In fact, what a well-made Soave offers that a lot of Italian whites don’t is good weight on the palate, which American drinkers in particular have come to expect in their whites.
When garganega is blended with trebbiano di Soave, rather than trebbiano toscano, Soave is more invitingly aromatic, with aromas of white flowers and even a touch of pine on top of the clean, melony fruit. A number of producers are now experimenting with fermenting their wines in oak barrels, including Gini and especially Inama, although the results are mixed. Garganega can be very deeply flavored and even juicy in texture, but it doesn’t have the stuffing to stand up to a lot of oak.
The difficulty, then, is finding the good Soave in a sea of mediocrity. “The DOC just doesn’t mean anything anymore,” says the excitable Roberto Anselmi, who in 1999 abandoned the Soave DOC altogether, choosing instead to label his well-known wines with an IGT designation. As one of the best-known vintners in the area, his exit was high Italian drama, punctuated by a fiery Dear John letter to the Soave zone, which he published in a variety of trade journals.
Anselmi’s main beef is with the tendone system of viticulture, which he says is incapable of producing quality grapes. He prefers a cordon-spur, or guyot, system, where the vines are trained lower to the ground, planted more densely, and closely pruned, so that the juicier side of garganega can come out. He also laments the gradual disappearance of trebbiano di Soave from the zone, and says that the Recioto di Soave designation, a DOCG reserved for sweet wines (see below), is “a joke” because it allows for the production of sparkling versions of the wine. In his open letter to the industry—a heartfelt, occasionally comic rant against politicians, cooperative wineries, and everyone else he held responsible for the destruction of Soave—he likened his exit to a “divorce” from a longtime love.
“You are not ‘suave’ as your name implies, you are uncontrollable, untameable, unfaithful,” Anselmi wrote. “So that’s it. I’m going. I’m leaving you, and this letter tells you why … It is easy to understand that hillside viniculture is potentially very different indeed from the viniculture of the plains. Unfortunately, the market mistakes one for the other: The bad vine chases the good vine away!”
A lot of wine drinkers have given up on Soave for that very reason, but this means missing out on Anselmi’s fat and fruity whites, especially his single-vineyard “Capitel Foscarino.” It also means missing out on the elegant, floral whites of Leonildo Pieropan, one of the best small producers in the zone, and of Gini and Inama, whose Soaves show off the plump, mouth-filling character of ripe garganega. Artisan producers such as Graziano Prà, Monte Tondo, Tamellini, and Suavia are all turning out good wine. And even among the larger houses, there are some eye-openers, among them Bolla’s “Tufaie” Soave Classico and Bertani’s Soave Classico Superiore. The problem, in the minds of winemakers like Anselmi, is that people consider good Soave a surprise.
“There are no limitations on yields in the vineyards, and because so many big wineries take grapes from both the Classico area and the plains, there’s no distinction being made by the consumer between the two,” Anselmi says. “Who on earth explains to the consumer that the Classico is better? No one!” For him, the only solution now is to create an entirely new DOC for the Classico vineyards, but these days he stands on the DOC periphery rather than getting into the fray.
Since the hardcover edition of this book was published, Italy’s national DOC committee has tinkered with the production formula for Soave, limiting somewhat the amount of trebbiano toscano that can be used. Further, it elevated “Soave Superiore” to DOCG status in 2003, though it is noteworthy that this new DOCG does not make the Classico/non-Classico distinction. It doesn’t appear, in fact, that there were many significant changes to the production of the wine to merit the promotion, but as we’ve noted elsewhere, politics sometimes play a greater role than winemaking in the DOC/DOCG game.
Of, course, Veneto white wine does not begin and end with Soave. But while there are some other noteworthy white-wine DOCs and a smattering of varietal wines from selected producers, none of them coalesce into a broad “category” like Soave. Probably the two most interesting non-Soave DOCs are Lugana (the majority of which is in Lombardy, on the southern shores of Lake Garda) and Gambellara (abutting Soave to the east), which showcase the local duo of garganega and trebbiano di Soave to sometimes great effect.
In the case of Lugana, trebbiano di Soave is the grape on display, and in some of the better bottlings the aromatic qualities of the variety really show through. Ca’ dei Frati of Sirmione in Lombardy is widely regarded as the top Lugana producer, although the Zenato winery of nearby Peschiera (in Veneto) gives them a run for their money, especially with their “San Benedetto” bottling.
In Gambellara, which is anchored by Zonin but includes notable smaller producers such as La Biancara and Dal Maso, it could be argued that the wines are purer expressions of garganega than those of neighboring Soave. The Gambellara production formula is less diffuse than that of Soave, calling for a minimum of 80 percent garganega and allowing only 20 percent of other varieties in the blend. Although still regarded as “little brothers” of Soave, there are some solid Gambellara wines to be found: La Biancara’s “Sassaia” and “I Masieri” versions are great examples, although Zonin’s Gambellaras will likely be easier to find in the United States.
Aside from that, Veneto white wine tends to be highly variable. The ubiquitous Santa Margherita Pinot Grigio, well-known to American consumers, comes from a winery based near Verona but carries the Valdadige DOC designation, meaning that the grapes can be sourced from Trentino–Alto Adige as well as Veneto. There’s also an ocean of easy-drinking varietal wines, such as those from Folonari, which hail mostly from the eastern plains of Veneto and carry either the Piave DOC or the Veneto or Delle Venezie IGT designations. Although there are some good wines to be found in these easterly reaches (including some interesting dry prosecco), as a general rule it’s safer to stick with some of the more central DOCs, such as Breganze and Colli Euganei.
The red-wine scene in the Veneto, like the white, is rooted in Verona. Although there are a number of excellent reds farther afield (headlined by the cabernets and merlots of Fausto Maculan in Breganze), the Veneto, for better or worse, is defined by Valpolicella. Although less so than Soave, Valpolicella is saddled with a long-standing bad reputation. But an attentive buyer can now find a tremendous amount of interesting wine in the zone. In fact, if Soave is the most discredited DOC in Italy, Valpolicella may be its most underrated.
The Valpolicella zone is often described as an open hand, whose “fingers” start in the Monte Lessini range north of Verona and spread southward. The long, vine-covered ridges flank a series of mountain streams, which amble down past Verona in search of the Adige River. Like Soave, Valpolicella has a more historic “Classico” zone, reaching from the commune of Sant’Ambrogio in the west to Negrar in the east. But unlike Soave, the areas outside the Valpolicella Classico—the Valpantena, Squaranto, Mezzane, and Illasi valleys, all to the east—are natural extensions of the zone. They were part of the original DOC when it was created in 1968, and today there are as many important producers outside the Classico as there are inside.
Because the name Valpolicella has become a mass-market brand in its own right, a lot of modern wine drinkers overlook what is one of the most evocative wine regions in Italy. In Verona, a place with more Roman ruins than any other Italian city outside of Rome, many of the narrow streets are paved with the reddish rosso veronese marble mined in the Valpolicella hills. Just off the broad Piazza Brà, the well-preserved Roman arena is the site of a summerlong opera festival. It’s a genteel, clean, manageable city. And for all of the heavy braises and grilled meats on menus, there are also some incredible food products on display in the market on the Piazza delle Erbe: delicately perfumed olive oils from the shores of Lake Garda and the hills of Valpolicella; Asiago and the more pungent Monte Veronese cheese, the latter an aged cow’s-milk variety from the Monti Lessini; peaches and especially cherries from communes such as Garganago and Cazzano, also in the Valpolicella hills. Biting into one of those cherries when they’re picked in June is a taste preview of the harvest season yet to come: It’s like there’s an inch of cherry flesh between the skin and the pit, the juice tart and spicy and sweet all at once, a perfect evocation of the wines from the neighboring vineyards.
Valpolicella, which means “valley of many cellars,” is home to a series of red grapes, most of which have unclear origins and are rarely found elsewhere in Italy. Corvina, a dark-berried, thick-skinned variety, is the principal grape in red Valpolicella wines, forming the backbone of the blend with its firm tannins and rich, smoky, red-cherry scent (there’s also a bigger-berried version of corvina called corvinone, which some people think is a sub-variety, like brunello is a sub-variety of sangiovese). The other key grape is rondinella, also deeply colored but considered more aromatic than corvina. After those two, which comprise a minimum of 60 percent of the blend and usually much more, the roster of ingredients is highly variable: There’s molinara, the high-acid third banana in Valpolicella, which is increasingly being phased out; local rarities such as croatina, negrara, and dindarella, often used as light seasoning in Valpolicella blends; and “international” varieties such as merlot and cabernet sauvignon.
What can be difficult to understand about Valpolicella wines, aside from what’s in them, is the hierarchy of styles. Crisp, cherry-red Valpolicella, and its lighter counterpart from Bardolino, are the wines people most readily associate with the zone (also worth a mention is the Bardolino rosé called chiaretto, which can be a great quaffer in the summer). But these lighter wines are more recent creations. They were preceded in history by the sweet Recioto della Valpolicella and its unusual dry counterpart, Amarone. By most accounts, Recioto came into fashion during Roman times, when wines were made sweet and alcoholic to withstand the rigors of travel. The Romans are said to have developed the process of appassimento, in which grapes were either left to dry on the vines or on straw mats to concentrate their sugars; since yeast typically stops working when wines approach 20 percent alcohol, traditional Reciotos had a considerable amount of residual sugar left over.
Recioto, whose name is thought to be a derivate of either recia (dialect for “ear,” purportedly in reference to the shapes of the drying grape clusters) or the Latin racemus (meaning a grape cluster that has been cut and left to dry), is still one of the great wines of Verona, an Italian answer to Port. But the wine regarded as Verona’s greatest achievement is Amarone, which may have been discovered by accident.
The conventional wisdom is that Amarone was created when someone left a barrel of Recioto unattended, and somehow the yeasts in the barrel continued to work and the wine fermented to dryness. The style came to be known as Recioto Amaro (amaro meaning “bitter,” in reference to the more tart, almondy, dried-fruit flavors of the wine), and later as Recioto della Valpolicella Amarone. Known today as Amarone della Valpolicella, it’s a wine that still confounds people with its vinous split personality: Densely concentrated and deeply colored, often almost syrupy in texture, it behaves like a sweet wine without technically being sweet. Amarone is the big palate tease, letting all its luscious, sappy fruit flavor hang out before covering up with a savory robe of alcohol, acidity, and tannin.
As a wine in a bottle on sale in a store, Amarone is a very recent phenomenon: Bolla first commercialized Amarone in the fifties, and was quickly followed into the market by Masi and Bertani. A mass of producers didn’t develop until much later. Because Amarone isn’t produced in very large quantities, there isn’t a lot of old wine to be found, but the opportunity to drink an Amarone from a vintage such as 1967 or 1983 should not be missed. The aromas of these wines—a melding of cherry syrup, coffee, leather, almonds, tar, spice, and so much else—are matched only by older Barolos and Barbarescos from similarly great years. The difference comes in the texture: In an older Amarone the glycerine richness created by appassimento continues to show through, coating the palate like a nectar. As Sandro Boscaini, technical director of Masi, puts it: “No other wine is so positively affected by the hand of man.”
The most simple description of Amarone comes from one of the Valpolicella zone’s most famous boutique producers, Romano Dal Forno, who likens the process of appassimento to “leaving a peach on the counter to ripen.” And while there are some who view appassimento as cheating, as a way of extracting personality from boring grapes, Dal Forno insists that “appassimento is only as good as the material you’re starting with.”
Typically, corvina, rondinella, and the other Valpolicella grapes are harvested in early October, after which they are spread out to dry on straw mats called graticci. The drying process usually lasts until January, with the grapes losing between 30 to 40 percent of their weight before they are pressed and vinified (grapes for Recioto are dried longer). And while a number of producers, including Tedeschi and Allegrini, have created temperature- and humidity-controlled drying rooms in which to carry out the appassimento, most still cling to the natural method of drying the grapes in open lofts or barns. The relatively mild winter climate in Valpolicella, moderated by nearby Lake Garda, is generally credited as the secret to Verona’s success with appassimento. But this is not to say that success is guaranteed: too much humidity and the grapes could rot. So in addition to simply opening the windows, most producers are using at least some kind of fan or dehumidifier system to hedge their bets.
What, exactly, happens during appassimento? “There’s a dramatic increase in sugars without a corresponding increase in acidity,” says Sandro Boscaini. “Essentially, the water evaporates out of the grapes, leaving a purer, more concentrated fruit extract inside.” This, he says, is what many people mistake for sweetness when tasting Amarone; it’s not sugar that’s coating your mouth, but fruit extract. This makes Amarone the ultimate “reduction wine” for braises and stews, but of course it’s much more than that.
In tasting through a series of Amarone wines, a clear style spectrum emerges: Some are juicier, more syrupy, more colorful, even hinting at Port-like sweetness, while others have more dried fruit flavors, even a tarry, resiny quality, and less color. While this has at least something to do with the ripeness of the corvina and other grapes going in, much of the variation in Amarone style can be explained in technical terms. In general, Amarone style is defined by the following factors:
• Grapes and Blending: Naturally, some producers grow fuller-bodied corvina than others. Beyond that, what is their blending formula? If they’re still using a good percentage of molinara, for example, the wine will likely be higher in acid, less deeply colored, and lighter-bodied.
• Length and Type of Appassimento: Boscaini contends that grapes dried at higher elevations will produce more powerful, fruity, tannic wines, while those dried in lower, more humid locations are more likely to be attacked by the noble rot called Botrytis cinerea, which essentially consumes tartaric acid to create glycerol. Wine affected by botrytis, he says, has a telltale glycerine richness. As for the length of appassimento, the effect is obvious: “The longer the drying, the more concentration,” Boscaini says.
• Method of Aging: One of the key changes in Amarone in recent years has been the type of barrels used for aging and the length of time the wines are aged. In the past, when fermentation was carried out naturally, it may have taken a year or more for the wine to ferment to dryness. This caused the wine to become oxidized, even Madeira-like, during the process, losing color and developing secondary aromas of nuts and dried fruits. Although most wines are now fermented in stainless steel using yeasts specially developed to work more quickly, the practice of long-aging in large, old barrels is still used—creating a more lightly colored, spicy, mature-tasting Amarone. By contrast, some producers are using new oak barriques to age their wines, and are leaving the wine in wood for a shorter time, since the surface area of the wine in contact with the wood is much greater. The faster influx of oxygen in the smaller barrique stabilizes the wine’s color, while the tannins in the newer wood are absorbed by the wine. The result is a denser, more youthful style of Amarone.
“Today, the new imperative is to achieve as much extraction as possible with minimal oxidation,” says Boscaini. “A lot of this is accomplished with select yeasts that are able to work at higher alcohol levels. We don’t leave the wine to macerate on its skins as long as we once did, which reduces the amount of bitter tannin in the wine and helps us preserve color.” Indeed, as is often noted by winemakers, all of the color in a red wine is extracted in the first twenty-four to thirty-six hours of maceration; after that, it won’t get any deeper, but may in fact begin to break down as the chemical reactions of fermentation proceed.
Then there’s the question of botrytis. Is it noble rot that gives Amarone wines their syrupy texture, or is that just the weight of the extract playing tricks on winemakers’ minds? It’s a hotly debated topic in Valpolicella, with both sides holding firm. “Certainly there’s a smoky element to the aroma of Amarone that indicates botrytis,” says Riccardo Tedeschi, winemaker at the Tedeschi estate. “The softness and richness of Amarone is in direct relation to the degree the grapes are attacked. For us, we usually see about 30 percent of botrytis-affected fruit.”
“In our case, anyway, botrytis is not something we want,” counters Marilisa Allegrini, whose family winery in Fumane produces some of the most potent Amarone and Valpolicella in the zone. “It breaks down the skins of the grapes, which in turn destroys the structure of the wine. Botrytis may make the wine sweeter and rounder, but it breaks down acid and tannins, both of which we want to give the wine a long life.”
Given all the variables influencing Amarone style, it’s not surprising that people have trouble deciding when to drink it—and whose to drink. Will it be a rich, syrupy style for a traditional pairing with stinky cheese? (The local Monte Veronese is great with a richer-style Amarone, but even better with Recioto.) Or is it a more balanced, spicy, dried-cherry expression of Amarone better suited to game birds or lamb? Most people are content to sip Amarone on its own or with the cheese course, but it’s a mistake to think of the wines only in this context.
Although it’s difficult to generalize, some of the traditional producers of Amarone include Bertani, Tommasi, Speri, Le Ragose, Le Salette, Bolla, and Accordini, all of whom make wines in a more approachable, spicy, medium-bodied style that is readily compatible with food. For fuller, richer, more extracted wines better suited to cheeses, look to Masi (particularly the single-vineyard “Mazzano”), Corte Sant’Alda, Allegrini, Tedeschi, Tenuta Sant’Antonio, Tommaso Bussola, and Dal Forno Romano. Of the latter two, expect a raw power to rival that of vintage Port.
Somewhere on their own plane, occupying a middle ground between the resiny maturity of the traditional and the juicy extract of the modern, are the wines of Giuseppe Quintarelli. His estate in the heights of Negrar, home not only to vines but to cherry orchards and a wide variety of vegetables, has been the benchmark in Valpolicella for decades. Quintarelli only makes Amarone in exceptional vintages, and ages his wines for more than six years in large Slavonian oak casks before they are released. Yet even after long aging, Quintarelli wines, like the octogenerian winemaker himself, hold on to their youthful energy: It’s rare to find a red wine from anywhere in the world that combines power and complexity the way a Quintarelli Amarone does. It’s a wine that keeps you guessing, grasping for descriptors, wondering how all those seemingly divergent flavors found their way into one bottle.
More so than in the past, in fact, the magical properties of Amarone are coloring the other dry reds of the zone, especially Valpolicella. While the pizza-parlor Valpolicella of the seventies was made only with freshly harvested grapes, most producers today are either blending in a percentage of Amarone-style wine or employing a process called ripasso, in which a Valpolicella vinified in the fall is poured over the wine-drenched skins and pulp left over from an Amarone fermentation. This “repassing” incites a secondary fermentation, infusing the wine with a hint of the tarry, spicy, glycerol kick of Amarone.
Although most producers indicate on the label when a wine is a ripasso, there is often no telling exactly what’s in the bottle of Valpolicella or Valpolicella Classico these days. When made with only “fresh” grapes (a good example F.lli Zeni’s “Vigne Alte”), the smoky cherry flavor of corvina is checked by a tart acidity, making it a great choice for tomato-sauced pastas. In ripasso Valpolicella, that buoyant cherry is fleshed out with a resiny, toffee-ish richness. In still other Valpolicellas, most notably those of Dal Forno Romano and Marion, the use of a percentage of appassimento wine pushes them in the direction of Amarone. In this respect, Valpolicella is a work in progress, and as more producers refine their growing techniques for corvina, the “fresh” style of Valpolicella may come back into vogue, albeit with a new look. Even the light and easy Bardolino is getting a face-lift, as producers such as Le Fraghe and Masi plump it up, ever so slightly, to suit modern tastes. Bardolino, in fact, was made a DOCG in 2001.
“It’s very hard to explain to consumers the changes that have occurred in Valpolicella,” says Riccardo Tedeschi. “Today we’re producing important wines, and the younger producers are unanimous in the belief that corvina can produce world-class reds without the use of appassimento.”
As the Veronese try to figure out what they want Valpolicella to be, winemakers in other parts of the Veneto have stolen some of their thunder, often with Bordeaux-style blends of cabernet sauvignon, cabernet franc, and merlot. Chief among them has been Fausto Maculan, who in 1972 began making wines in the relatively far-flung commune of Breganze, north of Vicenza. His wines, including a luxurious, barrique-aged cabernet sauvignon called “Fratta” and a single-vineyard merlot called “Marchesante,” have become the cult wines of the Veneto, a region where cabernet and merlot are widely grown but rarely interesting.
Maculan’s success has inspired other producers outside of Verona to experiment with Bordeaux-style wines, particularly in the volcanic soils of the Colli Berici and Colli Euganei DOC zones. Stefano Inama, whose flinty, complex “Bradisismo” cabernet sauvignon is made in the Colli Berici DOC, says that the zone was the first in Italy to feature cabernet sauvignon. “Although they’re only now getting attention, the Colli Berici and Colli Euganei are traditional zones for cabernet and merlot,” Inama says. “The whole northeast of Italy has been a traditional place for these grapes, since the days of the Austrian domination, if not before. The string of volcanoes here in the Veneto is the only volcanic terrain in the north of Italy, and it’s perfect for cabernet.”
Only now is the wine scene in these zones beginning to develop. In Breganze, both Maculan and Vigneto due Santi have become sought-after names, while in Colli Berici, practically unheard of just a few years ago, producers such as Inama, Dal Maso, Domenico Cavazza, and Conte Alessandro Piovene are putting the zone on the map. Colli Euganei is headlined by the smoky, cabernet-based blends of Vignalta, which are beginning to see wider distribution in the United States.
It may seem unfair to ignore the mass of red wine being made in Piave and Lison-Pramaggiore, in the eastern Veneto. But with so much inexpensive and higher quality merlot and cabernet sauvignon being made in Chile, Argentina, and Australia, it’s difficult to find a place for inexpensive—and not-so-high-quality—merlot and cabernet from Veneto’s plains. Plus, there isn’t much of this wine to be found anyway, unless you’re drinking red wine on tap in a Venetian osteria. Lison-Pramaggiore has almost as much vineyard area as the Valpolicella Classico, but you’ll be hard-pressed to find the DOC name on much bottled wine, and the same goes for Piave: There are lots of vineyards, more than any other Veneto DOC zone, in fact, but hardly any producers bottling wine under the Piave designation.
Unjustly lost in the shuffle, as so many sweet wines are these days, are the Recioto wines of Soave and Valpolicella, the Veneto’s answer to Sauternes and Port, respectively. In Recioto di Soave, a DOCG-designated wine, the vibrant acidity of garganega and trebbiano helps keep the rich glycerol sweetness of the appassimento in check, so that the wines are sweet without being cloying. Most of the better Soave producers make good Reciotos as well, including Pieropan, Gini, and Anselmi, although Anselmi has taken the DOCG designation off his luscious, golden-hued “I Capitelli.” Also well worth seeking out are the trio of sweet wines from Maculan, especially his “Torcolato,” made from the local vespaiolo grape.
Like Sauternes, these wines often have a smoky tint to their honeyed, melony fruit flavors, making them compatible with savory foods as well as sweet ones. Because so many restaurants prefer to serve sweet whites such as Recioto with sweet desserts, the complex flavors of the wine can get lost in a clash of sugar-on-sugar. Try them with aged cheeses instead.
The same goes for Recioto della Valpolicella, the ultimate match for a hunk of Gorgonzola or Robiola, two of Italy’s more potent cheeses. Unlike Amarone, Recioto is made by arresting the fermentation of the wine (sometimes by chilling down the must) so that some residual sugar remains. With all that sugar, the extract, and the alcohol, a Recioto can be almost overwhelming in its intensity, with fruit aromas as head-spinning as gasoline vapors and a weight on the palate that makes it a meal in itself.
PROVINCES: Belluno (BL), Padova (PD), Rovigo (RO), Treviso (TV), Venezia (VE), Verona (VR), Vicenza (VI)
CAPITAL: Venice
KEY WINE TOWNS: Bardolino, Breganze, Negrar, Soave, Valdobbiadene, Verona
TOTAL VINEYARD AREA*: 73,636 hectares, or 181,954 acres. Rank: 3rd
TOTAL WINE PRODUCTION*: 8,825,000 hectoliters, or 233,156,500 gallons (1st); 62.8% white, 37.2% red
DOC WINE PRODUCED*: 23.4% (9th)
SPECIALTY FOODS: Asiago (cow’s milk cheese); Grana Padano (cow’s milk cheese); Monte Veronese (cow’s milk cheese); Ubriaco (cow’s-milk cheese soaked in grape pomace; ubriaco means “drunk.”); radicchio trevisano (red radicchio from Treviso); cherries and peaches from Valpolicella.
*2000 figures. Rankings out of twenty regions total (Trentino–Alto Adige counted as one). Source: Istituto Statistica Mercati Agro-Alimentari (ISMEA), Rome.
GARGANEGA: A semiaromatic white thought by some to be related to the greco or grecanico of southern Italy. As the principal grape in Soave, its personality is highly variable. It can be juicy and mouth-filling, with distinctive apple and pear scents, or watery and light, depending on how it is grown.
TREBBIANO: Two types thrive in the region: the aromatic trebbiano di Soave, used as a blending variety in Soave and Lugana whites (and thought to be related to the verdicchio of the Marche), and the workhorse trebbiano toscano, know more for its productivity than any particular flavor or aroma.
PROSECCO: Late-ripening white that gives the sparkling wines of northeastern Veneto their characteristic peachy softness.
OTHERS: CHARDONNAY; TOCAI FRIULANO; RIESLING; INCROCIO MANZONI; PINOT BIANCO; VESPAIOLA, a tart, lemony native used mainly in the Breganze DOC.
CORVINA: Considered native to the Valpolicella region, this dark-skinned, richly flavorful variety is the basis for Valpolicella and Amarone. Meaty, tannic, and aromatic. Increasingly popular is the larger-berried CORVINONE, which some producers say is a clone and others say is a distinct variety.
RONDINELLA: Local native used for color and body in Valpolicella/Amarone blends.
MOLINARA: Local native that traditionally added acidity to Valpolicella/Amarone blends, but that is becoming increasingly scarce.
CABERNET: Cabernet sauvignon, cabernet franc, and a mix of the two known simply as “cabernet” are all found in abundance here, as in most of northeast Italy. Although the family has a long history in the region, the majority of wines made from these grapes have a nagging green-bell-pepper flavor that arises when grapes are not fully mature.
OTHERS: RABOSO (dark and tannic native found mainly in the Piave plain); MERLOT.
Amarone is the Veneto’s principal collector’s wine, and it is built to last: Because of its high alcohol content, thick tannins, and deep concentration, it is a wine typically aged from three to six years before it is released. It is a unique wine in that it is approachable when young but can also spend twenty to thirty years or more in bottle and still be rich and satisfying when opened. Legendary older vintages include 1967 and 1976. More recent top years: ’83, ’85, ’88, ’90, ’93, ’95, ’97, ’98, ’99, ’00, ’01, ’04.
A rite of passage for many American wine professionals is a trip to Verona for the annual VinItaly wine fair, which is held every April at the city’s exposition center, called Veronafiera (see www.vinitalyonline.com for more information). Verona is definitely the Veneto’s principal wine town, and whether or not you’re there for VinItaly it’s worth making a trip to the Antica Bottega del Vino (Via Scudo di Francia 3; 045-800-45-35), a worn-at-the-edges wine bar not far from the city’s main square, the Piazza Brà. The selection of Veneto wines is encyclopedic, most of them listed on a large blackboard, but just about every region of Italy is well-represented. It’s a fun place with a solid osteria-style menu. Also noteworthy is the nearby Valpolicella region, just ten to fifteen minutes outside of the city, where you’ll find a host of excellent country restaurants set amid beautiful vineyards. Set yourself up in a Verona hotel, preferably during early July through early September, during the Verona opera season, so you can check out the opera in Verona’s Roman Arena. Then take day trips into the Valpolicella hills and eat like a king in places such as Al Covolo (Sant’Ambrogio; 045-773-23-50); Trattoria Dalla Rosa Alda (San Giorgio; 045-680-04-11); and Trattoria Alla Coà (Ospedaletto; 045-676-74-02). There’s also a regional Valpolicella enoteca in the town of Fumane (045-683-914-67) that serves light fare and a broad array of the region’s wines. Also worth a visit is the Serègo Alighieri estate in Gargagnago, a villa where the poet Dante once lived. It is the site of some prized vineyards now used by the Masi firm to produce wine, oil, and condiments. Tours are available and there is a shop that sells the various food products, including the great Serègo Alighieri Amarones (045-770-36-22; www.seregoalighieri.it). Another good contact is the Consorzio Tutela Vino Valpolicella in San Floriano (045-770-31-94; www.valpolicella.it). And finally, there’s Venice, a great wine town even if no grapes are grown there. Check out the enoteca-pizzeria All’Aciughetta (Campo San Filippo e Giacomo 4357; 041-522-42-92), or for more serious diners, Al Covo (Campiello della Pescaria 3968; 041-522-38-12) and Da Fiore (Calle del Scaleter 2202/A; 041-72-13-08).
Mionetto Prosecco di Valdobbiadene “Casada,” $
Zardetto Prosecco di Conegliano Brut, $
Ruggeri Prosecco di Valdobbiadene Cartizze, $
Starting with the Mionetto wine and finishing with the Ruggeri, you’ll get a good sense of the style spectrum of sparkling prosecco: from light and faintly peach-scented to richer and more firmly structured. Even in the Ruggeri wine, however, there’s a delicacy and softness of texture that makes it best-suited to sipping as a light apéritif, maybe with some smoked salmon or tramezzine sandwiches (see recipes that follow). Other reliable prosecco producers: Carpenè Malvotti, Nino Franco, Bellenda, Collalbrigo.
Leonildo Pieropan Soave Classico Superiore “Vigneto La Rocca,” $
Roberto Anselmi “San Vicenzo,” $
Gini Soave Classico Superiore “La Froscà,” $
This, too, is a climb up the ladder in terms of mouthfeel: Pieropan’s wines are known for their delicacy and balance, and you’ll likely find the “Vigneto La Rocca” to be the most crisp and aromatic of these three wines. Anselmi’s “San Vicenzo,” while no longer called a Soave, is a benchmark, known for its appley, mouth-filling fruit. It shows off the juicy texture of the garganega grape. Gini’s “La Froscà” includes a percentage of barrel-fermented garganega, so it tacks on a layer of creamy richness. These wines all have a cool, soothing feel on the palate; rather than being tartly acidic, they have a smooth, dewy quality that might remind you of cantaloupe or honeydew melon, as opposed to citrus. Other notable names in Soave: Inama, for a more wood-aged style; Graziano Pra; and La Cappuccina, also for more wood-aged styles.
F.lli Zeni Valpolicella Classico Superiore “Vigne Alte,” $
Le Ragose Valpolicella Classico, $
Speri Valpolicella Classico Superiore “La Roverina,” $
A basic, dry Valpolicella—one that has not been put through the ripasso process or blended with a percentage of Amarone to pump it up—is becoming harder and harder to find these days.
In these three wines you get the crisp acidity and spicy cherry flavors of corvina, the principal grape in the Valpolicella blend. These are lighter-styled wines for red-sauced pastas, pizza, or barbecued foods: Their brambly red-cherry and wild-berry flavors have a sharp, rustic edge. Consider giving them a slight chill to mute the acidity somewhat.
Zenato Valpolicella Superiore “Ripassa,” $$
Bertani Valpolicella Valpantena, “Secco Bertani,” $
Giuseppe Quintarelli Valpolicella Classico, $$
In these three wines the naturally light and fruity Valpolicella is given a super-charge, either by being passed over the lees of just-fermented Amarone (ripasso) or by the inclusion of a small amount of Amarone-type wine to the blend. These wines have a “blacker” fruit quality than a traditional “fresh” Valpolicella, tacking on some extra weight from their time in contact (or in concert) with Amarone. In the “Secco Bertani” bottling in particular, flavors of red raspberries and dried cherries are intertwined with a coffee-toffee character that is a typical result of ripasso. The Quintarelli wine, meanwhile, has a hint of glycerine-like sweetness thanks to the presence of a small percentage of Amarone in the blend. Not just bigger and fleshier but more aromatically complex, these Valpolicellas have the stuff to take on richer dishes, especially heartier stews and braises.
Bolla Amarone della Valpolicella, $$$
Masi Amarone della Valpolicella, $$$
Allegrini Amarone della Valpolicella, $$$
Another rich, richer, and richest lineup, this trio represents three benchmark Amarones at three distinct price points. Technically, they are not sweet wines, but when you smell and taste them you may be inclined to think they are: On the nose there are inviting scents of bitter chocolate, coffee, stewed cherries, blackberry jam, resin, leather, even cinnamon, and on the palate the rich, even syrupy concentration of the wine may lead to the perception of sweetness. The principal distinction among these wines is the level of weight, or viscosity, in the mouth. As you get to know the style spectrum of Amarone, you’ll know to reserve more medium-bodied wines such as the Bolla and Masi for osso buco or maybe a steak, while setting aside the Allegrini for the cheese course. For other medium-weight styles look to Tedeschi, Bertani, Le Ragose, Cesari, and Le Salette. For more powerful, sappy styles go with Tommaso Bussola or Dal Forno Romano. For a wonderfully complex mixture of both, look for the long-aged Amarone of Giuseppe Quintarelli.
Anselmi “I Capitelli,” $$
At one time not long ago, “I Capitelli” was the best-known example available of Recioto di Soave, the Veneto’s DOCG sweet wine. The Anselmi winery no longer uses a DOCG designation on the wine, but it remains a luscious example of what the garganega grape becomes when it is made in an appassimento style: rich and honeyed, with hints of banana, mango, and citrus, with a whiff of exotic spice and smoke, all cleaned up with a refreshing wave of acidity. Not to be outdone, Fausto Maculan of Breganze gives the appassimento treatment to his local vespaiolo grape, creating a Sauternes-like dessert sipper with a similarly sweet-yet-crisp personality. These are nectars to be sipped on their own or paired with desserts such as a torta di mandorla (almond torte) or pan d’oro (golden bread, a vanilla cake that is a specialty of Verona). And don’t hesitate to try them with cheeses, including aged versions of the Veneto’s star, Asiago, or milder local cheeses such as Montasio.
Make ahead note: The curing process for this dish takes 3 days.
To download a PDF of this image, visit http://rhlink.com/vita017
ALTO ADIGE
10 Valdadige/Etschtaler (shared with Trentino and Veneto)
11 Alto Adige Colli di Bolzano/Bozner Leiten (subzone)
12 Alto Adige Meranese/Südtirol Meraner (subzone)
13 Alto Adige Santa Maddalena/Südtirol St. Magdalener (subzone)
14 Alto Adige Terlano/Südtirol Terlaner (subzone)
