| Comments | Transcript



A few quick and easy things to look for to better understand an Italian wine label.
Download the Podcast

Transcript

Matt: I'm with Mike Supple of SuppleWine.com. We're talking about how to read labels, and we are now in Italy.

Mike: Alright. Italy's a fun one, because Italy is a really important wine region. Italian wines are very popular in the United States. The number one import in the United States is actually Pinot Grigio. In case you don't know, that's an Italian white wine. They come in all kinds of styles; some of them are crappy, some of them are delicious.

Of course, beyond Pinot Grigio you have red wines: Chianti is the biggest one. A lot of people think of Chianti as cheap straw flask crap that you get in your little local pizza joint or whatever. There are some delicious Chiantis out there.

Italy can be incredibly complicated and difficult, because in Italy there are more grape varieties grown than the rest of the world put together. And they all get their little label and little region. It's a small country, so that's a ridiculous amount.

Matt: Everything's under vine.

Mike: They plant everywhere. But let's talk about the big basics. You want to learn about Chianti; you want to know if you're getting a good one. There are certain things to look for. Let's look at the label here. The first thing you see is the producer. Castello d'Albola is the producer, right here. That's the winery that makes the wine. If you like following a specific producer, that's good to know.

Next thing, 2004. That's the vintage. That's the year the grapes were picked. 2004 happens to have been a great vintage for Tuscany, the region that Chianti is in. It's sometimes important to know what years are good and what years aren't. 2004 is a great year and there are a lot of them available right now to drink, so go look for those.

Next you're going to see it says "Chianti Classico." This is where it gets a little bit complicated. Chianti is a region within Tuscany, a large region in Italy. Chianti covers a whole big area. There are actually several sub appellations, sub areas in Chianti that have specific characteristics to them. Chianti Classico is in the center core, and they sort of consider that the roots of where Chianti came from. You're going to see [the word Classico] on a bunch of Italian wines. If you see any type of Italian wine that says "something Classico"...

Matt: You're kind of looking at the best of the best.

Mike: Exactly. So maybe Soave, a white Italian, you see Soave Classico...

Matt: Rico.

Mike: Rico Soave Classico. That means it's from a core area. It's legally defined and it's a little bit better quality. So when you see that on a label it usually means it's better quality; it also means it's more expensive.

The next thing you're seeing on this label, you see the word "Riserva" right there. It has slightly different meanings depending on what part of Italy you're in. Again, it's controlled by law, it's a little different in each region, but basically it means it was aged for a certain amount of time before they released it. It had a certain number of years in oak, a certain number of years in bottle, and then it came to you. That usually means that it's better quality; it always means it's more expensive.

Anything else on here you need to know?

Matt: One thing that you should know is that it doesn't say the grape on the front of the bottle anywhere.

Mike: That's one major difference between New World - California, Australia, Argentina - wines and Old World wines. In the Old World - like Italy, like France, Spain - they're a lot more about the region than they are about the grape. The reason for that is they have a lot more history making those wines. So instead of knowing, "this is a Cabernet," you say, "this is a Chianti," and that means it has certain characteristics. Chianti is made from the grape Sangiovese, mostly, but they're allowed to blend in little things. They're allowed to blend in up to 10% of some white grapes, if that just happens to be whatever's in the guy's field who makes Chianti. So it's more important in the Old World about getting a certain style. You know Chianti's going to taste like this, it's going to smell like this; it's not necessarily about the grape. You're going to find that everywhere in Italy; everywhere in the Old World.

Some wines will list the name of the grape; it's their choice. In some regions they're allowed to and in some they're not.

Matt: Sometimes they do it just for the American market because we're used to seeing the varietal.

Mike: One other quick thing about Chianti. See at the top of it, this little rooster. That's another government seal. They can only put the rooster on wines from Chianti Classico. Again, Chianti Classico is the region within Chianti.

You're also going to see these little pink strips at the top of Italian wines. The government does control quite a bit of quality wine. They have different rules in different regions, but if you see the pink strip it just means it's got a little bit more of a government guarantee that the quality is better. Whatever you want that to mean.

Like regular labels from anywhere else, they're going to have the volume, 750ml. They're going to have the percentage of alcohol on the bottom of that label somewhere. Import labels are going to tell you a little more about the importer, they're going to have US government warnings, maybe a barcode here and there, and that's about it. So that's Chianti for you.

Matt: Now we're looking at a little older bottle, and we just want to show you something different. This is from 1983, this is Amarone.

Mike: The important thing about Italian wines is that they can label the wines in different ways. Some of them label by the region, some will label it by the grape, some of them will label it by cultural or historical myths. There's a particular wine called "Est! Est! Est!". E-S-T. That's a long one to get in to, we'll do some other time. Chianti, again, is the region. This wine here, Amarone della Valpolicella, the region is Valpolicella. Amarone is not the grape [it's made of a blend of Corvina, Rondinella and Molinara grapes]. Again, it's labeled by the region the way the Chianti is.

This is kind of a fun one. 1983. Just a quick thing. If you see, particularly with older wineries, if you see the vintage, the year the wine was picked, up on a separate label, the reason they do that is because they want to save money. They print a ton of these bottom labels that don't change at all, and every year they just print this tiny little new label with the year on there.

Matt: Which is really cheap considering [the Amarone] is a $250 bottle, and these guys [the Chianti] ponied up, and this is more like $15.