Wine comes to mind when dining at Italian, and French, restaurants, more so than with other cuisines. With the exception of some inexpensive sandwich and by-the-slice pizza joints, wine is, and has always been, an important part at Italian restaurants in this country – with the possible exception of the dark days of Prohibition, though even then at many, or most. This is because wine was a fundamental, and often needed component, of the daily table of the Italians who emigrated. Wine has been drunk throughout the Italian peninsula, and almost wherever grapevines grew in Europe, for well over a couple of thousand years as an activity of daily life. Largely because the “consumption of wine in the main European winemaking countries was part of the everyday diet largely because it was an important part of the caloric intake necessary to perform work activities,” noted an academic survey, A History of Wine in Europe, 19th to 20th Centuries.
 
That expectation for wine extended to life in America for those coming from Italy, even the calories provided by it was no longer as needed. Viewed almost as a liquid dish, wine had always been served at meals in Italy and continued in the new country. “Wine is food as well as drink to the Italian people,” as a piece in the New York Daily Tribune observed in 1904. It was on the table in Italy and was always found at Italian restaurants in the new country, even if the wine might not have been made nearby as in the home country. That wine served in American restaurants might have been imported from Italy or, more so, shipped from California, which was cheaper.
 
Though wine was expected by the Italians arriving on the shores, the eventual home-grown customers were less versed in the fruits of the vine. Wine was not part of the culture of the United States as it was in the wine-producing countries of Europe. In the U.S., for most of its history until recent decades, wine was the province of the more well-to-do and more sophisticated, as wine was not a widespread agriculture product and not nearly as ubiquitous. Wine was a staple for Italians, somewhat of a luxury for Americans.
 
Before Prohibition…
 
The wine offerings at Italian restaurants were rather limited compared to today in the years leading up to Prohibition, and well afterwards, for that matter. Most were humble table d’hôte establishments with a significant portion of the clientele the recent arrivals from Italy, until recently, peasants or laborers for whom wine was not much more than a requisite part of the meal. These customers were certainly not that fussy about the wine, as long as it was mostly palatable. Wine was almost necessarily included in the price at Italian table d’hôte restaurants, and all Italian restaurants then had a table d’hôte option. Though these have long gone out of fashion in favor of the a la carte menus, table d’hôte was a common type of restaurant and option before the Second World War where a multi-course meal, with no or a very limited of choices, was served at a fixed price.

A New York paper reporting about Italian restaurants in 1905 wrote that the wine “is mainly from California” and “often served with seltzer.” About a decade later, at the popular Buon Gusto in San Francisco, a customer was “served a pint of good table wine” as part of a six-course dinner for fifty cents – a feast for all of $16 in 2024 currency – and this was typical throughout San Francisco, New York and elsewhere.
 
As the grape varieties in the eastern part of country would not yield an acceptable product, that table d’hôte wine and all the most inexpensive wines came from California, sometimes shipped in bulk and bottled at the restaurant. Those might be around 40 cents, less than $10 in 2024, if purchased by the bottle or quart. The nicest domestic bottlings like Tipo, from Italian Swiss Colony in Asti, California, were a $1 a bottle at restaurants, around $30 today.
 
The wines that were imported from Europe were a little sturdier than the young wines that most of the immigrants had consumed at home. These had to last the trip and some additional lag before consumption, and more was to be made from exporting the better wines. These were from the more well-established wineries and regions: Asti Spumante, Barolo and an earlier spelling of Nebbiolo, Nebiolo, which was sometimes spumante, from Piedmont; Chianti in a couple hues from Tuscany; and the once-famous Lacrima Christi from the slopes of Mount Vesuvius – that in red, white, and sparkling in both red and white. The better Italian restaurants also served a fair number of wines from France, Germany and sometimes Spain. These imported wines were usually identified by the negociant rather than the producer, unlike today. Renganeschi in Manhattan had about forty wines on its list in 1916, the noted Guffanti’s, about seventy, each ranging from about nine or ten dollars to $130 in 2024 dollars, the most expensive being from Champagne, labels that are still popular today, Veuve Clicquot, Charles Heidsieck, Pommery. The Champagne region has always found a home at the nicest Italian restaurants, as in the nicest restaurants almost anywhere.
 
During Prohibition…
 
Though Italian restaurateurs thought Prohibition ridiculous and a serious threat to business, nearly all carried on, the popular Gonfarone in lower Manhattan being an exception, shuttering at its onset with the inability to serve wine legally. Wine was still served in most, though, if not so legally. Wine continued to be made, largely by non-professionals, with grapes being shipped from California to points east for manufacture. This home winemaking was not actually lawful; it’s illegality was just not enforced, and local municipalities sometimes even issued permits for it. The demand for grapes, especially from Italians, for this created a boom in grape growing causing an increase in acreage devoted to it by over 23,000 acres in California from the advent of Prohibition through 1924 and peaking in 1926. By mid-decade, the country was consuming about 150 millions gallons of the amateurs’ output. That often ended up in the dining rooms of Italian restaurants; likely not having to travel very far. The most popular grape traveling to the eastern cities was the thick-skinned, attractive and dark-juiced Alicante Bouschet, that made a mediocre wine, at its best, usually worse, as wines were also made after the initial press. But it was wine.
 
And the wine was available. A news service sketch of lower Manhattan in 1929, nearly a decade with Prohibition, describes the area around Eighth and Fourth streets with “Italian restaurants where the wine, if young, is still wine.” Around that time in Chicago, a guidebook describes that the “obscure little restaurants and other similar places all over town, and some not so obscure, that have about as much respect for the Eighteenth Amendment as the eminent Mr. Capone has,” so that “you ought at least to find Dago Red. In case you're more fortunate, however, and come upon a wide assortment of table wines.” Joe Marchetti of the Como Inn, also in the Windy City, recalled years later: ”We had a lot of great years during Prohibition. You could get a glass of wine if you had to have one. What`s an Italian meal without wine?”
 
There was some risk in this, but the rewards seemed to outweigh these by a ways. At least two of the most well-known and highly regarded Italian restaurants in Manhattan were successfully raided by Prohibition agents to some notoriety. Guffanti’s, the first time in early 1922 when agents were able to purchase a quart of wine for a very steep $5. A certainly better bottle of Tipo red was $1 before the Volstead Act. A couple of years later, agents found alcohol there valued at an estimated $100,000 – that’s $1.6 million in 2024. In 1930, a squad of Prohibition agents, search warrant in hand, descended on Leone's – eventually known as Mamma Leone’s – “during the peak of the dinner rush-hour…seized $5,000 worth of wines, whiskies and liqueurs, and arrested Joseph Leone and his brother Celestine, two of the three proprietors, and three waiters,” and startling customers, “many to hurry away, some leaving their dinners untouched.” That wine and other intoxicants were served was widely known and somewhat protected as “admission to the restaurant is by card only” and it was recognized that Leone’s “numbers among its patrons some of the best known professional people in the country.” The raid on Leone’s was caused by a complaint by its neighbor, a Methodist church. Leone’s later purchased the church’s property, demolishing it for expansion in the 1940s. As for Guffanti’s proprietor, Joseph Guffanti, he died in 1929 with an estate valued at a million dollars, not all it from the proceeds of the restaurant.
 
A great many throughout the country still felt the need for some alcohol when out for an evening meal during the 1920s and into the 1930s. “Prohibition, with its lackluster speakeasy cuisine, had led many diners to investigate small foreign restaurants,” according to Michael and Ariane Batterberry in On the Town in New York, their historical survey of dining there. And those foreign restaurants were largely Italian, both in New York and elsewhere. Somewhat ironically, for such a wine-inducive cuisine during Prohibition, “as their prices remained within reason, the popularity of these little restaurants was cemented permanently by the Depression,” that carried on after drinking became legal again.

After Prohibition for many years…
 
The misguided experiment that was Prohibition help to destroy the domestic wine industry and also help to alter, ruin, American palates about wine. The wines made during those years were with far less skill than before and later, largely in basements and warehouses, not in wineries. It was also nearly entirely red. Vineyards in California were devoted to lesser grapes like the Alicante Bouschet – there was not much Cabernet Sauvignon, Zinfandel and Chardonnay planted, with only 7,000 acres of white in the state by the early 1930s – and the taste of wine consumers was toward the inexpensive fortified wines, the poor person’s spirits. These were sold at a ratio of five to one when alcoholic beverages became legal again. Most of those with more disposable income drank mostly cocktails. Just after Prohibition, Americans consumed just over a quart of wine per person. In Italy, 24 gallons were consumed per person – that’s over 90 times more than Americans drank on average. Then the French, who were at their thirstiest at almost 40 gallons and continuing a spree that seemed to begin with the Armistice. It was not until 1967 did the per capita wine consumption in the U.S. hit one gallon. After repeal, three-quarters of the wine was sold in just five states: California, Louisiana, New Jersey, New York, and Michigan, all with large Catholic populations. And American’s were consuming wines that still largely sweeter at that point, not the best accompaniments to the dinner.
 
Italian restaurants began to stock wines again legally in the 1930s, sometimes including those sugary- and different-tasting wines likes Virginia Dare. The lists resumed similar outlines to that before 1920, with better lists in New York and San Francisco, as before, but generally shorter. Wine offerings might not have returned to the breadth of those pre-Prohibition years until maybe the 1980s at most Italian restaurants. Americans still were not big wine drinkers for decades. Piero Selvaggio commented about the early days of his landmark Valentino restaurant that “the few people that drank wine took us by surprise.” It was still the days of cocktails. The order was usually “the martini…in the 1970s that was what people drank with a meal…three of them was standard,” something much more American than Italian. And not the most ideal complement to the food.
 
Things would eventually improve concerning wine at Italian restaurants.

Renganeschi's Saturday Night by John Sloan, 1912 - Art Institute of Chicago

During a visit earlier this summer to Produttori del Barbaresco, the famed wine cooperative in the village of Barbaresco, my host, Michela Cucca, brought up the event that really increased the winery’s notoriety, its reputation, and sales. It was in November 2016 when Wine Spectator announced, to the surprise of the winery, that one of its wines was picked as the fifth best wine released that year, the Produttori del Barbaresco 2011 Asili Riserva, a bottling from a single vineyard in what is probably Barbaresco’s most famous cru.
 
She said that phones immediately began ringing and ringing, with customers around the world hoping to purchase bottles of the wine, which was just $59 on release. It had already sold out, as all of its wines do, with nothing at all left even for the employees, but that great acclaim, from the most widely circulated American wine publication has had a huge residual impact for the reputation of the winery and subsequent sales. Cucca said that Wine Spectator has been the most important for them but some other outlets including James Suckling, Wine Advocate and Vinous influence sales along with the well-regarded British publication, Decanter, if less so. Interestingly, Italian publications have not been as influential in terms of impacting sales. Though the wine is produced in Italy, what Americans think about it – some subset of informed Americans, at least – really factors into the sales success of wines. The US is a rather big market, after all.

I recently returned from a trip to Piedmont: Turin, Monferrato and the Langhe, with plenty of wine on the agenda, and more on the table and afterwards. One of the winery visits was to the historic and well-known Pio Cesare, which is best known for its Barolos, and is the only winery left in the delightful town of Alba. The general, public tour and tasting we had booked was very entertaining and definitely recommended. Our guide, Davide, did a terrific job over the two hours or so.
 
One of the interesting things he pointed out in the subterranean cellars built around Roman ruins was a bottle from the first vintage packaged like that for commercial sales, from 1916, which was shown next to one from a recent release, 2018. The bottles were nearly identical. This might be a part of the winery’s success over the years, work from a graphic artist: an attractive and recognizable label, and then name, that is easy to remember and discern when shopping for wine.
 
Branding can be very important. From the worlds of consumer foods and dining, there are the Keebler elves, Frosted Flakes’ Tony the Tiger, the Pillsbury Doughboy, the Coca-Cola logo, and McDonald’s arches to point out a few of the most well-known. Pio Cesare is not nearly in the same category in terms of consumer recognition, but its products are much more enjoyable, and natural, to be sure.

After getting stuck in a museum for an additional hour or so by what we later heard was the largest hailstorm in memory in Turin and first finishing a warming bicerin in the closest open café, I ordered a half carafe of Dolcetto, a grape that is widely planted in the region. It was shockingly awful, even when I felt in need of a drink, suggestive to me more the output of a process plant than a winery. My mom, who long has had a tolerance for very inexpensive wines, said it tasted “worse than a bad jug of Gallo.” That was just the first of three mostly bad carafes of house wines.
 
During my first few trips to Italy, when both my wallet and palate were lighter, I really enjoyed the house red wines. That was often in Tuscany, though, where there is more inexpensive good red wine than elsewhere in Italy. But that held true a little over a decade ago, too.
 
The second bad one was at a humble and unexpectedly quite good trattoria in the hills overlooking Santa Margherita Ligure. The salumi and cheeses to start were terrific, even at times rustic. With the first sip of the red wine from the carafe, I pronounced to my chef sister-in-law, “This is grim-tasting.” The seven of us at the table didn’t come close to finishing it. The third was in a humble, friendly spot in over-touristy Portofino. The meal satiated the hungry, the fizzy white wine called Verduzzo – maybe actually from Friuli – was mediocre, maybe that.
 
The last carafe was actually quite tasty and well-made, a Dolcetto, too. After a couple pleasing sips I looked at the glass bearing the name of the winery, Cantina di Nizza, the nearby cooperative winery where we had more than a few surprising and each very enjoyable boxes of wine in varying sizes and labels with low prices.
 
With more wineries eschewing vini sfusi, wine sold in bulk, inexpensive carafes of wine are seemingly tougher to get in restaurants in Italy. Also, I am certainly asking for more these days.

Needing to restock after returning from two-and-a-half weeks in northwestern Italy then France, I stopped at the big Kroger on 11th Street the other day, the one with a nice wine selection, and felt compelled to pick up at least a couple of bottles of wines labeled “Nebbiolo.”
 
Before the trip, which was largely in Piedmont, I hoped to learn more about the region’s star grape, Nebbiolo, that becomes Barolo and Barbaresco in its most exalted forms. A visit to 13 Celsius prior to leaving and sampling a 2022 G.D. Vajra Langhe Nebbiolo had convinced me that these were worth exploring, too. Nebbiolos are the lesser-aged, less fussed about, easier to drink and much more affordable, if less complicated bottlings from the Barolo and Barbaresco producers. I returned also with an enthusiasm about those.
 
These Nebbiolos were created, in part, to provide income while the Barolos and Barbarescos are aging, similar to the Rossos from Montalcino and Vino Nobile in Tuscany. But Nebbiolos have struck a cord, certainly at least where it is produced, becoming the everyday wine for nearby Alba and much of the area, at least for younger drinkers, I was told, displacing Dolcetto, long the wine found on most lunch and dinner tables. This has been helped by the changing climate that has made the fickle and late-ripening Nebbiolo grapes easier to grow well. As Aldo Vacca, the former head of Produttori del Barbaresco, said on Levi Dalton’s podcast: “There are really no bad vintages anymore.” Like Barolos and Barbarescos, Nebbiolos are better than ever and there is more of it, too.
 
Nebbiolos don’t have the complexity nor depth of flavor of the Barolos and Barbarescos, but exhibit the pleasant red fruits and maybe a spiciness with noticeable acidity and tannins. But those tannins, especially, are muted compared to the younger Barolos and Barbarescos that are on most restaurant menus, and what most people here drink at home making a Nebbiolo often a better choice with the meal. This was my experience at lunch recently at Campamac, an ambitious, Michelin-cited restaurant in the village of Barbaresco. When I asked for a Nebbiolo – I had to have something with that grape in Barbaresco – the enthusiastic, youngish sommelier recommended what turned out to be a beautiful Bruno Giacosa from the 2022 vintage that he thought was more approachable than from the previous year. It went quite well with the agnolotti with wild goose and the Torinese take on the Milanese. He commented that the famed Bruno Giacosa was the second best Barbaresco producer after Gaja. By all accounts, true.
 
In addition to possibly being quite satiating and satisfying on their own, the Nebbiolo wines are also a chance to understand the winery better and determine whether or not you want to spend the additional money for their Barbaresco or Barolo. “Nebbiolo is a preview for Barbaresco and Barolo” according to Michela Cucca, my host when I visited Produttori del Barbaresco a couple of weeks ago. I was told at another winery that if you like their Nebbiolo, you will like their Barolo or Barbaresco. Davide Abram at Pio Cesare told us that “The better the Nebbiolo, the better the Barolo and Barbaresco.”
 
You can find Nebbiolos for around $20 to $30 retail. I quite enjoyed the Nebbiolo from Produttori del Barbaresco that has been available in Houston for a while, but I didn’t feel like paying $27 at Kroger for it after buying a couple of bottles for €15 a piece at the winery. The higher tariff is certainly worth it, though.
 
If you enjoy Barolo and Barbaresco, you should definitely seek out a Langhe Nebbiolo or a Nebbiolo d’Alba. Or if you just enjoy Old World wines are looking for a reasonably inexpensive wine to accompany a meal, you might give one a try.

Just returned from an enjoyable two-and-a-half week vacation in northwestern Italy and across the border in Nice. The wines of Piedmont, arguably Italy’s top region for red wine and wine overall, were a prime reason for the itinerary. An indicator of quality, the region is home to the most number of DOCG wines – the country’s top classification – at 19 – Tuscany is second at 11, and it also has the most of the second highest, DOC, tied at 41. Piedmont’s most famous wines, Barolo and Barbaresco, were on the docket and I visited several top producers, but most of the wine I drank was most commonly planted red grape there, the almost always enjoyable, and often much better than that, Barbera. And most of that came from a box. Several boxes, really. It was too palatable and fairly too easy on the wallet.
 
Among the wineries I had scoped out before the trip was one I had never heard of before, Cantina di Nizza, the local cooperative, which was just a six-minute drive from the house we rented. The reason was that it sold some of its wine in boxes, 10-liter boxes, something that I had never heard of, and for a song. I felt I had to pick one of those giant packagings. And, maybe, my family drinks wine quite readily. But these wines, in a half-dozen different versions, were easily the best wines I have ever had from a box, including at least a couple that Eric Asimov had touted last year. The Barbera Fruttoso, made with unclassified grapes, was easy to consume, 12.5% alcohol, with nice berry on the nose and palate, balanced acidity, and a fairly long, mostly smooth taste; well-noted as “ideal as a table wine, to accompany everyday lunches.” It was priced at a ridiculously low tariff of €22,50 for 10 liters. That works out to $1.81 per 750 ml bottle, while tasting better than probably most of the $15-20 bottles I purchase here. This would be a daily drinker if available here, even at a much higher price.
 
The best wine in a box we had was the L’Audace, a Barbera 2020 DOC, with a richer, more pronounced and serious taste at 14.5%. We went through a couple boxes of this, too, albeit at the punier 5-liter size, but pricier €23. Not just these two, but another Barbera option, Corposo, a fuller expression than the Fruttoso, was also very nice. And I especially enjoyed a Cortese DOC. These are good wines. Each of the several boxes we tasted were quite well-made as I am sure the other ones are, also. There are ten wines available in boxes, from 3- to 10-liter.
 
I’d recommend visiting Cantina di Nizza if in the area. It has a number of other wines, in bottles, some of which have earned two bicchiere from Gambero Rosso, best value citation also from Gambero Rosso, and medals from the top British wine publication, Decanter, ranging from under €10 up to just €24. Though less atmospheric than most other wineries in the region, the wines are of high quality and even those in box can be tasted before buying. I found it fun to sample wine poured straight from a 10,000 or so-Hl stainless steel holding vessel, which was quick and unpretentious, if a tad incongruent with the caliber of the wines.
 
Cantina di Nizza
Strada Alessandria, 57
14049 Nizza Monferrato (Asti) – Italy
 
tel. +39 0141 721348

For customers at 13 Celsius who are in the mood for a red wine but not sure which one, the staff can be quick to suggest the Patina Due Gelsi Barbera d’Alba from the 2021 vintage. I’ve long been a fan of Barberas – actually traveling to that area again next month – and this is an easy one to enjoy.  With some berry and cherry notes on the nose, the first sips are smooth, dry, with less immediate acidity that Barbera was once largely known for.  It has a nice body, rich and with some tannins from the wood-aging but those are not prominent. It is easy wine to drink without food; the 15% alcohol is pleasantly obscured.
 
This will readily appeal to most fans of Italian reds and it has also resonated with a big range of red wine drinkers at 13 Celsius.  This is truly a house wine, too.  It is made by Guidobono, which produces several wines including a Barolo in the Langhe and Roero in Piedmont, exclusively for 13 Celsius under the Patina label and found nowhere else.  You’ll notice that the label features a photo of the distressed tin tile ceiling at the bar that might not quickly be noticed after the second glass.  The Patina Due Gelsi Barbera d’Alba is $13 for a full pour, and $7.50 for 3-ounce half pour. 
 
13 Celsius
3000 Caroline (just north of Elgin), 77004, (713) 529-8466
13celsius.com

The reputation of the most popular names in Italian white wine suffered even before the advent of millions of gallons of bland Pinot Grigio began flooding the market. The estimable Eric Asimov in the New York Times wrote somewhat recently, “Years ago, Gavi di Gavi was one of the best known Italian white wines, along with Soave and Frascati. The reputation of each of these sank under the weight of a profusion of insipid wines.”  Frascati, grown near Rome, was possibly the prime offender in this.
 
Katie Parla, the Rome-based food writer and tour guide wrote that “much of the zone’s vino has been mediocre at best for a couple thousand years. Rome’s proximity guaranteed a built-in market thirsty for cheap wine, while mass production from the 1970s to today saw production grow to supply foreign markets with insipid Frascati.” A wine site thought that “most producers go strictly for quantity as nothing more is wanted beyond wine to fill carafes in the big city.”
 
The entire region of Lazio where Frascati and Rome belong haven’t received much respect even through it produced the equivalent of about 16 million bottles of wine last year. A few years ago, the Gambero Rosso annual wine guide complained about Lazio that “an overall selection that featuring few interesting wines” for the past year’s releases.  Another wine guide, from Slow Food, devoted only three of its 275 wine review pages to the region.
 
I was of the same mind and had long advised friends traveling to Rome to look about Frascati to Orvieto, Friuili, Sardinia for whites while in the Eternal City.
 
But I knew that there was certainly some very good white wine produced there, as the quality throughout the country has improved and looked forward to a tasting a couple of weeks featuring Roman-area wines sponsored by the local Italy-America Chamber of Commerce at Vinology.
 
And the initial wine impressed, Roma from Principe Pallavicini, made with 100% Malvasia del Lazio, that’s also called Malvasia Puntinata, which is one of the main grapes for the Frascati blend. The dry white was slightly aromatic with hints of maybe basil and featured notes of apricot in a fairly long, mouth-filling taste with some heft courtesy of the four to five months of sur lie aging and a 13.5% alcohol. It very pleasantly surprised, a repose to the dull, forgettable Frascatis, and likely a nice match for a wide range of dishes along with being very easy to start with. And, not surprisingly, Gambero Rosso has positively reviewed vintages of Roma, including a prestigious two bicchiere for the 2016 one.
 
From the largest private estate in Frascati, these wines from an old aristocratic Roman family, are not available in the Houston area yet, but the Roma sells for about $18 elsewhere, quite a fair tariff.

The Ai Tre Scalini wine bar in Rome

I arrived uncharacteristically fifteen minutes early for dinner yesterday with my family at Palinuro, an Italian restaurant my brother and sister-in-law like near their house in Cinco Ranch, and so had ample time to peruse the short, simple wine list. Looking for a glass then I thought a bottle of white wine to start, as it was hot outside and we were six adults, I did a double-take when I saw Pieropan La Rocca for just $65 in the two-page booklet that was filled with mostly uninteresting choices. This Soave is a terrific wine and consistently one of Italy’s most acclaimed whites.
 
Made with entirely with Garganega grown in a single vineyard with clay and limestone soils, fermented in wood and aged for around fifteen months in 500-liter tonneaux, La Rocca offers a different, more deeply flavored expression of Soave. These are serious wines.
 
Though not indicated on the list, it turned out to be the 2021 vintage, which James Suckling gave 95 points. It was delicious. A bit of fruit on the nose and a taste that was easy and savory and very long-lasting, with a mouth-filling body. The wine worked well before dinner and throughout, especially with my very enjoyable, sturdy house-made ravioli filled with lobster and served in a light tomato, cream and crab sauce. We went through three bottles of La Rocca by the end of the meal.
 
Certainly a surprise to find it on Palinuro’s list – I keep my eye out for Pieropan having visited its dramatic new winery last summer – what was also unexpected was its price. You can find La Rocca at Total Wine for $38 now, which is almost ten dollars cheaper than elsewhere. Using the rule of thumb of a 200% to 300% markup over retail, most restaurants would price this from between $90 to $150, and it would certainly be fair.
 
I’ll wager that you won’t find a wine as good at any Houston restaurant as Pieropan La Rocca at Palinuro.

We are now in the heart of rosé season in Houston, which really lasts much of the year here, and those always chilled, usually uncomplicated wines work especially well to start an evening or a meal.  The French gave the world the inspiration with the pale-colored wines from Provence and other rosés from elsewhere in southern France.  As the world of wine has gotten larger and the world warmer, rosés have become much more popular in the last fifteen years or so.  And rosé production has spread widely.
 
Italian wineries are also jumping into the fray and there are many more rosés made in Italy, mostly in places without a tradition with those wines.  As new products, most are trying to find a suitable style.  There are four long-standing areas of rosé production in Italy, only two of which were ever really found here and not terribly widespread.  But at least one is worth checking out, Cerasuolo d’Abruzzo.
 
Made with Montepulciano, the same varietal that goes into the region’s red mainstay Montepulciano d’Abruzzo and it does a similarly good of a job with rosés as does Grenache in southern France, if in making much different types of wines.  These are rosés that might be considered almost light red wines, typically featuring a deep garnet color that is many hues from the pale salmon-colored Provencal rosés and with a body matching the color.  The prominent scent of cherries are often on the nose and the smooth medium-bodied wines can be fruity in an Old World way with notes of strawberries, cherries and even orange.  These are food-friendly quenchers that are a little more serious than the usual rosé.
 
At a dinner a couple weeks ago at Davanti sponsored by a wine consortium in Abruzzo, we tried several wines not currently sold in the area, red, white and rosé. The two rosés, both Cerasuolo d’Abruzzo from Torre Dei Beati and Torre Raone, were served to accompany a ravioli in a rich, savory sauce that had a just a touch of spice.  With that, the considerable heat of the 100-degree day that made for a slightly warm dining room filled with three dozen people, and the heft of the wines, made these nice complements to the dish.  They were praised by all of the wine professionals at my table.  Easy to drink, enjoyable and with the acidity and flavors to go well with an Italian preparation.  From the prices of these wines in the UK, I would guess these would probably retail for around $20 a bottle, fair prices.
 
If you enjoy rosés or light red wines and looking for different, but traditional taste of Italy, look for Cerasuolo d’Abruzzo.

By Wine is a near necessity for me at the evening meal, so I believe that restaurants’ wine lists are important. I just want to have interesting enough options that run to the food-friendly and are fairly affordable.
 
The quality of the wine lists, mostly in the breadth of offerings, has been one of the most noticeable and welcome improvements in the dining scene here in the past quarter century, similar to what has occurred in most major cities in the country. The wine lists at the best restaurants – just restaurants for this piece; wine bars are treated separately – are resolutely European in makeup; these wines generally pair well with food, much better than the vast majority of the New World wines. Though a great many area diners, and regular wine drinkers, favor the big Napa Cabernet Sauvignons and other fruit-forward New World bottlings, this has been shifting over the years, as many become familiar with a greater range of wines. And that range has been increasing.
 
There are a number of enticing wine lists at restaurants around Houston today, thankfully. Below are the best, with the number of full bottles at a couple different price levels to give an idea of what might be in store.
 
Bulbous Wine Bibles
 
Pappas Bros. (Westheimer) – Long regarded as one of the best wine lists in the entire country – 5,000 labels and 28,000 bottles in the cellar – there is seemingly everything you might want at a fine dining restaurant with depth in Champagne, Burgundy – both colors, with pages of Grand Cru and Premier Cru – Bordeaux, Napa, Super Tuscans, Barolo, Rhone, and much, much more. You can spend a small fortune on just drink here, but you don’t have to as cool gems abound: Beaujolais from Jean Foillard, Guy Breton and Lapierre, a couple from the idiosyncratic Dettori in Sardinia, a number of vintages of Fontodi Flaccianello, Lebanon’s Chateau Masur both recent and affordable and decades old and not so much. Wow. There is plenty of help if needed, too.
Approximate number of bottles under $50 – 70; $100 – 530
 
Pappas Bros. (Downtown) – The same as above if just slightly smaller; only 3,900 items and 18,500 bottles. You won’t notice the difference, as there are still over 20,000 bottles in its cellar.
Approximate number of bottles under $50 – 60; $100 – 500
 
Mastro’s (Post Oak) – The scene at the flagship of this Landry’s steakhouse chain might have a sports bar / strip club vibe and cooking not among the top tier locally, but the wine list is incredibly expansive and well-chosen beyond what might appeal to the regular customers, one of the very tops in the country according national publications. Domaine de la Romanée-Conti is here in most of its glory and nearly everything else you can dream of like Screaming Eagle and Mascarello Monprivato in many iterations. Wines might be expensive here – a local wine professional told me he was shocked by what he thought were 400% markups (over wholesale prices), but there are plenty under $50 and finds like a half-dozen Tannants from Uruguay that pair quite well with steak and a Fess Parker Chardonnay – it really is better than from most of its fancier Santa Barbara neighbors – that is just $30. It’s also got a highly respected staff that’s earned their chops at other top wine spots in town. There are 4,000 selections and a total of around 38,000 bottles that they can aptly help navigate.
Approximate number of bottles under $50 – 120; $100 – 620
 
Vic & Anthony’s – This upscale steakhouse catercorner from the ballpark has exalted Bordeaux labels galore and among its list of Burgundy there is the rare Domaine de la Romanée Conti Romanée Conti in a couple of vintages for $16,000 and more; and La Tâche, Richebourg, Romanée St. Vivant crus if you only want to pay four digits for a DRC. The emphasis is Old World here, but there are plenty of Napa Cabernets and a lot of great New World bottlings. It is a terrific, wide-ranging and fun list that should easily satiate any wine lover. That top local wine pros Gary Lapuyade and Justin Vann once worked here is still evident.
Approximate number of bottles under $50 – 25; $100 – 160
 
March – With around 12,000 bottles cellared and a list of over 100 pages, it is all here from the biggest names repeated often in Burgundy, Bordeaux, Napa and Barolo, and even many, many more. Among the pages, there are many more listed at over four digits, but there a hundred under $100, if barely. You can find something “affordable” here if you choose not to do a wine pairing, and the excellent wine staff can certainly assist.
Approximate number of bottles under $50 – 0; $100 – 105
 
Brennan’s – Around since 1967, plenty of time to build a collection, and sibling to Commander’s Palace, which boasts the best wine list in New Orleans, it is not surprising that its offerings skew heavily French, which is a good thing, I believe. It is very deep for Burgundy and excellent for Bordeaux, plus there is plenty of choices from Champagne and much more breadth for dessert wines than elsewhere here, befitting the celebratory mood that the Brennan family is deft at cultivating, and not just in the Crescent City.
Approximate number of bottles under $50 – 35; $100 – 175
 
Bubbles
 
a’Bouzy – Champagne – You don’t come to this River Oaks restaurant for its food, it’s the Champagne, around 200 labels at terrific prices; according to the Wine Spectator in 2022, it’s one of the best stops in the country for Champagne geeks. There is actually a lot more, over 1,000 selections, all with generous pricing, if you want a sparkler from elsewhere or even something less effervescent, red, white or pink.
Approximate number of bottles under $50 – 235; under $100 – 460
 
Buono
 
Giacomo’s – Italian – Possibly my favorite wine list in Houston: very interesting, very affordable, very food-friendly, very easy to navigate, very Italian. And there are number of enticing French selections, too. The dozen or so sections are divided among helpful broad styles like “Bianco: fragrant & vibrant” and “Rosso: structured & textured.” There is a lot from which to choose, and scattered throughout at higher price points, but fairly priced, are offerings from cult producers like ARPEPE, Gravner, Emidio Pepe, Paolo Bea, and Paolo Scavino, too.
Approximate number of bottles under $50 – 70; under $100 – 120
 
Bueno
 
El Meson – Spanish – One of the best wine lists in the city is to found at this casual long-timer on University Boulevard in the Rice Village serving Cuban, Spanish and Tex-Mex fare. There is diversity on the wine menu, too, but the big heart is Spain with enticements from Vega Sicilia in some breadth and depth, La Alta Rioja and Lopez de Heredia and many others, all nicely priced. Excellent by-the-glass program that can be had by quarter-liter carafes, also, filled with neat stuff from Spain like Muga’s Rioja rosé, a Cabernet Sauvignon from Torres in Penedes, plus even a Finger Lakes Riesling.
Approximate number of bottles under $50 – 85; $100 – 285
 
BCN – Spanish – This grand Spaniard sports one of the city’s most informative and helpful of wine lists featuring very useful descriptions for each wine. There really not too many choices on this all-Spanish wine list that makes no concessions even to Champagne, but what’s here is expertly selected.
Approximate number of bottles under $50 – 0; $100 – 20
 
Bien
 
Café Rabelais – French – This humble, quaint and a bit kitschy French spot is a paradise from lovers of the wines from France in much of its glory. Seemingly all Gaul is represented here, Jura, Savoie, Rhône, Alsace, and Corsica along with Burgundy, Bordeaux and Champagne, with those more intersting than elsewhere if not the grandest of labels. There are more big bottles here, too, not just magnums but also 3-liters and up. Nicely, there are a number of bottles under $30.
Approximate number of bottles under $50 – 75; $100 – 215
 
Le Jardinier – French – Not a show-stopper like the restaurant nor the museum in which its set, the wine list is better than it needs to be with plenty of Burgundies and Bordeaux listed by growth. You know there is a plenty of sense here as the only two Pinot Grigios are from the Collio and half the rosés are Bandols.
Approximate number of bottles under $50 – 0; $100 – 40
 
Bistro 555 – French – From the folks formerly of the lauded Le Mistral on the west side and natives of Bandol, who certainly believe that wine must be part of the meal, the somewhat succinct all-French list obliges to complement the menu of artfully composed familiar Gallic fare. The dozen or so choices by the glass nicely includes a Sauternes to finish.
Approximate number of bottles under $50 – 30; $100 – 70
 
Just Plain Good
 
Georgia James – One of the city’s top steakhouses, and the most interesting, its wine list has always been oriented well beyond the Napa Cabernets that have dominated most steakhouse lists around the country. You might be tempted with Sangiovese, as the Tuscans drink with their beef, a robustly tannic Sangrantino from Umbria, or one from the Syrah- or Grenache-dominated Rhone. A lot of neat selections here, as it’s been since inception a couple buildings ago.
Approximate number of bottles under $50 – 5; $100 – 85
 
Rosie Cannonball – Master Sommelier June Rodil has put together a list with “a strong Italian, Spanish and French focus” that is fun for the Old World wine lover and complementing the mostly Italian fare with options that won’t break the bank. The noted Abruzzo producer Tiberio comes in three colors, all $65 and less, Movia from Slovenia in two plus more than a few of importer Kermit Lynch’s wines.
Approximate number of bottles under $50 – 5; $100 – 90
 
State of Grace – A quick glance at the thirty or so by the glass options shows Jermann, Massolino, La Rioja Alta and Tolani, which should reassure you that this clubby River Oaks eatery knows and enjoys wine. The wordy wine list – in a very welcome way – is somewhat concise, but there a numerous tempting options for most diners and also those able and willing to splurge in a grand fashion.
Approximate number of bottles under $50 – 20; $100 – 70
 
Tony’s – Still the grandest dame in Houston dining carries on with a lengthy wine list that might be more approachable and affordable than you might expect. There is enough Bordeaux, Burgundy, Napa Cabs, all nearly three and four numbers after the dollar sign, along with a few bottles stretching back before the Dreyfus Affair, but also a section front and center exclaiming “Over 75 Wines at $75” and another listing “Natural Wines” for the kids. California Syrah and red blends from the Garden State both merit a fair amount of space. Relative values can be found like the lush oak-aged La Rocca bottling from the terrific Pieropan for $70 that I paid 25 euros for at the winery in Soave this summer, and the base Pinot Noir from the acclaimed Au Bon Climat in Santa Barbara that is only $55. 
Approximate number of bottles under $50 – 15; $100 – 120
 
Rainbow Lodge – Enticing selections for most wine drinkers with big-names and finds from California, France and elsewhere: Domaine De La Romanée-Conti, Kosta Browne, Biondi Santi, Vega Sicilia joins a couple score of well-chosen Napa Cabernets including a few cult labels. A robust wines by the glass among white, pink and bubbly also includes a number of rarer treats dispensed by the Coravin system that could be Tignanello, Opus One and an Argiano Brunello di Montalcino that was Gambero Rosso’s red wine of the year.
Approximate number of bottles under $50 – 10; $100 – 85
 
Backstreet Café – Sean Beck has long done an wonderful job with wines and all matters of beverage here and at the other stars of the H Town Restaurant Group (Hugo’s, Caracol, Xochi, Urbe) and the wine list is user- and food-friendly with more than enough options and featuring prices that beg for at least a bottle at the table for the “Seasonal American Bistro.” Many are even priced below a fair portion of the per glass list at Bludorn, which is not too far away.
Approximate number of bottles under $50 – 75; $100 – 105
 
Helen Greek – Greek – It’s all Greek to everyone here, and only Greek, but this charming Hellenic bistro will quickly inform you that Greek wine belongs on the world stage; it’s not just the vastly overpriced, barely mediocre and possibly headache-inducing stuff you are stuck with at the Greek festival.
Approximate number of bottles under $50 – 5; $100 – 35
 
Brasserie 19 – The buoyant atmosphere, healthily encouraged by friendly wine prices and a many fine choices by the glass, rather than the quality of the fare has always been the attraction here. This a great place to drink wine, with a number of alluring options well under $50, featuring a list with a strong French accent.
Approximate number of bottles under $50 – 35; $100 – 80
 
Nancy’s Hustle – You, at least I, can trust the team here, proprietor and manager Sean Jensen and award-winning sommelier Justin Vann, whose tastes might run more adventurous than most (mine included), but it skews very hard to food friendly and even exciting, often funky, which pares well with the dining buzz at this terrific contemporary bistro.
Approximate number of bottles under $50 – 15; $100 – 40
 
Squable – The cooking, the creativity, the atmosphere, the cocktails, along with the wine options, make this the best restaurant in the Heights. Just an example, the wines by the glass might even include a nearly decade-old Crianza from the terrific Rioja producer López de Heredia.
Approximate number of bottles under $50 – 0; $100 – 80
 
Bludorn – Wine prices skew high here, as with the menu, and there are plenty of nice Burgundies to increase the final bill to a really large number. Plenty of nice wines, period. Lengthy by the glass choices average well over $20.
Approximate number of bottles under $50 – 5; $100 – 105
 
The Very Best Prices
 
Porta’Vino – Vino is part of the name for a big reason as ridiculously inexpensive wine pricing is key to the popularity and expansion of this casual Italian-themed restaurant. There are about fifty wines, mostly fruit-forward and Californian, nothing much at all to excite enophiles, but it is so inexpensive.  Other restaurateurs scratch their heads on how cheaply wine is priced here.
Approximate number of bottles under $50 – 40; $100 – 50

By veceazy

I was excited for a presentation and tasting for wines of Masciarelli the other week during Milano Wine Week. Yes, there was a Milano Wine Week, and it was in Houston, too, at least as a part of it, via videoconference.  I was familiar with Masciarelli as a value producer of Montepulciano d’Abruzzo.  I knew that it had some well regarded wines but I had just experienced its base wine, a very affordable rustic red that would adequately wash down a weekday dinner.  This tasting highlighted some of its best bottlings, both Montepulciano and the white Trebbiano d’Abruzzo, all of which turned out to be quite good.  That wasn’t surprising.  Montepulciano d'Abruzzo, along with Barolo, are the favorite wines of legendary restaurateur Piero Selvaggio, who won a James Beard Award for wine and whose Valentino in Santa Monica had, for decades, one of the very best wine collections in the country
 
Montepulciano d'Abruzzo ("mohn-tay-pool-chee-AHN-oh duh-BROOTZ-oh) translates to the native red Montepulciano grape from the largely mountainous Italian region of Abruzzo that is east of Rome and abuts the Adriatic in the center of the country. Both the mountains and sea give the wines its often unique character. From Burton Anderson's The Wines of Italy these are generally, "full-bodied, even robust, with a capacity to age but with a supple smoothness that can make it eminently drinkable even when young." These wines have gotten much better in the past couple of decades, especially at the higher price points. These are the ones that Selvaggio really likes. But, bargains still abound.  Eric Asimov in The New York Times had an informative piece some years ago, "For Wine Lovers on a Budget, Try Montepulciano d'Abruzzo."

The better Montepulciano’s from Masciarelli, from the Marina Cvetic and Villa Gemma, provide something a little different, even for those familiar with Italian wines – a leanness to the wines, a lean structure.  Still deeply rub red colored, but the rusticity, maybe the most noticeable facet of the inexpensive versions of Montepulciano, is not much in evidence in these.  There are still noticeable tannins, but are firm and smooth, but the nose in each is noticeable, exuberant for the Villa Gemma Rosso Riserva 2017. The wines are smooth and flavorful.  Delicious, especially, with the Villa Gemma, which retails for around $80. The Marina Cvetic sells for roughly $30.

To note, it's not related to the similarly named Vino Nobile di Montepulciano from Tuscany. That is made with a clone of Sangiovese. These can also be very fine wines, too, and a wine label with even more syllables.

When we finally booked our rental in Verona for June, I knew for sure that I was going to head to Soave, just about a half-hour away, during the stay there.  That was because of ignorance.  I really didn’t know much at all about the wines of Soave other than a few producers like Pieropan and Pra were highly regarded and I remember enjoying those in the past.  Soave is made primarily with the Garganega grape, which is largely unknown to most, myself included.  Reading about the spectacular, brand new winery at Pieropan made the trip there even more desired.  Then the town of Soave was named this spring as the "Borgo dei Borghi 2022” or the most beautiful village in Italy by an Italian travel television show.  The most beautiful village in all of Italy, which is filled with hundreds of beautiful villages, towns and cities, is quite something.  I felt that it would have been a sin not to visit.
 
Thankfully, we were able to get a reservation for a tour and tasting.  As Italy has changed with he pandemic and reservations required for seemingly most everything, we almost missed our chance.  My brother and sister-in-law ran to the winery near the close of business the previous day to sweettalk us into a nearly last-minute spots for a visit.
 
Not far from the autostrada, the next day our van drove through some of the village and then snaking through vineyards to a parking space in front of the winery.  Pieropan’s entrance is rather dramatic: numerous irregular tan columns set in front of a lengthy curving portico with a walkway leading to small glass door entrance and the bulk of the winery hid under the rising hilltop that is covered in more vines.  I’ve been to a number of wineries, mostly in Italy, and I’ve never seen anything like Pieropan in Soave.  Finally finished and opening to the public in April and costing a reported 20 million euros, it takes advantage of current technology, inspired industrial design, beautiful contemporary architecture, a minimalist décor, and a strong sensibility for a low-impact to the environment and sustainability in production.
 
After an introduction by the entrance, our smallish group was lead through dark gray, mostly unadorned and soaring hallways to the first of the production rooms.  That was one of the most striking aspects of the winery’s design was the compartmentalization.  Each part of the wine production – crushing, fermentation, aging for each type of Soave, bottling, packaging – seemed to have its own room.  Another was the extensive use of nitrogen, which was distributed from a room of its own, too.  Pieropan claims to be one of the first to use nitrogen in the bottles, allowing for much less use of sulfites as a preservative, just 30 to 40 grams.  Those lower amounts help the wines age much better they believe.  Their basic Calvarino bottlings of Soave can easily age fifteen to twenty years.
 
Large rectangular fermentation tanks fit snuggly against each other with no wasted space in the fermentation room.  The aging room for Calvarino initially appeared to be something out of Alien, large almost egg-like cement vessels in two sizes set in three straight rows alighted from below in a largely darkened room.  The next chambers, for wood-aged La Rocca wines was nearly as dramatic, featured rows of similar-looking red-banded tonneaux, the French 500-liter barrels, on the floor with a few larger vertical wood tanks visible along the walls, and a pithy phrase shown in neon above some of them.  We saw rooms for bottling, for the direct distribution to restaurants in Italy of specially aged bottles, and for bulk distribution that had plenty of space for trucks to be loaded.  There was a lot of extra space for substantial expansion.  The winery makes around 700,000 bottles of Soave now.  The most surprising thing to me was that there are just two production employees, if I heard our guide correctly.  That is efficient.

There were several other men in our small group for the tour.  Tall and poorly dressed, I assumed that they were German or Dutch.  Taking non-touristy photos like the inside of a large fermentation vessel and asking very technical questions, it turned out that they were from a winery in Croatia getting tips and inspiration.  There was a lot to learn from this new subterranean palace.

Though each of us was quite impressed with the design and look of the winery, we were mostly there to taste the wines, which did not disappoint after we had moved to a clean-lined conference room that looked out to the expanse of vines.  All were beautiful balanced, fruity enough and noticeable acidity and a certain depth of flavor.  Pieropan’s wines are made only with organic grapes if selected yeasts.  From the base Soave Classico, crisp and tasty and a very welcome aperitif, especially on a warm day.  The Calvarino Soave that is aged in the glass-lined cement tanks was my favorite, with a pronounced minerality, a salinity, and a long taste and notable finesse.  The wood-aged La Rocca was a favorite of a few of the others, offering a different, more deeply flavored aspect of the Garganega, with even a small portion of grapes that might see some botrytis depending on the year.  We also tasted a Valpolicella that Pieropan makes in a separate winery in the Valpolicella territory just to the west of Soave.  They “make red wine like white wine.”  Delicious, too.
 
A visit to Pieropan was the start to a very enjoyable day – there were two more stops in Soave – and one of the highlights of two weeks in Italy this summer.

All photos courtesy of Rob Montoya with the exception of the "Pieropan" wall, which is from Italian Weekly Wine News.

The name “Soave” doesn’t mean much to most wine drinkers.  If the name resonates at all, it doesn’t resonate well: it’s as a bland or insipid white wine, at least for those with a few vintages under their belts back when Soave was one of the most popular wines from Italy.  And, much of what was sold here under the Soave banner – from Bolla, for example – was truly bland and insipid.  However, the influential Italian wine critic James Suckling has asserted that “Soave should be your go-to dry white for food… [as a] fresh Soave pairs well with almost everything on your dinner table thanks to its approachable styles, freshness and wonderful balance that are keys to drinkability.”  That was a key take-away after recently spending nearly a week in Verona and visiting a few wineries in nearby Soave, the town, which gives its name to white wines made there and close by.
 
The cool, typically crisp, slightly fruity and balanced, surprisingly fuller flavored than anticipated Soaves, often with welcome minerality, paired extremely well with the very warm Italian summer and the Italian version of air conditioning.  Thanks to its evident acidity, these are very capable and versatile food wines, as Suckling wrote, more so we found with lighter fare.  We drank quality versions readily, as an aperitif, with the pasta course and even at the end of the evening.  
 
Soave does not feature a well-known varietal.  It is made with a minimum of 70% Garganega and a maximum 30% Trebbiano di Soave, which is Verdicchio in the Marche region, and possibly also up to 5% of Chardonnay.  Pronounced gar-GAHN-eh-guh, Garganega came to the Veneto, where it is almost solely grown, centuries ago from Sicily where its antecedent is known as Grecanico.
 
The Soaves we quite enjoyed there were: Ca’ Rugate Soave Classico 2021 San Michele; I Campi Soave Classico Campo Vulcano 2020; Le Battistelle Soave Classico 2021; Pra Otto Soave 2021; and three different expressions from Pieropan.  I was hooked, but it can take some effort to find these are similar quality Soave here.  There are seven Soaves at the closest Total Wine to me, including the terrific, mineral-laden Calvarino that regularly garners a prestigious Tre Bicchieri rating from Gambero Rosso and the richer, La Rocca that is aged for fifteen months in fairly large barrels then in 500-liter tonneaux, both that I really enjoyed both at the winery and afterwards.  The big Spec’s on Smith Street has only five, but the base bottling from Pieropan, the Soave Classico, which is still quite nice.  Be sure to check the vintage dates at Spec’s, which can’t really be trusted, especially for its Italian white wines.  From Houston for Soave, it might be easier to order from out of town.

At the new Pieropan winery in June in Soave.

“Wine was food, part of the necessary calories of the day” for those that worked here in years past said Vittorio delle Ore, the proprietor of the Villa di Maser, to our small group visiting earlier this summer.  Even the site of the villa, long called Villa Barbaro after its founders, was because the Barbaro brothers in the mid-16th century thought it was advantageous for vineyards he further explained. 
 
That statement was not surprising to me, but the juxtaposition of it with the extraordinary setting, in one of the most famous buildings designed by Andrea Palladio – “the perfect Renaissance villa,” according to a British Academy article and part of a UNESCO World Heritage site – while we were surrounded by magnificent and sometimes whimsical frescoes by Renaissance master Paolo Veronese covering its walls and ceilings, helped to emphasize just how important wine has been to Italian life over the centuries.  Though wine is luxury to many people today, where vineyards grew historically, wine was an important part of the daily diet for nearly all.
 
And in a link to its history, the vineyards here are still producing wine, now under the Villa di Maser label.  Wine remains a significant part of Italian life, maybe not as essential to everyday living but important for economic and cultural reasons, not to mention gastronomic and celebratory.  And, Villa di Maser’s wine were part of our enjoyment later.

The front of Villa di Maser, from Wikipedia