My first visit to southern Italy didn’t start well. I was flying from Rome to Palermo in Sicily, and the air conditioning cut out as we ascended. I fell asleep, or passed out, and woke up drenched in sweat.

The airport was undergoing renovations and as I waited in the makeshift baggage-reclaim hall, my eye was caught by some activity.

Some locals had peeled back the flimsy metal of the improvised building to create a direct exit to the real world. They were crouching down and disappearing through it to stand outside, smoking in the hot air as they waited for their cases.

I was in a strange land – one that I didn’t understand and still don’t.

Palermo alone would be too much to grasp, a city where people spend more on their sunglasses than their scooters, where every bar is full at 2am on a Tuesday morning, where old women gather to drink Campari and soda in the afternoon in a way that’s inconceivable in England.

The problem of comparison

Wine is one way into southern Italy – a major success story, but a messy one.

The region makes everything you can think of, from oaked Chardonnay to orange wine, from Sardinia’s Vernaccia di Oristano, aged under a layer of flor yeasts in the barrel, to the lithe, sinewy reds of Nerello Mascalese from Etna.

To some, this looks like chaos; to others, it’s creativity.

Etna is the closest thing the south has to an ambassador, but even these wines tend to be positioned in relation to the north, the reds being frequently compared to Nebbiolo or called ‘the Barolo of the south’ – an epithet applied to various red wines from Italy’s islands and regions south of Rome (sometimes described as the Mezzogiorno) that prove they can play by northern rules.

The Roman writer Ovid tells us that Zeus imprisoned the titan Typhon under the island of Sicily because he couldn’t kill him. Etna is his mighty head, his splayed limbs reaching out to Messina and Noto, his legs pinned down under present-day Marsala.

The island’s earthquakes and eruptions are Typhon’s attempt to break free of his overlord. Etna, then and now, is chaos managed, destruction contained, catastrophe postponed.

Endlessly fertile despite the barren flows of lava, the ground is a rich, composty brown.

Visiting Ciro and Stef Biondi’s eponymous winery, it’s no surprise to see ancient phalluses unearthed and re-erected in their vineyards, which sit in the fertile tongues between the lava flows.

The misty ground here steams with what seems like Jurassic plenitude. Sicily doesn’t need Etna to justify it, but it has helped, even if the volcano is just one facet of wine here.

Across the island, increasingly brilliant wines are being produced from varieties such as Catarratto, Nero d’Avola and Frappato.

A reputation for greatness

Over the water, Campania (the ‘shin’ of mainland Italy) has been restoring its ancient reputation for greatness.

Falernian, a famed wine of the Roman era, was made here – the 121 BCE vintage was so famous it was still being talked about by Romans 200 years later.

And the vineyards of Pompeii, a town just south of Naples that had more wine bars than modern Hackney, are producing wine once again.

Away from the glittering Amalfi coast, Campania conceals one of Italian wine’s greatest surprises. Irpinia, the land of Taurasi, Greco di Tufo and Fiano di Avellino, is almost comically verdant.

It can get twice as much rain as London, and its fertile soils, rich in volcanic ash, sulphur and much else besides, produce world-class wines.

It’s the long-lived whites that command critical attention, but it’s with the Aglianico grape that southern Italy puts forth its most heroic red wine.

The death or glory grape

On the volcanic soils of Campania and Basilicata, Aglianico (in the form of Taurasi DOCG for the former and Aglianico del Vulture DOCG for the latter) delivers wines of Homeric scale: ambitious, grand and elemental.

A visit to Salvatore Molettieri in Taurasi isn’t for the faint-hearted.

He runs his estate with his four sons, who appear to have sprung from his thigh in his image. Aglianico isn’t a crop here, it’s a point of honour.

The purple pasta we eat over lunch is laced with it, and the wines seem to operate on some other timescale of evolution.

They are ferociously dark-fruited and muscular, pungent with coal dust and black carbon ink, spiked with resinous rosemary and medicinal juniper, encased in tannins, energised by acidity.

A great Taurasi or Vulture wine is often too far beyond wine’s polite points of reference, so there’s been an effort to make them more friendly.

I taste these wines and understand them, but they leave me conflicted, like hearing about a dilapidated old building with enormous renovation costs that’s now being torn down to make way for modern flats.

I don’t want to feel sympathy for Aglianico. At its best, it’s blood and glory, more like Islay whisky in sensibility than anything else.

Peated malts such as Lagavulin, once deemed too coarse to drink undiluted, are now one of Scotland’s most distinctive and valuable assets. Perhaps Aglianico will have a similar story.

Cirò reconsidered

If Aglianico is Achilles in a glass, Calabria’s Gaglioppo offers a radically different flavour.

The red grape of Cirò is everything Aglianico isn’t: early maturing, easily dominated by oak, pale in colour, with scents of dried flowers and grated nutmeg.

It has tannins, of course – we’re still in Italy – but it’s a variety that seems to draw on the dried spices of the bazaar and the aromatic woods of the sacristy.

Thanks to a small group of growers who have shown inspiring loyalty to Gaglioppo, Cirò is finding its way forward with remarkable conviction and authenticity, its small Classico zone promoted to DOCG as recently as July 2025.

Here you can find some of Italy’s most palate-expanding whites, reds and rosés: wines that stand on their own terms.

The grammar of granite

Over on the island of Sardinia, Cannonau has begun to shed the soft-focus cosiness that’s often expected of the variety (elsewhere known as Garnacha or Grenache).

The Mamoiada region in central-east Sardinia, a world away from the glamour of Porto Cervo on the northeastern coast, is craggy, wind-scoured and granite-bound, and the wines carry some of that gravitas with them.

The reds of Barbagia are still finding their voice, but they show that even when the grape is familiar, Italy’s south doesn’t want elocution lessons – its local accent is what makes it distinctive.

A blue-collar grape

And what of Puglia, on Italy’s heel, and its primitive Primitivo?

If you were to ask a wine professional what their favourite grape is, they would probably say Riesling, even if it’s not, but I’m certain that no one has ever said Primitivo.

Much like the Carignan shipped from Tangiers to beef up Burgundy in the 20th century, Primitivo travelled north to darken other regions’ wines.

There was no first-class ticket for this immigrant from Croatia (where it goes by the names Crljenak Kaštelanski or Tribidrag); Primitivo is a worker, somehow uncomfortable and pulling at its collar when served in a Zalto glass.

It doesn’t move easily in the aspirational wine world. At Fatalone in Gioia del Colle, Pasquale Petrera’s immaculately tended vineyard is idyllic.

The wine he makes from it is a real Primitivo: rugged, sturdy, heady, full of baked plums and fig jam.

Primitivo isn’t a perfectionist. Its bunches arrive with berries that are raisined, berries that are perfectly ripe, and berries that are green.

Far from being fruity filler for fattening up the deficient wines of the north, Primitivo is a scrappy, difficult variety, one that’s all too easy to stigmatise and ignore.

It’s a variety that’s had a hard life. It has travelled all over the globe on a third-class ticket, but it has seen things in the world that Pinot Noir can’t even imagine.

Changing perspectives

For those who want to tidy up, straighten out or pin down southern Italy, it will always be a frustration.

It has always resisted mastery – and it still does. But where there can’t be mastery, there can be something far better: discovery.

Every native grape variety, every twisted old vine and every family coming back to the land has something to tell us.

There’s no El Dorado here, no piles of gold for vinous Columbuses to quickly plunder and take home, but there are committed winemakers, passionate local cultures and much that’s waiting to be understood, rather than domineered.

You can’t start to rethink southern Italy if your frame of reference is northern Italy or France, or your goal is to bring the wines and places into step with more familiar names.

But if you love the thrill of great Vosne-Romanée, then you have it in you to love the great wines of southern Italy.

If you’ve found your way inside the soul of a great Brunello, you can do it again with Taurasi.

That’s what counts – and it’s all anyone needs in order to understand southern Italy and its wines.

Soul of the south: Southern Italy in a glass

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It gets pretty warm in Puglia in June. I am at Gioia del Colle, in the centre of the region, exactly halfway between the Adriatic and the Ionian seas, and by mid-morning the temperatures are already above 30°c.

By the evening, however, I am reaching for a jacket. Gioia del Colle is on the high plateau of the Murgia, 400m above sea level, and at these elevations, night-day temperature variations through the summer can be as much as 20°c.

It is one of the key features of the growing environment that sets Gioia del Colle apart.

The other is the soil. The Murgia is a Karst plateau – basically a massive block of limestone tunnelled by underground streams, on which sit thin, red ferrous topsoils.

Put these two features together, and you have the perfect conditions for Gioia del Colle’s focus grape – Primitivo.

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Primitivo

Gioia del Colle has a viable claim to be the original home of Puglia’s best-known variety. Towards the end of the 18th century, a local cleric and amateur botanist by the name of Franceso Filippo Indellicato noted that in the jumble of unselected varieties of the vineyards of the period, there was one which, despite flowering after all the others, ripened first.

He took cuttings of the variety, which he called ‘Primativo’ from the Latin ‘prima’, and started to reproduce it, in what was for the period an innovative experiment in specialised monoculture.

From this beginning, the variety spread through Gioia del Colle and the neighbouring communes, and only much later down to the Salento peninsular, to what is the today the area of the Manduria DOC.

Primitivo suits the climate at Gioia del Colle, firstly because late flowering means it avoids any risk of frost, and secondly because the temperature excursions in the run up to the harvest slow down ripening, making for the accumulation of aromatic substances and the preservation of acidity to balance the naturally generous sugar levels.

Add to this the impact of the lean, calcareous soils which restrain the vigorous nature of the variety and give a tangy quality to the wines, and you have the typical taste profile of a Gioia del Colle Primitivo; bright fruit aromas on the nose, a juicy palate with fine tannins and a dry minerally finish.

It is rare here to encounter the perhaps more familiar, soft, jammy style of Primitivo which is typical of the flat lands along the coast.

Gioia del Colle today

The producers’ consorzio puts the current annual production of Primitivo from the 400ha of the Gioia del Colle DOC zone at around 500,000 bottles a year.

Vine growing has ancient roots in the region, but specialised viticulture is relatively recent. The Gioia del Colle DOC dates from 1987, and the producers’ consorzio itself was only founded in 2000.

At a rough head count, there are between 60 and 70 producers of Gioia del Colle Primitivo; for the most part small- to medium-size family-owned estates. There are some longer established growers amongst their numbers, but also a number of much newer wineries.

Estates like Polvanera and Pietraventosa have well-established reputations, but others are much less well known. I went to visit two producers with very different stories, one long-established, one up-and-coming in the fast track – but both representative of a fascinating terroir.

Fatalone

Pasquale Petrera is the fifth-generation grower at the site of the Fatalone estate in Gioia del Colle. The winery was the first to bottle Gioia del Colle Primitvo when the DOC came out in 1987, and Pasquale can still present vertical tastings of every single vintage since that date.

The estate is certified organic, and the cellar is completely energy-autonomous, with zero CO2 emissions. The 12ha of vineyard, all but one hectare of which are planted with Primitivo, encircle the winery on one of the highest points of the DOC, at 390 metres above sea level.

The average age of the vines is 35 years, and the training system a modified version of the traditional ‘alberello’ or ‘gobelet’.

Pasquale (who speaks impeccable English – his wife is American) defines himself as an artisan, but the cellar has a number of sophisticated refinements, including the use of hospital surgery-standard UV-C lamps to maintain hygiene.

The wines ferment with indigenous yeasts without added sulphites but at strictly controlled temperatures, and they age in 750l Slavonian oak barrels in a highly controlled environment to the sound of classical and new age music.

When I appear a little bemused at this, Pasquale explains that the vibrations of the sound waves stimulate the activity of the microorganisms in the wine. Hmmm…

Fatalone produce a vigorous dry IGP Rosato called Teres, and two DOCs: the white-label Primitivo and the gold-label Primitivo Riserva. The former ages for six months in wood, and the latter for 12 months in wood. Interestingly, they both hit the market at the same time.

I had a slight preference for the version with less wood. ‘Never over-ripe and never over-extracted’, is Pasquale’s description of the style – and it fits. The wines have very precise fruit and a splendid natural energy on the palate.

Giovanni Aiello

Giovanni Aiello was born and raised in the countryside in Puglia. He studied viticulture and enology in two of Italy’s leading research centres and worked in France, California and Australia before returning to Puglia to create his own wines.

Sourcing grapes from small plots of old vines in the area around Castellana Grotte and Putignano, his first wines were made in 2015, in a garage.

He moved into temporary rented cellars later, but lacked a place of his own, with the space to grow and experiment. He finally found it in the middle of the vines at Putignano: spacious cellars built in 1857, at a time of flourishing wine production in Gioia del Colle.

These splendid examples of 19th century rural architecture, after a chequered history, had fallen into disuse, so he renovated and equipped them and moved in, in 2021.

The ecclectic Aiello makes three wines from the native white Verdecca. Chakra Verde 2024 is floral-citrussy with a minerally bite. Chakra Blu 2023 is everything you could want from an ancestrale-style frizzante; fresh with a hint of mature lees, delicately creamy on the palate, crisp and dry.

Chakra Essenza 2023 is a wine of complexity and depth, from a vineyard of alberello-trained Verdecca planted in 1916 and still lovingly cared for by its owners, a married couple in their 90s.

There are two versions of Gioia del Colle Primitvio. The Chakra Selezione Oro comes from 80-year-old vines, and with 40 days of maceration and 30 months of oak-ageing is the senior partner. Chakra Rosso is a toothsome, earlier drinking introduction to the denomination.

Giovanni writes that ‘Chakra’ represents the fusion of the energies of man and the elements of earth and air. If the name is ancient and mystical, the wines are modern and real world; precise, engaging expressions of a terroir with a strong identity, but with an element of poetry.

Giovanni produces 55,000 bottles and each bottle has its own individually crafted label, made in the cellar using an ingenious system of hand painting inspired by Australian aborigine art.

Below is my top 10 selection of the current vintages of Gioia del Colle Primitivo, tasted during three days of estate visits and sit-down tastings at the Radici del Sud event in Bari, in June this year.

Richard’s 10 Gioia del Colle Primitivo picks:

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A region of remarkable contrasts, Puglia stretches between two seas, the Adriatic and the Ionian, giving it almost 800km of coastline. Forming the heel of Italy’s boot, in the deep south, it has a typically Mediterranean climate, and a long winemaking tradition thought to date back to the Phoenicians.

Scroll down to see tasting notes and scores for 20 top Puglian Primitivo reds

Its red earth is rocky in places, and its windswept, sun-drenched landscapes are a patchwork of vineyards and drystone walls. Groundwater flows through karst aquifers in its stratified landform.

Puglia’s predominant grape is Primitivo, which is grown practically all over the south of the region. The variety has found its ideal habitat in two areas in particular: the red-soiled lowlands in the province of Taranto, which produces mostly Primitivo di Manduria DOC (and, to a far lesser extent, sweetish Primitivo di Manduria Dolce Naturale DOCG); and the Murgia plateau near Bari, with Primitivo Gioia del Colle DOC.

Primitivo’s fascinating history is thought to have originated in the Balkans, on the other side of the Adriatic, before Slavic refugees introduced it to the Gioia del Colle area. There, in the 17th century, an abbot with agronomy expertise carried out a clonal selection. Primitivo ripens early (the name derives from the Latin primativus, for ‘precocious’), meaning it can be harvested before the autumn rainfall. Meanwhile, its late bud break makes it impervious to spring frosts. These crucial characteristics helped it spread, probably from Gioia del Colle to Manduria first, before reaching the broader Taranto area and Salento.

Big on drinkability

The Gioia del Colle Primitivo area features altitudes of 250m-400m, constant winds and temperature variations of up to 11°C during the ripening period. The vines’ roots plunge into the limestone just beneath the thin layer of red soil, with naturally low yields per hectare.

Here, Primitivo expresses a particular style: elegant, fresh, savoury and cellarworthy. While this appellation is small, quality is improving fast. Fortunately, local growers have avoided relying too heavily on oak ageing or overripening. Instead, the current trend seeks to strike a balance between ripeness and freshness, with an accent on drinkability.

Manduria is the Primitivo city par excellence. Primitivo vines are traditionally bush-trained (gobelet), and century-old plants can be found on these lowlands, reaching barely 150m. Clay-limestone soil, proximity to the coast, and a windswept Mediterranean climate: the area’s characteristics produce wines that are generally fruit-forward and full-bodied, delightfully velvety and mellow, with robust alcohol content making them potent yet balanced. These wines can be enjoyed young, or laid down for years. Pope Benedict XIII famously produced Primitivo di Manduria.

Today, Italian and international celebrities (such as American actor Ronn Moss) have bought their own vineyards.

Covering some 4,500ha, this DOC is leading a constantly growing market, with 70% of its output exported. Production, and sales, increased even during the Covid-19 pandemic.

Part of Primitivo di Manduria’s appeal is undoubtedly its value for money, with prices in major retailers ranging from £7.99 to £39 in exceptional cases.

Puglian Primitivo really delivers in the glass, exuding the special atmosphere of this welcoming Italian region, abundant in natural beauty.

Power and poise: Piubello’s 20 top Primitivo reds to try

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Expert’s Choice: Puglia wines

Puglia travel guide for wine lovers

For many years certain English people spoke of Puglia as their new Tuscany, a land rich in wine and hilltop towns, which was just ripe for discovery.

As the long heel of the Italian boot, Puglia faces across the Adriatic to Croatia. A fertile but flat landscape devoid of natural defences, Puglia’s northern coastline was for centuries prey to pirates, causing landlords to build masserias, fortified farms behind big walls. But Puglia also faces the gentler Ionian Sea on its southern flank and borders Basilicata and Campania inland. Meanwhile Le Murge, a long range of hills, runs like a spine down the centre of the region.

Culturally, Puglia offers ancient Roman port cities such as Bari and Brindisi, historic jewels – including the baroque city of Lecce, which is beautifully carved out of honeyed stone – and trulli, the circular, Hobbit-like stone houses that litter the countryside around Alberobello.

Adrian’s top Puglia restaurant and accommodation recommendations

Summer temperatures in Puglia can rise to scorching Sicilian levels, making red rather than white the mainstay of the wine industry, but the slopes of Le Murge nurture white grapes such as Fiano and Verdeca. It’s best not to visit at the height of summer (July and August), although perversely this is a popular time for visitors from Rome who just want to lie by the pool and sizzle. There is an excellent annual wine festival organised by Borgo Egnazia, which normally takes place in September.

Puglia has had a thriving wine industry for centuries, always out-producing Tuscany and nearby Campania. These days it is second only to the Prosecco heartland of Veneto in terms of hectolitres of wine produced. Historically, however, most of Puglia’s grapes were sent north to create vermouths in Piedmont or were blended with other wines by the big urban producers.

Puglia fact file:

Production 9.5m hl

Producers 1,300, more than 80% small operations with an average of 1.8ha, producing fewer than 10,000 bottles annually

Ecomony Wine and olive oil production together make up 60% of the region’s economy. Many farmers produce both

Late arrivals

It was only late in the 20th century that Pugliese producers began to bottle and market their wines as Puglian. Hitherto what had not been sent north was sold to the locals, who would fill their own flasks straight from the barrel. This growing regional self-confidence may have been a response to the influx of those tourists looking for the new Tuscany and seeking recognisably Puglian wine. It was also encouraged by the arrival in 2000 of the producer Marchesi Antinori, which opened two massive wineries at opposite ends of Puglia to do for this region what it had done for Tuscany in the 1970s.

Puglia is Italy’s longest region (450km) and far too attenuated to have established wine routes. This means that visitors rarely manage to visit all of its five main wine regions, from the baked southerly plains of Salento to the northerly vineyards of Daunia via the green hills of Valle d’Itria. There are nearly 30 DOPs making excellent wine, very often with grapes unique to the region such as Nero di Troia, Minutolo, Maruggio and, of course, Primitivo, the founding grape of Puglia’s wine industry.

It’s best to make a base for yourself somewhere in the middle of the region (around Alberobello, for example) and venture in whichever direction appeals. Alternatively, choose an attractive city, such as Lecce in the south, and contact the local wineries. Food- focused travel company Zest of Italy is expert in creating bespoke wine itineraries throughout Puglia.

Puglia’s main airport is Bari, and this is a convenient place to begin a wine voyage. Travel south into Valle d’Itria and Magna Grecia or east towards the rich Primitivo heartlands of Salento.

A one-hour car journey north from the airport brings you to Agrinatura Giancarlo Ceci, an organic farm and vineyard based in an old castle. The castle belongs to Giancarlo himself, the eighth generation of Cecis to have farmed here since 1818. From its ramparts you can see the famous castle of Frederic II that gives this particular DOP its name: Castel del Monte. Wine tastings take place within the castle, surrounded by family photos.

Thirty kilometres west, near the border with Basilicata, stands Tormaresca’s Bocca di Lupo vineyard, built and run by Antinori. At the heart of its 150ha is an extensive, modern winery-cum-visitor centre whose design is based on the typical fortified Puglian masseria. Four of Tormaresca’s 14 wines are produced here, including Bocca di Lupo, a deep ruby red Aglianico aged for 15 months in French oak. The building is calm and spacious, exuding the self-confidence of the Antinori operation.

Family affairs

Drive south from Bari airport and you reach Terra Jovia, a small urban winery that in the 18th century was a farm surrounded by fields. The Colapinto family only began bottling its Primitivos in 2008, but these days they sell red wine all round the world as Gioia del Colle and as the rich, but more expensive Puglia Rosso Passito.

Nearby, facing the hilltop town of Mottola, is Cantina Pantun, an organic enterprise begun in 2000 by Domenico Caragnano and his German wife, Jutta. The back-to-nature work is hard but rewarding on these steep slopes and the couple use only recycled machinery, much of it hand-cranked. From 3ha of vines planted on either side of a steep valley, Pantun produces Primitivo reds and rosés, as well as Mo’tula, a white blend that is 30% Greco Bianco, a local grape that Jutta wanted to save from imminent extinction.

Further east and directly south of Brindisi’s Salento Airport, the Cantele family opened a vineyard in 1979. It wasn’t until the 1990s, however, that they began bottling the wines and selling them under the family name. Nowadays Cantele produces seven reds, six whites and three rosés. This energetic winery is still very much a family operation within a large, modern white building that nods to the masseria style.

Just 16km to the north of Cantele, Masseria Li Veli was taken over by the ambitious Falvo family in 1999. The winery was created by Marquis Antonio de Viti de Marco, a renowned Italian economist who died in 1943. The Falvos have expanded Li Veli’s operation and now create 350,000 bottles of wine from their 38ha of vines and another 350,000 bottles of Contrade wine, made with grapes bought from independent farmers within Puglia. They also recently opened a restaurant in London’s Covent Garden (called Li Veli) to promote the excellence of Puglian wine.

Puglia: Getting there

Puglia is served by Bari Karol Wojtyla International Airport and by Brindisi Airport (also known as Salento Airport). Bari is close to Alberobello and Le Murge. Brindisi is further south and serves the hot plains around Lecce. Rhino offers cheap car hire rates from both airports. It is also possible to hire a car at one airport and return it to another.

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There are seriously underrated wines in Italy’s hot south if you know where to look, says Susan Hulme MW, who selects a few examples from 10 of her favourite producers.

Southern Italy rightly has a value-for-money reputation, but it also has the potential to rival great wine regions, thanks to a warm Mediterranean climate, distinctive and characterful grape varieties and a long history of winemaking that goes back to the time of ancient Greece and Rome.

Yet as recently as the mid-1990s, southern Italian wines were still languishing in the doldrums.

Happily, in the last 20 years, much has begun to change; new sub-zones like Campi Flegrei DOC, Cilento and Paestum have created a buzz alongside the historically famous DOCGs of Fiano di Avellino and Taurasi, and the recently trendy Etna DOC. It is clear the south has a very strong hand to play.

Scroll down for Susan Hulme MW’s wine picks from 10 of her favourite Southern Italy producers

One might assume the region is too hot for fine wine, especially with the warming effects of climate change, but that isn’t so.Climate change is about erratic weather patterns just as much as increased temperature. For example, the 2011 vintage saw long periods of drought and record high temperatures, while in 2014 producers experienced prolonged, heavy rain.

Southern Italy has late-ripening grape varieties, such as Aglianico and Nero di Troia, and warm autumns to cope with wet vintages (in 2014 quality was badly affected in the north of Italy, but Sicily had a great vintage).

It also has grape varieties that have adapted to the intense summer heat, and vineyards are often located in high-elevation sites with big diurnal temperature differences, allowing vines to cool down at night and slow grape ripening in hot and dry vintages.

When it comes to grape varieties, the south has an abundance of riches: Carricante, Falanghina, Fiano and Greco make top-quality whites; black varieties include Aglianico (capable of rivalling any of Italy’s best black grapes), Frappato, Nero d’Avola, Nero di Troia, Primitivo and many, many more.

Add to that distinctive volcanic soils, a range of elevations and the skill and daring of a bunch of passionate winemakers and you have a heady and intoxicating mix.

What they have created is an explosion of vivid, delicious wines that are full of personality. There’s so much going on that it’s difficult to limit the number of producers represented here to only 10; these are the ones that have impressed me most in the past 18 months.

Coincidentally, many are farmed organically or even biodynamically. While some are new, and others are established names, they remain relatively undiscovered. In other words, here are a few of southern Italy’s hidden gems.

Pietracupa, Campania

Pietracupa is a name that comes up whenever the famous white varieties of Campania, Fiano and Greco, are discussed.

Owner Sabino Loffredo likes to push the boundaries with these classic varieties – his style is one that does not aim for simple fruitiness, rather for depth of flavour and a richness of texture. He likes his wines to have three things: depth, elegance and freshness.

The winery was founded by his father, with Loffredo taking over in 1999. It is situated 10km north of Avellino and about 70km east of Naples.

He has almost 10ha of vines split between the elevated area of Montefredane and nearby Santa Paolina at elevations of 350m-550m, and almost all of his vineyards are south- or southeast-facing and on stony soils. The high elevation allows him to retain acidity and freshness, which is essential.

The winery won the ‘Up and Coming Winery of the Year’ award from Italian wine magazine Gambero Rosso in 2006. Building on this success, Loffredo launched in 2015 his G, Greco di Tufo 2010 (only 2,000 bottles), ambitiously priced at £109 but full of intense, smoky, brimstone flavours and aromas.

The single-vineyard Fiano, Cupo, is much more affordable and equally worthy of attention.

San Salvatore 1988, Campania

I can’t remember when I first tasted these wines, but I sought them out again to share with my family on a recent summer holiday in Capri.

San Salvatore 1988 wines have a luminosity and brightness to the quality of the fruit that just shines through and is so appealing. Having really enjoyed its delicious Fiano and Greco during the summer, we all took delight in the intensity and purity of its Aglianico during cooler months.

The estate is situated in the beautiful Cilento national park, about a two-hour drive south of Naples, beyond Amalfi, near the town of Paestum, whose ancient Greek temples can be seen from the winery.

San Salvatore is proud of the fact that vines were cultivated here by the ancient Greeks and it produces its wines under the relatively new (established 1995) Paestum IGP classification.

I also love its holistic approach; as well as producing deliciously vibrant wines, it also manages olive trees for oil and a herd of 450 buffalo for mozzarella, cultivating organically and biodynamically.

Tenuta Cavalier Pepe, Campania

The Pepe family originally sold Aglianico grapes to other producers to make Taurasi DOCG, but after studying viticulture and oenology, eldest daughter Milena arrived to do her first vintage on the family land in 2005.

Since then she has overseen 12 vintages, working as a jack of all trades. ‘I had to do everything from making the wines to choosing the bottles, corks and labels, writing the brochures in several languages, and I had to learn the laws for the wine sector in Italy.’

The estate is located in Campania, in the province of Avellino in Irpinia, 20km from the town of Avellino and 80km from Naples.

The vineyards are all located in the heart of the Taurasi appellation at 350m-500m above sea level in the foothills of the Apennine mountains. The family grows traditional local white varieties such as Coda di Volpe, Falanghina, Fiano di Avellino and Greco, and Aglianico for the reds.

Pepe is a firm believer in the region’s traditional varieties: ‘We have to keep the typicity of flavour that a grape gives from a particular terroir. I like to recognise the flavour of a wine when I drink it, and for it to speak of where it comes from.’

Tenuta Cavalier Pepe caught the attention of the UK wine market by winning Best Red Southern Italy Over £15 at the 2016 Decanter World Wine Awards with its La Loggia del Cavaliere 2009. I think the 2011 is even better.

Cantine del Notaio, Basilicata

This winery was founded in 1998 by Gerardo Giuratrabocchetti, whose family has been involved in winemaking for seven generations, and his wife Marcella.

They are champions of the Aglianico del Vulture grape, grown on the slopes of the nearby extinct volcano Monte Vulture in Basilicata. Notaio produces different expressions of the grape, including sparkling, a skin-contact white and passito, but La Firma red is its flagship, winning Gambero Rosso’s top Tre Bicchieri award in 2016.

The estate’s 26 hectares of vineyards are distributed across seven sites, each with a slightly different soil composition but all volcanic in nature, all farmed organically and, since 2008, biodynamically.

Wines are aged in natural cellars cut deep into the volcanic tufo and dating back to the 1600s. Cantine del Notaio is regarded as an inspiration for a whole host of young winemakers. Its very attractive Aglianico wines are firmly structured but with a purity of fruit and aromas.

Paternoster, Basilicata

I first tasted Paternoster wines in 2015, at Radici del Sud, a wine competition held in Bari, Puglia, which celebrates the wines of southern Italy.

One of the side events was a day-trip to Basilicata, where several producers were showing their wines. The overall quality was very high but I was very impressed by the quality of the Paternoster wines and in particular its flagship red, Don Anselmo.

Paternoster is a regular winner of Gambero Rosso’s Tre Bicchieri awards, and its Don Anselmo wine is a favourite of the critics.

Big changes have recently taken place: a new split-level winery and cellar complex has been built and now the big Valpolicella producer Tommasi has acquired a majority stake in the company, adding it to a portfolio that includes estates in Veneto, Montalcino, Maremma, Lombardy and Puglia.

Tommasi’s intention is to preserve what attracted it to Paternoster in the first place – high-quality wines expressing the singular Vulture terroir – while adding the commercial muscle of a wine giant.

In the midst of all these changes, I hope the company can retain its individuality and continue to be one of the best ambassadors for the Aglianico del Vulture grape.

Cantine Carpentiere, Puglia

Nero di Troia, that characterful black grape with high acidity and high tannins, can be such a difficult variety to get right, and rarely have I seen it managed so well as at Cantine Carpentiere, by owner Luigi Carpentiere and winemaker Valentina Ciccimarra.

They are based in the hills of the Alta Murgia national park and have only been producing their own wines since 2012.

The wines are a little bit edgy, funky even, but full of character and personality.

Carpentiere pushes the boundaries: how about a 100% Nero di Troia vinified into a deliciously full, textured white wine called Come d’Incanto (‘as if by magic’)? Or a Nero di Troia Senza Solfito (without sulphur), which has bruised apple and traditional Champagne-like aromas and flavours?

But what they do especially well here is to tame the wilder sides of Nero di Troia.

The harvest takes place in the last week of October (surprisingly late considering the estate is so far south) but they seek to push the variety to its best phenolic ripeness in order to get smooth tannins, avoiding the greenness typical of this variety when it is harvested too early.

The wines are characterful, exciting and delicious and they are definitely one to watch.

Morella, Puglia

Morella makes La Signora, one of the most exciting Primitivo (aka Zinfandel) wines I have tasted in a long time.

It is so deliciously seductive, managing to combine all the richness, intensity and concentration of Primitivo from very old vines (60 to 80 years) and from Puglia’s hot climate, but still with persistently refreshing acidity and super-soft but pleasantly drying, plum-skin tannins.

This wine transported me back to a time of lazy summer days living by the sea in Bari, with the cooling, salty breeze just taking the edge off the heat.

Morella’s Primitivo is made by Lisa Gilbee and her partner Gaetano Morella. Gilbee is an Australian winemaker who graduated from Adelaide’s prestigious Roseworthy College then found herself making wines in Tuscany, Soave, Emilia-Romagna and Sicily, finally settling in Puglia where she met Morella.

Their Primitivo vines are aged between 30 and 75 years old, are bush-trained in the traditional style and farmed biodynamically. Their single-vineyard La Signora (The Lady) is from a singular clone of bush-vine Primitivo and is a truly stunning wine.

The vineyards are on a favoured patch of terra rossa topsoil with a limestone subsoil – in fact, very much like South Australia’s famous Coonawarra. Perhaps Lisa has found a home away from home after all?

Feudo Montoni, Sicily

Feudo Montoni is a very special place. Surrounded by wheat fields, the vineyards are 500m above sea level in Cammarata in the province of Agrigento, in central western Sicily, about a two-hour drive from Palermo.

The estate produces a range of white and red wines from local varieties: Catarratto, Grillo and Inzolia for the whites; rosé from Nerello Mascalese; reds from Nero d’Avola and Perricone.

But it is the flagship wine Vrucara from Nero d’Avola which really stands out. This is a single-vineyard wine from 80-yearold, ungrafted, pre-phylloxera vines – the producer’s very own special clone of Nero d’Avola, identified as such by noted oenologist Giacomo Tachis, of Tignanello fame.

He believed it may have developed partly due to the isolation of the vineyards.

Feudo Montoni is one of Italy’s true hidden gems, revealing a more elegant and ethereal side to Nero d’Avola than is usually seen.

The wines have a lovely purity of expression and fantastic ageing potential. I recently opened a magnum of the Vrucara 2007, which seemed hardly to have aged at all.

Owner Fabio Sireci comments: ‘Nero d’Avola is like a crazy horse, it needs time to be reined in.’ Perhaps, like a thoroughbred, it also needs time to show its best.

Occhipinti, Sicily

Arianna Occhipinti’s wines have been causing quite a stir for a while now. She makes elegant, deliciously easy-to-drink Frappato and Nero d’Avola reds, as well as intriguing whites from the rare Sicilian grape variety Albanello, blended with Moscato di Alessandria (known locally as Zibibbo).

Occhipinti’s vineyards are located in the heart of the Cerasuolo di Vittoria Classico DOCG area in southeast Sicily.

They are 260m above sea level and just 8km from the sea, but in front of them is the 1,000m-high mountain range Monti Iblei. The overall effect of these factors is a beneficial diurnal temperature difference and a cooling breeze, allowing the grapes to ripen more slowly.

The low-yielding, old-clone vines are planted in what Occhipinti calls ‘our treasure’, an unusual, pre-Miocene era mix of red topsoil with an underlying layer of limestone.

Occhipinti is certified organic and does not irrigate or use selected yeasts (although this is permitted under organic rules). Everything is aimed at producing a natural, unforced style of wine and I especially love what I see as its hallmark – elegance and purity.

I was particularly struck by its SP68 blend of Frappato and Nero d’Avola. The name comes from the country road that passes the winery and vineyards, and was chosen to reflect the idea that wine, like life, is ‘a journey’.

Tenuta di Fessina, Sicily

Back in 2012 I tasted a lot of older vintages of Carricante at a special tasting in Sicily and I was amazed by their quality and ageing potential.

Carricante is one of Italy’s best white grape varieties, yet it is still not very well known, even among wine professionals, a fact probably explained by it being mostly grown in a limited area on the slopes of Etna. It is, however, Sicily’s white jewel in the crown.

Tenuta di Fessina was founded in 2007 with the purchase of some very old vineyard plots around an 18th century wine press, and quickly went on to become a leading light of Etna’s new-wave producers.

It makes elegant reds from Nerello Mascalese and Nerello Cappuccio, but the star is its A’ Puddara Carricante, winner of the Gambero Rosso Tre Bicchieri almost every year since its first vintage in 2009. The name is local dialect for the Pleiades constellation seen in summer above Mount Etna.

I have tasted this wine a few times, but I remember especially the first occasion: the combination of delicate white flower aromas with a concentrated, nervy structure that matched so well with lightly steamed swordfish enjoyed in a little trattoria by the sea shore in Catania.

See Susan Hulme MW’s wine picks from 10 of her favourite Southern Italy producers

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There’s an initial hit of plush, vanilla oak, but the violet-tinged, black cherry, cranberry, raspberry and red berry fruit comes forward and proves more than a match. They both work in harmony on the palate which holds breezy, refreshing flavours of cherry, and beautiful, savoury tannins (13%).

Not available in the UK

POA Tuscan Vineyards Imports USA

VERONICA PASSERIN D’ENTREVES grew up in the Tuscan countryside, since her family owned two estates there: Fattoria Dianella and Tenuta di Piaggia. Her own involvement in the family business began with the development of tourism at their villas, but slowly she became more and more interested in the making the wines herself.

Passerin d’Entreves’ first vintage was 2001, which was also the first vintage of this wine. The aim was to produce an expression of the Fattoria Dianella terroir, using only native grapes (100% Sangiovese) but with a modern approach.

The result, with its perfumed red fruit and hints of spice, won through in a three-way Italian taste-off for this International Trophy, against rivals from the Marche and the deep south of Puglia.

Grapes taken from the oldest part of the Dianella vineyard are hand-selected for this Trophy-winning wine, and fermented at low temperatures in stainless steel, with a long maceration on the skins, followed by malolactic fermentation, part in cement and part in tonneaux. Maturation in small French oak barrels lasts for at least 12 months, with six months’ further ageing in bottle.

It’s a wine that Passerin d’Entreves is unlikely to forget, since its first bottling in 2003 coincided with her wedding to husband Francesco.

It’s also an expression of a single vineyard, the Vigna della Madonnina. This spot has now taken on an additional role as the source of grapes for a new white wine. Serena e Nuvole is made from Vermentino grapes, which were planted as a result of frequent finds of fossilised shells while working the soils there.

harvesting Sangiovese grapes on the Fattoria Dianella estate in Tuscany

Tasted against

Terre Monte Schiavo, Marzaiola, Lacrima di Morro d’Alba, Le Marche, Italy 2014 • Vigneti Reale, Rudiae Primitivo, Salento, Puglia, Italy 2013.

It was in the ancient village of Apricale – like many in the Ligurian mountains, a kind of oozing honeycomb of stone – that I first came across the delicious concept of the albergo diffuso. A functioning hotel, in other words, whose rooms are scattered around different private houses in a village.

Village of Villa in Arroscia valley. Credit: Andrew Jefford

As I tasted and talked to locals about Vermentino, I began to suspect the notion should be extended to grape varieties, too. Is this a vitigno diffuso? Genetically, it’s a single variety; Pigato, Favorita and Rolle are all synonyms. The locals, though, claim that Pigato and Vermentino are far from identical. The leaves, they say, are a different shape (Pigato’s leaves are more deeply lobed than those of Vermentino); the buds are a different colour (Pigato’s are pink and Vermentino’s are green); and Pigato’s grapes are speckled in a way that Vermentino’s aren’t – hence its name (pigato means speckled in local dialect). Official statistics regard them as distinct varieties.

I contacted José Vouillamoz for the official genetic view. ‘This is a common question,’ he said, ‘especially for Italian producers who actually see and taste the differences between Pigato, Vermentino and also Favorita. We can safely say that they have the same DNA profile, meaning that they all originate from the same initial vine that grew from a single and unique grape pip. It doesn’t mean that they are 100% identical, though; there are some clonal differences and if we sequenced the whole genome of each clone we would see where those differences are. Over time, they have accumulated mutations which is why they look and taste different – just like Cannonau and Garnacha, or Tribidrag and Primitivo and Zinfandel, or indeed different clones of Pinot. Yet each is the same, single variety.’ As Fabio Corradi from the Ligurian Maixei co-operative loves to point out, humans and chimps are 99 per cent genetically identical, too.

Diffuse Vermentino is an adaptable and charming variety – the Mediterranean Chardonnay, in many ways, widely grown and usually happy near the shoreline of both coasts and islands. In Languedoc, it is used to add a spoonful of cream and a sprinkling of aniseed and fennel to blends, but it’s a starring white variety on its own in Provence. Côtes de Provence’s most underestimated wines, in my opinion, are its Rolle-based whites: filmy, soft wines of lamb-like gentleness – the finest tissue paper or silk chiffon rendered liquid. Perhaps you have to learn to make great rosé (a wine style born of understatement) before you can make white wine like this: undemonstrative yet utterly seductive, full of the soft scents of seeds and plants, plumped with pristine lees.

Liguria’s scenery is more dramatic than that of its Provençal neighbour, and its Vermentino white wines seem to share in that drama: less cream and less seed flavours; more sap, more vitality, and more orchard fruit. They often have lower alcohol (12% or 12.5%), despite being picked in mid-September or later. When high-grown in Dolceacqua, they can be sculpted, gothic, almost Riesling-like. Further east, in the valleys which lie inland from Imperia, they take on the weight, sappiness and chewiness of a top Pinot Bianco, Sylvaner or Grüner Veltliner. Head further east still into the Colline Savonese and they can have the poised rotundity of Pouilly-Fuissé and occasionally – given enough ambition with the skin maceration – something of the exoticism of a Viognier. Head right around the coast to Colli di Luni, hard by the Tuscan border, and there is a richer, almost Manseng-like fruit in the mix: a touch of pineapple, a squeeze of orange. Adding to this wonderful chameleon show is an ability to pick up and transmit a non-fruited earthy or stony spectrum, too, which lends the best of them real dignity.

Is there, though, a palpable difference between Vermentino and Pigato? Yes, but it may well be the filter of intent: those who produce both wines tend to contrive to make the Vermentino a lighter, fresher and simpler soul, while the Pigato is the vehicle of their ambitions, and gets all the cosseting. Little wonder that it’s deeper in hue, thicker on the tongue and more concentrated and perfumed in its fruit style. But a light Pigato and a richer Vermentino can overlap seamlessly.

Perhaps its best to let those who know them intimately describe the differences. ‘They should,’ says Filippo Rondelli of Terre Bianche, ‘share a hidden saltiness, drinkability and a kind of purity and elegance. Vermentino has more herbal and flower notes, and is a little lighter in body; Pigato is fruitier and spicier, and bigger-framed, sometimes with a hint of pine resin.’ Roberto Tozzi of Vis Amoris, who only makes Pigato wines, says that Pigato has an ability to age which marks it out, with more sappy fullness and more structure than a classic Vermentino.

The lesson, in truth, is the same as the one I wrote about on April 27th in relation to Rossese and Tibouren: the longer that a variety has been in a certain place, the less it seems to reflect ‘varietal’ characteristics and the more it seems to become an actor in the drama of terroir. I’ve always felt vaguely antagonistic towards variety synonyms, on the basis that they muddy our understanding, but perhaps I’ve been wrong: they have secret lessons about environmental adaption to teach us.

Leading Ligurian Vermentino and Pigato producers include:

Laura Aschero, Maria Donata Bianchi, Bio Vino, Bosoni, Lambruschi, Bruna (especially the old vine U Baccan Pigato), Costa de Vigne, Felce, Fontancota, Gajaudo, Giacomelli, Lupi, Il Monticello du Nemu, Rocche del Gatto, la Ghiaia, Conte Picedi, Rondelli, Le Russeghine, Terenzuola, Terre Bianche, Terre Rosse, Torchio, Vis Amoris.

Written by Andrew Jefford

Primitivo is practically synonymous with Puglia and the south of Italy. Yet it is taking a plucky band of pioneers to re-establish it in its truest form, as a bush vine. Monty Waldin reports

Bush-vine Primitivo

Quick links:

• The origins of Primitivo
• Monty Waldin’s taste of bush-vine Primitivo

The small town of Manduria lies a 40-minute drive southeast of the southern Italian port of Taranto, along a gently rising, arrow-straight road. This is the Salento peninsula, the broiling heel of Italy’s boot.

My father came here in 1944, having landed at Taranto with Allied troops. With his radio receiver he’d crawl in Salento’s dusty, iron-rich red soil, using the local olive groves and vineyards as cover. Back then, Manduria’s vineyards were overflowing with Primitivo, Puglia’s signature red wine grape. Since the vines grew as low free-standing bush or alberello, Primitivo provided the perfect cover. To this day, Primitivo bush vines dating from the 1930s and 1940s remain in this arid part of Italy’s heel. But over the last 20 years most have been ripped out.

Spotting an opportunity

Australian winemaker Lisa Gilbee and her Italian partner Gaetano Morella created their Morella winery in 2000 to try to save some of what old-vine Primitivo remained. Lisa had worked in Italy as a flying winemaker, and settled in Puglia ‘partly because no one else was making single-vineyard Primitivo. Most Australian red wines are based on French grapes, which taste flabby without heavy acid adjustment in the winery,’ she says. ‘Primitivo’s natural inner freshness means no adjustments are needed. And you don’t have to be a millionare to buy Primitivo vines, live near the beach and make wine here.’

The couple now have 17 hectares of vines, 11ha of which are bush-vine Primitivo from the 1940s. Top quality wines usually come from sloping ground, rather than from the flattish terrain of Salento. Yet, Gilbee says, ‘Primitivo subtly reflects minute changes in the terroir. You can taste profound differences between vines grown only metres apart. And bush vines allow each bunch its own unique microclimate of light, heat, shade, wind and rain. The bush has a three-dimensional shape which you just don’t get with onedimensional vines trimmed along wires in straight lines like hedges.’

Despite her eulogy, Gilbee says that ‘at least 80% of Puglia’s old, bush-vine Primitivo has been lost since we started.’ This was largely due to the European Union paying growers to rip out vines to reduce Europe’s wine lake. ‘Bush vines are naturally low yielding and have to be worked mainly by hand rather than by tractor,’ says Gilbee. ‘I understand why growers selling Primitivo by the kilo cheaply to co-ops ripped out their vines. They waited until interest rates were high then banked the subsidy money for their retirement.’

Gilbee particularly laments one recently ripped-out Mandurian Primitivo vineyard called La Pigna. ‘It produced tiny yields of incredibly deeply coloured grapes. It’s hard to remain optimistic when so many really old vineyards are gone. Mostly only vineyards of around 40 years remain,’ she says.

Regional character

Primitivo from Manduria is distinct as far as Puglian Primitivo goes because Manduria’s position in the middle of the Salento peninsula means it gets cooling sea winds from both the Adriatic sea to the east and the closer Ionian sea to the west. Nearby Sava is one of the best areas for Primitivo in the Manduria zone.

Massimiliano Pichierri’s grandfather started making Primitivo in Sava in the 1950s. ‘Sava is only 12km from the Ionian Sea,’ says Pichierri. ‘Sea winds give Primitivo here a savoury quality. But the flavour profile also depends on how deep the topsoil is over the spongy limestone below. The limestone holds the water the vines need to survive. Primitivo vines on 4m of topsoil produce higher yields and lighter wines than vines like ours in Sava, where the topsoil is shallow at less than 1m. We get smaller, more mineral-tasting grapes as a result.’

The Cantele family also works with old bush-vine Primitivo from Sava for its top Fanòi bottling. Umberto Cantele says, ‘Sava and Manduria on the warmer, western Ionian side of Salento are where the best bush vines are. It is harder to find bushvine Primitivo on the eastern Adriatic side as vines there are usually trained to posts and wires to get higher yields. Salento’s unspoilt beaches are making Puglia a tourist destination. Visitors want a food-friendly style of Primitivo, and this is what we try to give them.’

Outside influences

Cantele was the first Puglian winery to host ‘flying winemakers’ in the early 1990s. But the first foreign winemaker to take up residence in Puglia was Mark Shannon. He arrived in 1997 from California, knowing that Puglian Primitivo was the same as his beloved Californian Zinfandel, and realising that there was a terrific opportunity to style wines for modern palates from ‘bush vines so old and beautiful they gave me goose bumps’.

Shannon and his partner Elvezia Sbalchiero own no vineyards but work with growers in what Shannon calls the ‘triangle of Primitivo’, south-east of Taranto in Sava, Manduria and Torricella.

Shannon has a Masters degree in the sensory perception of grape and wine flavours. ‘Primitivo ripens quickly so in just a few days it can go from being underripe to perfectly ripe, and then to raisined and overripe,’ he says. ‘Saving these old vines means working closely with growers, to get grapes that give you the best shot at making clean wines that express the terroir.’

Primitivo pioneer

Primitivo may not have survived in Puglia without the contribution of the Petrera family. Pasquale Petrera says, ‘In the early 19th century, my greatgreat- great-grandfather, Nicola Petrera, rescued a red grape which ripened prima, meaning before all others. It became known as Primitivo, meaning “first selection”.’

The Petrera winery, Fatalone, is located in Gioia del Colle, just north of the Salento peninsula, where cooling sea breezes are less prevalent than on Salento itself. Pasquale Petrera converted his bush-vine Primitivo to overhead pergolas or strung them horizontally along wires. ‘The vines have more leaves to shade the grapes and produce a less overpowering style of Primitivo. Wines with lower levels of alcohol are what modern drinkers want,’ he asserts.

It is debatable whether Pasquale’s approach in modifying his bush vines encompasses what Mark Shannon calls his own ‘modified idealism’ regarding Primitivo’s very survival. ‘These are not grapes to be pushed, manipulated or mishandled. Primitivo is the most sun-loving grape I have seen. Modern training systems are always inferior to the native alberello. There will be opportunities to plant alberello Primitivo again, if you lead by example. The grapes tell you when they are ripe, meaning with just 5% of raisined berries per bunch. Pick then and you will have a great wine.’

My father probably had no time to drink wine from bush-vine Primitivo when he came to Puglia. But I hope he did at least manage to eat some perfectly ripe bush-vine Primitivo grapes.

Wine writer and biodynamic consultant Monty Waldin has made wine in Italy, France and the Americas, and is a DWWA co-Regional Chair for Italy.

Written by Monty Waldin

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Primitivo is practically synonymous with Puglia and the south of Italy. Yet it is taking a plucky band of pioneers to re-establish it in its truest form, as a bush vine. Monty Waldin reports

The origins of Primitivo

Monty Waldin’s taste of bush-vine Primitivo

In the early 1990s they found that a Croatian grape called variously Tribidrag and Crljenak was the same as Primitivo, and all were the same as California’s Zinfandel. Crljenak would have travelled to Italy across the Adriatic Sea, although exactly when this happened may never be known. In the early 1800s the vine went via Austria to America, where it was grown on the East Coast, initially as a table grape. It was then taken to California during the mid-19th-century gold rush, where thirsty miners and others made it into wine, by which time it had become known as Zinfandel.

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Primitivo is practically synonymous with Puglia and the south of Italy. Yet it is taking a plucky band of pioneers to re-establish it in its truest form, as a bush vine. Monty Waldin reports

A taste of bush-vine Primitivo

Morella, Old Vines, Salento Rosso 2011

19.5pts/20 (98/100pts)

85 year-old vines.

This was a low-yield year and produced super-concentrated grapes. Fermented as whole grapes rather than crushed berries to accentuate the fine flavours of black fruit and liquorice. The grapes were gently hand plunged, the wine was run off into barrel by gravity, and bottled by hand. Incredible depth, elegance and moreishness of fruit, with classy tannins running right the way through to leave one’s palate invigorated and refreshed. A monument to old-vine Primitivo.

Price: £34.95 Berry Bros & Rudd

Drink 2016-2026

Alc 14.5%

A Mano, Imprint of Mark Shannon, Appassito, Puglia Rosso 2012

19pts/20 (96/100pts)

40-70 year-old vines.

An inventive red made from Primitivo grapes picked ripe but not overripe which are then left to dry off the vine after picking. They shrivel slightly and gain in concentration. Wonderful balance of savoury tannins and sweet-tasting, fresh crushed raspberry fruit, with an intentionally light spritz. Reminds me of the best Zinfandels that old-timer growers in northern California would make in the 1970s for home consumption. Unputdownable.

Price: £12.99 Widely available via UK agent, Liberty Wines

Drink 2015-2022

Alc 14.8%

Cantele, Fanòi Primitivo, Puglia Rosso 2010

18pts/20 (93/100pts)

40 year-old vines.

A wine which pushes Primitivo’s moreish dark fruits and brighter red cherry flavours to the fore thanks to a cool and quickish fermentation. Ageing in new and second-fill French and American oak barrels has added an appealing sheen of vanilla.

Price: N/A UK cantelevini.com

Drink 2015-2020

Alc 14.5%

Fatalone, Primitivo Riserva, Gioia del Colle 2006

18pts/20 (93/100pts)

16 year-old vines propagated from Primitivo owned by the Petrera family since the early 19th century.

Aged in a cool underground cellar for two years in oak vats. 2006 was a blisteringly hot year, producing ripe, almost raisiny fruit with sweet-savoury tannins giving this appealing mouthfeel. Opens up to reveal soft tobacco textures and crisper red cherry flavours. A winter warmer.

Price: £16.68-£18.50 Exel Wines, Les Caves de Pyrène

Drink 2015-2021

Alc 15%

Savese, Il Sava, Primitivo di Manduria Dolce Naturale 2007

18.5pts/20 (95/100pts)

50-60 year old vines.

The grapes are picked late when slightly shrivelled on the vine for concentration. Aged for two years in large oak vats and sealed in locally handmade terracotta amphorae. Rich, smooth and slightly sweet with individual, savoury Christmas cake flavours and generous, rich mouthfeel. A Primivito like grandad used to make.

Price: £26 Bat & Bottle

Drink 2015-2018

Alc 16%

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In the world of wine, smaller is often regarded as better, with boutique estates and cult micro-cuvées taking the top spots. But, as Ian D'Agata discovers, large companies with their diverse portfolios and huge volumes of wine, can offer big surprises...

Land of Torre Rosazza, owned by Le Tenute di Genagricola

Wine speak has always been littered with catchphrases: terroir, native, local, biodynamic, artisanal, organic, family estate, old vines and so forth. So it’s not surprising many wine lovers assume that only small, family-run estates, or those working organically or solely using native grapes, can produce great wines. That’s just not so, and nowhere is this more apparent than in Italy.

A number of the country’s largest wine estates produce some of the country’s finest wines: witness Frescobaldi’s amazing Ornellaia and Masseto, or Antinori’s Tignanello and Solaia. But Antinori and Frescobaldi are admired by wine lovers around the world because they also deliver excellent wines in large volumes at low prices. Other large estates in Italy are similarly successful, though their top wines may not have reached comparable levels of fame.

Unfortunately, many wine lovers get to know Italy’s large estates by tasting inexpensive, entry-level wines: competently made but insipid Pinot Grigios or Proseccos. The key with Italy’s biggest estates is to pick those wines that aren’t the absolute cheapest in their range. Nevertheless, Italy’s larger wine estates have merits that go far beyond making great or dependable wines.

‘Chianti Classico produces 35 million bottles a year, so every producer, big or small, counts,’ says Sergio Zingarelli, owner of large Tuscan estate Rocca delle Macie, and also the new president of the Chianti Classico consorzio. ‘Bigger estates penetrate international markets better, pricing wines well thanks to economies of scale, which helps increase interest in us and our wine tourism. Smaller estates produce wines better suited to other market niches and tastes.’

‘Buying a well-made, fairly priced Pinot Grigio or Frascati is important to many,’ points out Davide Mascalzoni, general director of Gruppo Italiano Vini (GIV), owner of Italy’s largest collection of wine estates. ‘People know they can count on us to deliver consistent, dependable quality. Smaller producers often have only a limited supply of grapes to choose from, and this limits their winemaking options.’ At Cantina La-Vis and Valle di Cembra, 1.5 million bottles a year of wine are produced but this large co-operative has also launched a limited number of single-vineyard bottlings of Müller- Thurgau (Vigna delle Forche) and Pinot Nero (Vigna di Saosent) that are regularly among Italy’s best wines. The Cantina Viticoltori del Trentino (Cavit) unites 11 Trentino co-ops and has more than 4,500 members. A mind-numbing 65 million bottles a year are made, but its top sparkling wine, the Altemasi Graal Riserva Metodo Classico Trento Brut is made in small quantities and is often ranked among Italy’s best.

So bigger doesn’t necessarily mean standardised or dull. In fact, maintaining the independence and identity of each estate these large groups own is key. For example, GIV’s headquarters are in Veneto, but the group owns 14 cellars and 18 brands across Italy, totalling about 1,340ha under vine.

Thinking individually

Though all the estates are under one umbrella, each has its own viticultural expert, winemaker and cellar master. Mascalzoni adds: ‘Technical and winemaking aspects are kept separate, but estates benefit by having a common sales organisation, overseeing both common and specific marketing strategies, and integrated logistics services. As GIV owns estates from Lombardy to Sicily, our clients have an easier time stocking up on diverse wines from different Italian regions.’

Veneto-based Zonin has a similar set-up across its nine estates. It produces 40 million bottles a year and exports to more than 100 countries. Zonin has enlisted Denis Dubourdieu, a winemaker and professor of oenology at the University of Bordeaux, as its wine consultant-at-large, and follows environmentally friendly, sustainable agricultural methods. It’s family owned, with father Gianni Zonin and sons Domenico, Francesco and Michele running a remarkably successful enterprise, with a consolidated turnover in 2012 of Euro140 million – up 13% on the previous year.

‘Our wine estates are run separately, by mainly locals who live and work there,’ says Domenico. ‘We lived there too: as children, we’d alternate family vacations at the various estates, giving us a great bond to the different properties, terroirs and wines.’ Zonin’s aim is to help wine regions grow. ‘Once, hardly anybody spoke about Lombardy’s Bonarda, but we always believed in its potential. Now, not only is ours extremely successful, but other producers’ Bonardas have become popular too.’

Greater resources

He adds: ‘Oltrepò Pavese has great potential as a sparkling wine region, but what used to be made there wasn’t up to scratch. So we began organising conferences and wine tastings, then co-created the Pinot Club with about seven other local producers. The club’s goal is to produce better, more interesting wines by sharing information and working together. We even have two expert sparkling winemakers from Burgundy and Champagne to help everyone in the group get the best we can from our grapes.’

Study and research are also a big part of what large estates do. Le Tenute di Genagricola is the agricultural branch of Assicurazioni Generali, a huge Italian insurance group that, much like France’s AXA Millésimes, has invested heavily in wine estates. Alfredo Barbieri, Genagricola’s general director of sales in Italy, says he has terroir and tradition, not just sales, at heart: ‘Bigger companies have the financial means to study and experiment with little-known local varieties. We’ll bottle varietal wines like Albarossa, Picolit and Pignolo even though such small productions aren’t very remunerative. But that’s okay, as we stay actively involved in preserving traditions and native wines.’

Similarly, Zonin wants to promote the wines of Gambellara, an area near Soave and another bastion of the Garganega grape. In Gambellara both dry and sweet wines have been made for centuries, but few wine lovers are familiar with them. ‘Our basalt-rich soils allow production of totally different Garganega-based wines than Soave’s,’ says Domenico. ‘We hope to work with many large and small producers in the area as a cohesive association to help improve and market the area’s wines.’

Recently, Genagricola became the first company to use Schioppettino for traditional method sparkling wine production. The resulting wine, Blanc di Neri, has been a resounding success. ‘Our neighbours thought we were crazy turning Schioppettino into something it wasn’t meant to be, but some are now asking for advice on how to make their own version,’ says Barbieri.

Mascalzoni of GIV points out that the big guys learn from the little guys too. ‘At Castello Monaci in Puglia, we made classic Primitivo or Negroamaro wines, but were aware how successful local smaller producers were with Fiano and Verdeca. We now also make these varietal wines.’ In fact, Castello Monaci’s Acante Fiano and Pietraluce Verdeca are among the most interesting and fairly priced wines coming out of Italy’s deep south in some time.

Speculate to innovate

Sometimes, it’s simpler than all that. There probably wouldn’t exist a worldwide craze for Pinot Grigio without Santa Margherita, one of Italy’s largest wine producers. In the 1960s, 100% Pinot Grigio wines were rare in Italy, but the Marzotto family liked what they tasted and believed in the grape. The rest is history.

In Abruzzo, Tollo is a cooperative that has created countless jobs and preserved the livelihoods of entire generations of families in the Chieti area. It is likely that without Tollo, many of the vineyards would have been abandoned in the wake of the agricultural exodus during the 1960s and 1970s. Wine lovers have come to know Montepulciano and Trebbiano d’Abruzzo thanks to their efforts, but the preservation of old vines also means that previously unidentified or forgotten varieties have survived, which may culminate in new wines one day.

Innovation doesn’t stop at Italy’s doors either. Genagricola has invested in Romania and will bottle its first vintage of Romanian wines this year. And with the creation of Barboursville Vineyards, Zonin helped revive viticulture and winemaking in the American state of Virginia. Winemaker Luca Paschina was even named the Virginia Wine Industry Person of the Year in 2002.

We are regularly told that good things come in small packages when it comes to the size of wine estates. And while that is often true, it’s also clear that, through their fine wines and attention to tradition and innovation, Italy’s largest estates help celebrate the diversity of Italian wine the world over.

Facts & figures

• Italy is the home of the small landowner. The average vineyard area owned by each wine estate, 1.6 hectares, is increasing but remains below the European average of 7.9ha (2010 data)
• The largest vineyard holdings per person are in Friuli-Venezia Giulia (3ha), Sicily (2.7ha), Lombardy (2.5ha), and Tuscany (2.3ha)
• Italy’s 11 biggest wine companies, on the basis of operating profit margin, are (in descending order): Antinori, Santa Margherita, Frescobaldi, Gruppo Italiano Vini, Caviro, Giordano, Botter, Martini, Mezzacorona, Ruffino and Zonin (2011 data). They are much larger land owners than the national average: for example, Zonin owns 2,000ha under vine.

Who owns what in Italy?

Antinori

Fattoria Aldobrandesca, La Braccesca, Le Mortelle, Badia a Passignano, Guado al Tasso, Pèppoli, Pian delle Vigne, Tenuta Monteloro, Santa Cristina, Tenuta Tignanello, (Tuscany); Prunotto (Piedmont); Montenisa (Lombardy); Castello della Sala (Umbria); Tormaresca (Puglia)

Frescobaldi

Castello di Nipozzano, Castello di Pomino, Tenuta di Castelgiocondo, Ornellaia, Tenuta di Castiglioni, Tenuta dell’Ammiraglia (Tuscany); Attems (Friuli Venezia Giulia)

GIV

Ca’ Bianca (Piedmont); Nino Negri (Lombardy); Bolla, Conti d’Arco, Lamberti, Santi, Turá (Veneto); Conti Formentini (FVG); Cavicchioli (Emilia Romagna); Conti Serristori, Folonari, Machiavelli, Melini (Tuscany); Bigi (Umbria); Fontana Candida (Lazio); Castello Monaci (Puglia), Re Manfredi (Basilicata); Tenuta Rapitalà (Sicily)

La-Vis/Cembra

Lavis, Casa Girelli, Cembra, Cesarini Sforza (Trentino), Dürer-Weg (Alto Adige); Poggio Morino, Villa Cafaggio (Tuscany)

Le Tenute di Genagricola

Tenuta S.Anna (Veneto); Torre Rosazza, Borgo Magredo, Poggiobello, V8+ (FVG); Bricco dei Guazzi (Piedmont); Gregorina (Emilia Romagna); Solonio (Lazio)

Zonin

Zonin (Veneto); Castello Del Poggio (Piedmont); Tenuta Il Bosco (Lombardy); Tenuta Ca’ Bolani (FVG); Castello D’Albola, Rocca Di Montemassi, Abbazia Monte Oliveto (Tuscany); Masseria Altemura (Puglia); Feudo Principi Di Butera (Sicily)

Written by Ian D’Agata

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In the world of wine, smaller is often regarded as better, with boutique estates and cult micro-cuvées taking the top spots. But, as Ian D'Agata discovers, large companies with their diverse portfolios and huge volumes of wine, can offer big surprises...

Best buys from Italy’s winemaking giants

Cavit, Altemasi Graal Riserva Metodo Classico Brut, Trentino 2004

17.5/20pts (91/100pts)

By far the best wine made by Cavit, this is a worldclass bubbly. Complex thanks to age, this boasts breadcrumbs, butter and apricots.

Price £33–£37 All About Wine, Hangingditch

Drink 2014

Alc 13.5%

Valdo, Prosecco Extra Dry, Veneto NV

16/20pts (86/100pts)

Apricot, green apple and buttercups. Fresh, uncomplicated but well made and satisfying.

Price NA/UK valdo.com

Drink 2014

Alc 12.5%

Torre Rosazza, Friulano, Colli Orientali del Friuli 2008

17.5/20pts (91/100pts)

One of Friuli’s best estates. Great Pinot Grigio, Ribolla Gialla and Friulano. This latter wine ages well, with marzipan, pear, herbs and peach.

Price £20 Premier Wines

Drink 2014

Alc 13%

La-Vis, Vigneti di Montagna Pinot Grigio, Trentino 2011

16.5/20pts (88/100pts)

Green apple, pear and white flowers, with sneaky concentration. Much better than other Pinot Grigios at this price point.

Price £10 Waitrose

Drink 2014

Alc 12.5%

Cantina Tollo, Madregale Bianco, Terre di Chieti, Abruzzo 2012

15.5/20pts (85/100pts)

Easygoing wine made from Chardonnay in stainless steel. Bright and crisp, an uncomplicated glass.

Price £6.99–£10 Exel Wines, Les Caves de Pyrène, Roberson Wine

Drink 2014

Alc 12%

Nino Negri, 5 Stelle Sfursat, Valtellina, Lombardy 2009

17.5/20pts (91/100pts)

Amarone-like, but more refined, thanks to the Nebbiolo grape. Macerated red cherries, cocoa and sweet spices: a memorable experience.

Price £41–£47 AG Wines, Exel Wines, Winedirect

Drink 2014–2020

Alc 15.5%

Rocca delle Macie, Chianti Classico Riserva, Tuscany 2010

16.75/20pts (89/100pts)

Wines improving by leaps and bounds; the Riserva Famiglia Zingarelli is another winner. Savoury and fresh, with ageing potential, from a fantastic Tuscan vintage.

Price £16 James Nicholson

Drink 2014–2020

Alc 13.5%

Rocca di Montemassi, Le Focaie Sangiovese, Maremma, Tuscany 2010

16.75/20pts (89/100pts)

Fresh and easygoing, juicy yet savoury, perfect for Sunday brunch.

Price £9–£18 Underwood Wine Warehouse, James Fearson, Woodford Wine Room, Wimbledon Wine Cellar

Drink 2014–2015

Alc 13.5%

Pasqua, Amarone della Valpolicella, Veneto 2008

16.5/20pts (88/100pts)

Full-bodied, rich and long, with coffee, cocoa and red cherry aromas and flavours. Good with stews, or break your Port habit and try with Stilton.

Price £30 Mumbles Fine Wines

Drink 2014–2018

Alc 15%

Santa Margherita, Impronta del Fondatore Malbech, Veneto 2011

16.5/20pts (88/100pts)

A rare Italian Malbec, so this wins on novelty factor alone. Perhaps more Cahors-like than Argentina, with coffee, cocoa and tarry notes.

Price £12 Exel Wines

Drink 2014–2020

Alc 14.5%

Castello Monaci, Liante Salice Salentino, Puglia 2010

16.25/20pts (87/100pts)

Bright red fruits with black cherry, tar and flinty nuances on the juciy finish. Perfect with anything barbecued.

Price £10–£12 Customary Wines, Just Fine Wines

Drink 2014–2020

Alc 13.5%

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This year's Decanter World Wine Awards International Trophy for the Best in Show Red Italian Varietals under £15 went to Costarossa, Surani, Primitivo di Manduria, Puglia, Italy 2012, 14.5%

Tasted against:

• Abbadia Ardenga, Rosso di Montalcino, Tuscany, Italy 2012

Profile:

This award came down to a tussle between the fame and prestige of Tuscany and the sun-kissed land of Puglia. It was the latter which came out on top, with a wine that embodies all that is good about the region – so often the source of brilliant-value wines that regularly punch above their weight.

Costarossa is owned by Pasqua Vigneti e Cantine, a company set up by brothers of the same name back in 1925 when they moved from Puglia to Verona, settling on the region as the perfect location for launching their wine business. Today it is one of Italy’s leading independent, privately owned wine companies and is still run by the Pasquas, with the founders’ sons – Carlo, Giorgio and Umberto – presiding over the company’s businesses.

Its headquarters are in the heart of Valpolicella with the winery buildings couched among its vineyards – the head winemaker is also part of the Pasqua family.

Initially dedicated solely to Veneto wines, Pasqua now has interests in several other wine regions across Italy. Its growth has been impressive, to the extent that in 2013 it was responsible for the production of more than 14 million bottles of wine.

This Trophy-winner very much celebrates the family’s return to its homeland. Primitivo grapes thrive in Puglia, achieving perfect ripeness thanks to pristine growing conditions, including plentiful sunlight hours. Manduria is on the Salento peninsula, so enjoys the benefits of cooling breezes from both the Ionian and Adriatic seas, which help counter the searing temperatures the region is subjected to in the summer months.

For this triumphant 2012, Costarossa left the best Primitivo grapes on the vine to overripen and dry out slightly, concentrating the sugars. Following a first fermentation and malolactic fermentation in steel tanks, the wine is left to settle and mature in barriques of various sizes for up to eight months.

See the full information about this wine

Written by Decanter