montepulciano – Appetite for Wine

Montepulciano d’Abruzzo is an Italian varietal that is gaining in popularity in the U.S. Still unknown to many wine drinkers, there are great values to be found.

Not to be confused with Montepulciano the village in Tuscany, famous for its stellar Sangiovese based wines, Montepulciano is itself a varietal grape from the Abruzzo region of Italy. Tuscany is in central Italy, north of Rome, whereas Abruzzo is east of Rome, bordering the Adriatic Sea. Montepulciano, the grape, is noted for its deep, rich color and hearty character. Smooth tannins and relatively low acidity make these wines excellent for every day, yet they are bold and structured enough to complement a variety of foods. Their value pricing is an added bonus.

I’ve only just begun exploring this fantastic wine, and so far have sampled only two. The most recent was a 2013 Villa Rocca, purchased online for $9.99 from Wines Till Sold Out (WTSO.com). Here is what I thought of it:

Rich and full bodied. Inky purple in the glass with aromas of dark berry, violet, and vanilla. A bit tannic at first, but this softens with time. Concentrated flavors of blackberry, black pepper, and black cherry with an earthy, spicy finish. Best with food; we paired this with Grilled Margherita Sandwiches, and it was a delightful combination. It would be great with pizza and pasta, also.

I look forward to many more Montepulciano d’Abruzzo wines as fall and winter set it. I highly recommend exploring this region of Italy.

We enjoy wine. A lot. We are not wine professionals. We hold no certifications; we have no experience in the wine industry. We just enjoy tasting and drinking wine, and exploring wine regions.

Most of the wines we drink are from California, mainly because that is where we live, so when we go wine tasting, that’s what we buy. Nevertheless, we enjoy wines from other states in the U.S., and all over the world. We have an affinity for Spain (Rioja, Cariñena), Italy (Tuscany, Montepulciano d’Abruzzo, Barolo), and France (Red Bordeaux, Loire Sauvignon Blanc). We enjoy finding affordable wines from under-rated regions.

Over the years we have tasted several hundred wines, and can only recall a handful that were so bad we could not drink them. (One of those was early in my (Kent) wine journey and I now believe it was corked, but I didn’t know it at the time.) While we have favorites, and prefer big, bold reds, we haven’t met a grape – red or white – that we don’t enjoy in some measure.

Our main format for micro-blogging is Instagram. We are very active there, posting several times per week to share what we’re drinking, and what we’re thinking. Please visit us @appetite_for_wine and @robz_lyfe. If you like what you see, please follow us.

You may also want to follow Kent on Vivino, the wine rating app. He’s consistently rated in the top 140 users in the United States. That’s out of more than 5.5 million users! You can find him here: http://www.vivino.com/users/kent-rey. His Vivino reviews also post to his Twitter feed at https://twitter.com/k1reynolds.

If you’d like to reach us directly, or are interested in having us review your wine (samples gladly accepted), please send an e-mail to appetiteforwine (at) gmail (dot) com. Cheers!

– Kent Reynolds & Robyn Raphael

Tag: montepulciano

The Other Montepulciano

Appetite for Wine