I have never been to Italy. I’ve been in the wine industry for enough years that this hole in my wine region visitation schedule is a bit embarrassing. I’ve been to Australia five times, New Zealand twice, and South Africa once. Various places in California. New York, of course, given where I’m based. And a few regions in France. But Italy, nope.
That changed this summer when I went to the Abruzzo on a trip sponsored by the Consorzio Vini d'Abruzzo. On these trips, you don’t have a lot of say on the itinerary, so it’s best to know what you’re getting into before you say yes. In this case, the Consorzio was working with Jeremy Parzen (dobianchi.com) as the guide and interpreter and Jeremy was working with James Tidwell (of TEXSOM fame, among other projects) on who to invite. So, I knew we would be in good hands.
Done well, these trips provide an excellent overview of the dynamics of the region you’re visiting. You come away with a sense of the region’s vinous history, the issues it’s currently grappling with, and how it sees itself moving into the future. The best trips leave you wanting to learn more – and this ranked up there with the best.
What follows is a sort of “what I learned on my summer trip to the Abruzzo” report.
Entering the Abruzzo
The trip started with an espresso at the airport while our group assembled and waited for our luggage. This being Rome, the espresso was not served in a paper cup. Clearly this place does not run on Dunkin’. At our first lunch, Jeremy recited I Pastori (The Shepherds), a poem by Gabriele D’Annunzio describing the annual migration of sheep from the region’s high Alpine hills down to the Adriatic coast. Entering the Abruzzo, we had driven through those “hills,” spotting snow on the top of the Gran Sasso massif even during the heat of July. But the Adriatic remained out of sight even though we could feel its cooling breezes throughout the visit. One of the poem’s lines – Oh the voice of the one who first discerns the simmering of the sea! – could have been written for our group when the alleged sea came into sparkling view on our final full day.
It's Complicated
Like those sheep in the poem, the region’s vineyards followed their own migration pattern. Originally located in the hills, after World War II, they started to creep to the flatter, warmer coastal plain where it was easier to grow large crops of ripe grapes. The region’s main DOC, Montepulciano d’Abruzzo, was created in 1968. Then and now, cooperatives produce the majority of the region’s wine, with a focus on highly drinkable wines made in quite-high quantity. Here in the USA, we tend to think of these wines as falling firmly into the “cheap and cheerful” category. At my shop I always made sure I have one or two selections on the shelf, a regular size bottle that hits at $10 and a large bottle that comes in under $20. My main selection criterion? Since quality is uniformly “just fine,” it is, “give the business to a sales rep I like.”
Well, that was before. After this trip, my Montepulciano d’Abruzzo selection will be a little more complicated.
We’ll start with the provinces. There are four. L’Aquila is the inland province where during the day, it’s hot, hot, hot. The Ofrena, the province’s main high-altitude valley is literally called il forno dell’Abruzzo – the oven of the Abruzzo. We started our trip in Teramo, the northern province, which is mildly milder than the rest of the region. Heading south, Pescara has varied sites ranging from the foothills to the coast, including the river valley where ocean breezes are funneled inland. At finally, there’s Chieti, at the border of Molise. This southern-most province is where most of the cooperatives are found and it’s the most vineyard-intensive of the Abruzzo. Up north, the vines share space with olive trees and other forms of agriculture. You had to look a bit to find them. As we headed south, vines were everywhere.
In addition to topography and climate, there are a variety of soil types, which I won’t even begin to cover. Yet until recently, mention of a subregion was mainly limited to the labels of IGT-designated wines. This will change with the 2024 when new subzones are introduced, as well as a Superiore designation. This attempt to codify differences among the provinces will clearly complicate things. However, the labels (I think) will still all say Abruzzo and (I think) the grape variety, so trade and consumers who don’t want to go down this particular rabbit hole won’t need to memorize a sea of subzones.
One of the big topics of conversation throughout the trip was climate change. Francesco Valentini (yes, that Valentini, the only winemaker I will mention in this article, but come on, it’s VALENTINI!!!!) suggested not to tell what we think, but to tell what we see. I will tell what I heard. Like the sheep in D’Annunzio’s poem, the vines are migrating back into the hills. There were conversations about the importance of specific site selection. Conversations about irrigation. (To be used, it has to be approved each year and lately, each year it has been approved.) And especially, conversations about the return to pergola training is all its forms. Once the hallmark of high-volume grape growing, it is now being understood as necessary for solar radiation mitigation (i.e., preventing sunburn and keeping the grapes cool.) But it’s not just the heat that’s the problem. There was talk of extreme, excessive weather of all sorts. In this land of warmth and sunshine, where textbooks cheerfully highlight limited disease pressure, 2023 saw some regions lose nearly their entire crop due to a downy mildew outbreak following horrible springtime flooding.
But What About the Wines?
Ok, enough about the migrating sheep and the weather. Let’s talk about the wines we tasted and the grapes they are made from.
We’ll start with the region’s star grape, Montepulciano, which has a deeper story to tell beyond its familiar cheap and cheerful bottlings. And “deep” is a good place to start – as in the color of wines made from this grape – and the rabbit hole our group fell into with one of the winemakers trying to understand the chemistry behind it. There are several different anthocyanins found in grape skins, and Montepulciano is high in the one that provides vibrant, intense color that tends not to oxidize. So even the older bottlings maintained a depth of color and a freshness that was almost startling.
That intense color matters, well, intensely because deep color is often seen as a sign of quality. I can go purple in the face trying to explain why this isn’t true, but if I’m recommending a bottle to someone who likes Napa Valley Cabernet but wants to try something a little different, it’s a much easier sale if the wine is opaque in the glass. And that’s one of the things I found so exciting about the higher end wines we tried.
They had all the typical hallmarks of HIGH QUALITY wine: inky and opaque, deeply fruited, capable of soaking up fancy oak and integrating it beautifully, combined with the traits that a wine geek like me adores: freshness, vibrancy, and a savory character that reflects the scrubby bushes grown near the vines: Is that a note of sage? Maybe it’s licorice? Or freshly cut mint? Whatever it is, it’s lot of fun to sell, especially when even the higher-end bottlings tend to offer excellent value.
Then there’s Cerasoluo, also made from the Montepulciano grape. Production methods vary: some producers use only free-run juice, some give the wine a short maceration period, and some go uber-traditional and add a bit of skins back in fermenting juice. The resulting color will vary, but should be deeper than the pale, oyster-shell color of Provençal rosé (and there are new rules coming to ensure this is the case.) It’s an old school style, but it feels tailor-made for Instagram, where ruby-colored, are-they-light-red-or-deep-rosé wines are all the rage. And it’s the perfect wine for a region that celebrates both meat and seafood dishes.
Perhaps most surprising were the white wines. Single variety bottlings and blends, both still and sparkling from local specialties such as Pecorino and Cococciola are on well on their way to in-the-know cool kid status. But the winner of the how-did-we-not-know-about-this award? Wines made from the Trebbiano Abruzzese grape. Not to be confused with Trebbiano Toscano, which makes wines that are mainly, well, I think meh, may be the technical term, the Abruzzo version seems to turn out wines that are truly spectacular. Younger versions were appealing with subtle floral notes, citrus and white peach. But with age, that’s where they really revved up. Lemon, butterscotch, caramelized pineapple, peaches sprinkled with thyme and laid on the grill, wafts of mint, some flinty reduction, and oh yes, those textbook notes of nuts and honey. Impressive…and delicious.
And now, I think I need an espresso.
