GrapeDeal.com

The annual Amarone Calling tasting was held last week at The Middle Temple, hosted as before by the UK Sommeliers Association. Amarone is a ‘wine of method’, a wine that owes more to what takes place in the winery than in the vineyard. In this case, the essential step is allowing the harvested grapes to shrivel for up to four months before fermentation: the appassimento method. Wines of method also include all sparkling wines, fortified wines, aromatised wines such as Barolo Cinato and Vermouth, and wines aged sur voile (under a cap of yeast) such as Fino Sherry and some Jura whites. The category could be more liberally interpreted to include most rosé, and wines aged in a solera system.

Wines of method are a tribute to the ingenuity of man in the quest for vinous pleasures. Some of them go back a long way, and which one came first would be an interesting question to research. Amarone, under that name, would not be it, because its history is comparatively short. One account is that it dates from 1936, when a forgotten barrel of the sweet wine Recioto della Valpolicella was found to have fully fermented into a dry, high alcohol wine. But this had almost certainly happened many times before: https://tasteverona.com provides a more detailed and fascinating historical account.

Amarone as we know it was granted its own DOC only in 1990 and was elevated to DOCG in 2010. It remains a unique style; I can’t think of another (unfortified) wine for which the regulations require at least 14% abv. And this, for me, is the point of connection. There are many high alcohol wines that I struggle with, increasingly so as climate change promotes ever greater fruit ripeness and higher potential alcohol. But Amarone not only works, but wouldn’t work or even exist below 14%. The warmth of the alcohol is matched by the richness of the fruit, and by the touch of bitterness on the finish (from the Corvina grape) which lends the wine its name. Another common element is a trace of volatile acidity (mostly acetic acid), which arises from the very slow fermentation when this is finally started during the cold of winter.

All of which is best matched by a rich dish of roast or braised meat and/or hard, aged cheese. Sadly, a wild boar stew was not on offer at Middle Temple, but perhaps this reminded us merely to taste and not to drink.

What was new this year? Style-wise, thankfully, not a lot: the Amarone method doesn’t need to be tinkered with. This event is more of a market update: different producers, a new vintage, another year of bottle age. The last is valuable; these wines take some years to show their best. At MW Peter McCombie’s masterclass the 2013 Fracastoro by Vigneti Villabella had reached an excellent autumnal stage (UK importer please); the Pietro Clementi 2015 was just about ready though in a quite different way: aromatic but less lush and more savoury.

Another fine tasting and plenty of ideas for the right bottle for that Christmas partridge.

Many thanks to Peter, the UK Sommeliers Association and the other sponsors.