smccullough

PREFACE: I KNOW NOTHING ABOUT WINE....Having admitted that, my wife and I travelled in Italy last may. Had great meals in Rome, Venice, Florence, Venice and Montipuliciano (sp?). Anyway, ate at all affordable, outdoor seating type restaurants -- nothing fancy at all. We always ordered the house red wine and always thought it was great -smooth, easy to drink, and always affordable. I've asked a couple of wine stores at home these questions but haven't got a straight answer -what were we likely drinking? why was it so much smoother than the Italian wines I buy at home? what can i buy in America that is closest to what we were drinking? I realize there's substantial ignorance in these questions, but can't believe I'm the first persaon to wonder about this....any wine suggestions would really be appreciated....thanks

MikeBuckley

I enjoy my wine hobby immensely and I can't imagine how to answer your question.

Is it possible that you typically drink the very lowest price wine at home, the result being that you were served generally better quality table wine in Italy?

Is it possible that you were so intoxicated not by the alcohol but by the ambiance of Italy that everything understandably seemed better to you? You definitely wouldn't be the first to have that experience.

By the way, if the gelato also seemed better in Italy, that's because it really is.

DeirdreStraughan

House wines vary considerably. Some restaurants serve something local, others serve whatever they like in terms of cost/benefit ratio. Since you were eating in five different regions, each with its own variety of wines, in presumably many different restaurants, no one can guess what you may have been drinking.

I've been told that some Italian wines don't travel well, which adds to the difficulty of recreating these experiences at home.


best regards,
Deirdré Straughan

http://www.straughan.com

Nino

As Mike posted, you probably like "light" wine. Drinking and enjoying wine is a process, you would not fell the difference from a reserve and a house wine until you had a past tasting experience. You can start by getting different wines from different regions and really taste them - the idea to rate the wines you taste is really helpfull and you will see that your expertize will increase dramatically.

buongiorno

Your enjoyment of the wine probably has a lot to do with the pairing with food but I will try and help you with what you could buy in the US. In the Veneto you would likely be drinking whites typically Soave or Pinot Grigio which is a heavily planted grape in the Veneto area. In Rome, Florence and Montepulciano it is likely that you would be drinking reds and the predominant grape of the area is Sangiovese used in Brunello, Chianti and Super Tuscan wines. The Super Tuscans may also be blends that include Merlot and Cabernet. Given where you were it is unlikely that you were drinking Piemonte wines using Nebbiolo or Barbera grapes. These are typically Barolo, Baberesco, Barbara, Nebbiolo D' Alba, etc.

degas

I ALSO KNOW NOTHING ABOUT WINE!

However, I find that the very same thing happens to me when I get back home.

I do like a red Italian wine called Lambrusco Canei (Dell Emilia).

I'm sure its not very highly rated, but its cheap ($4.50 a bottle) and tastes good to me. Its not dry at all (I hate a dry wine that makes me thirsty) and it has a fruity taste, almost semi-sweet.

Can somebody comment on this wine and perhaps recommend others of a similiar type?

ira

Hi Degas,

Lambrusco is a basic, inexpensive red suitable for all occasions and all persons.

I think that if you just try all of the Lambrusco available to you locally, you might find one you like better - or maybe not.

ira

Hi SM,

As noted, there is no way for us to know what you were drinking.

On the Amalfi Coast, for example, we had some very nice Vin de Cassa that came from local vinyards and was not shipped farther than Sorrento.

> why was it so much smoother than the Italian wines I buy at home?<

Possibly, lower alcohol content and/or no sulfites.

buongiorno

Lambrusco is a typical red table varietal in the Emilia Romano area

MikeBuckley

I'm going to take another stab at this. The real point of the question is how to get you going in the right direction to ensure that you enjoy drinking what you buy. You already know from your travel experience that you like a wine that is smooth. So, I suggest that you ask a trusting merchant for some reds that have that character.

Taste is very personal and the words to describe them even more so. For me, the smoothest reds are from Bordeaux. That may or may not be a good point of departure.

If you're looking for a "round" taste, that might be the characteristic that gives you the impression that it is smooth. Such a wine might likely be made from a blend of grapes, rather than just one. Bordeaux is a good example, which partly explains why I think of it as being so "smooth." However, most Italian reds are also made from a blend of grapes. Considering that you enjoyed them less at home, buying a blended Italian red is not necessarily a good solution.

You also might want to ask a merchant to steer you away from a particularly dry red. If it is too dry for your taste, you might think of it as not being smooth. I wonder if a Chianti would be a good starting point (because it is blended and not especially dry.)

Last, if you do take the time to figure out what you like, try making that decision by drinking the wine unaccompanied by food. That's because, as one poster mentioned, that it could be that the pairing with the food makes the wine less appealing. The food can dramatically alter the taste of the wine so much that anybody of any experience would notice it.

socialworker

HI smccullough--the fact that your msg posted at 1:40 am makes me think you are either a night owl *or* that you might live on the west coast. If you live somewhere that offers a Trader Joe's that sells wine, I suggest that you just try the Italian reds and whites of all kinds and see what you like. One piece of info is that many Italian wines are labelled either DOC or DOCG on the little paper part covering the cork and maybe on the bottle as well. The G indicates a higher grade but is not always the one that may appeal to you. Also, sometimes--paradoxically--the G one is cheaper than others w/o the G.

Ryan

If you know nothing about wine, I would strongly suggest you pick up a copy of Wine For Dummies. I got it about 6 years ago as a gift and I must say, it's been a great primer on understanding wine, particularly wines from Europe.

Anyway, back to your question - what were you drinking? Impossible to know. If it was very light, it was likely a chianti or similar type wine. Bold and strong, either a Barolo or Barbaresco. You might have simply been drinking a "red table wine." There are about 8 to 10 different wine types in Italy, with Chianti and Barolo being on either extreme of boldness.

In terms of the quality here versus what can be obtained there, that's where the knowledge comes in. A mediocre or poor wine maker in Italy can make substantially more money shipping his mediocre wine to the US then he can selling it in Italy. If his wine doesn't qualify for being classified by type (such as chianti), it'll be worth little in Italy as a "red table wine." Here, you slap a nice label on it, toss in some fancy Italian writing, and you sell it for $29.99 as an Italian import.

The main difference between Italian wine purchased in the US versus Italian wine purchased in Italy, is the knowledge of the average consumer doing the purchasing. The owner of a restaurant in Italy, will know what the good years are and what vintner's are dependable. Generally, Italy's been fairly consistent on the quality of the vintages. But, as the country with the largest single number of wineries and, if this is still true as it was in 2002, the largest volume of wine manufactured in Europe, knowing who makes a good wine and who doesn't, is key.

While we get some of the very good wines, it would be fairly doubtful that your best Italian wines will be found in something other then a really top notch wine merchant.

zootsi

We too found the house wines in Italy to be quite good. The surroundings might have had something to do with it. .
Back home, we usually drink a Montepulciano Abruzzo as an inexpensive red, usually Citra or Placido. This is a light bodied, fruity red that goes great with pasta. It goes for about $7 for a 1.5 liter bottle.
For a white try a Pinot Grigio, again Citra and Placido are both very good.
Thes wines are often used as house wines, at least in the US.

MikeBuckley

Two of the people have mentioned that Barolo might have been served. As a table wine at "affordable, outdoor restarants -- nothing fancy at all?" Either I have the mistaken impression about the quality of the restaurants fitting that description, or that Italian restaurants serve much better table wine than in the U. S., or that Barolo is available at significantly cheaper prices than in the U. S. If I can reliably get Barolo as a table wine in Italy, I'll book my plane ticket now.

Seriously, please advise if you have reason to believe Barolo is served as a table wine. I know a lot of wines never get shipped out of the country they are made in, so maybe this is true for some inexpensive Barolos I'm not used to seeing in the stores or the restaurants in the U. S. If indeed that's the case, that in itself would explain why the original poster in this thread noticed the smoothness of the wine. Such a wine would usually run at least $75 per bottle in a restaurant in the U. S.

smccullough

Thanks for all the responses. I knew going in it was a question that likely didn't have a concrete answer, but I appreciate all the help. I guess i'll have to keep up the search....or just return to italy....thanks.

Budman

A lot of your Italian table wines (vino de tavolla) you will not find in the U.S. A lot of the table wines you get in restaurants are from the local grapes from the area. A lot from mom & pop wineries.

I hate to use the word "left over," but after the harvest/ferment process, what they don't fit in the oak barrels for aging sometimes up to 3 years, are put in stainless steel tanks to age. You can usually start drinking this after about 6-9 months. It's very good wine, but not of the quality of oak-aged wine.

Additionally, they'll mix different varieties of grapes together to be used for this table wine.

We spent a week in Tuscany (Montepulciano). There was a small local winery across the street from our apartment. They had some great Nobile di Montepulciano (Reserve) (3 years in the barrel and 6 months in the bottle) that cost anywhere from 15 to 20 Euros. I would walk over and fill up my empty wine bottles with their vino de tavolla for 1 Euro a bottle, and this was <b>great</b> stuff!! Could not get that anywhere in the States.

Does this make any sense?

Jolie

I also know nothing about wine. But to me, most &quot;local&quot; products in Europe taste better than what I can buy in America - including wine, beer, and cheese. My uneducated guess was that most of what I can afford to buy in America is mass-produced and intended to survive travel across long distances.

I always thought if I could get fresh, locally-made products in the US, they would taste as good as what I find in Europe (for example, a local Wisconsin cheese that is not intended to survive a five-month stint on a Safeway shelf). But that's just a guess.

My other conclusion was that it's psychological.

Intrepid1

Personally, I hope you find what you are looking for. I think your best plan is the one that involved another trip to Italy.

smccullough

Jolie and Budman: What y'all both said I've been told at wine stores.....the mass production vs the &quot;mom and pop&quot; winery...something about tannins or sulfites or addititves or something so they can send it overseas and it'll have a longer shelflife.....just may not be able to get that local quality without being local again....there are worse things, i guess....thanks again

easytraveler

Budman: you are making a whole lot of sense! (And please try to come to Yountville next year!)

smccullough: Years ago, while spending some time in Rome, I was told that the table wine I got was called &quot;vini romani&quot; and that they came from the area around Rome every day. It's inexpensive, cheaply made, and doesn't travel well at all. These wines were shipped in DAILY, which shows you how poorly they travel. Since these wines came in daily, it's not a uniform product. One day you may get one kind of wine, another day another kind of wine.

I would suspect that whatever you found that you liked was the local wine shipped in daily to the restaurants - a custom we don't really have in this country.

I'd also agree with you that these local wines generally are usually much more drinkable with meals than some hoi-poloi &quot;name&quot; brand with a &quot;99&quot; rating from Wine Spectator.

Try lambrusco if you'd like. Or try some of the Portuguese wines like Lancers and Mateus. My guess is that you don't like the acidity in some wines and therefore prefer the &quot;smoothness&quot;. French wines, like the Bordeaux wines, may also be more to your taste. Pinot Grigio is also a good suggestion. It's lighter and &quot;smoother&quot;.

Finally, if you do live on the West Coast, try Trader Joe's. Their wine buyer really knows what he is doing and, even though the price may sometimes be low, the wine selection is always good. You can't go wrong, even you go with their &quot;two-buck chuck&quot; (Charles Shaw $1.99).

Cheers!

easytraveler
I just like to drink!