Piedmont: Articles on Italy's Piedmont Wine Region

When one thinks of dry wines from Italy’s Piemonte, they are usually red wines.  There is a white wine though that should be on everyone’s radar. I am speaking about Arneis.  It is the perfect white for transitioning from summer to autumn.  Arneis is both the name of a wine and the grape from which it is made.  The name means “little rascal” in Piemontese dialect, so named because it can be difficult to grow.  Historically that difficulty was because the better situated vineyards were planted with the “more important” red nebbiolo grape leaving the “lesser” sites for Arneis.

IntoWine.com asked our panel of wine experts their recommendation for one Barolo wine worth seeking out (but which won't break the bank):

I love Barolo.  If I could only have one wine in the world to drink, it would be Barolo. It is one wine I WOULD break the bank for. Still, there are some out there that are not too expensive that are worth it. Mauro Veglio makes a basic Barolo as well as some single vineyard cru bottlings.  The basic Barolo can be found for around $30.  It drinks well young but just a few years to 10 years of ageing in the cellar brings out wonderful complexities. The wine has wonderful aromas of cherries, tar and roses. Drinking the wine shows layered nuances of each of these, more so with age. If you are going to drink it right away, I would recommend decanting. The Barolos with a named vineyard on the labeling will cost closer to $50. I would absolutely recommend storing them away in a cool cellar for at least 5 even 10 years. Your patience will be rewarded. The 2004’s are on the shelves now and are wonderful. Any vintage in the last 12 years is great though with the lone exception of 2002. Look for a lot of sales in the first quarter of 2009. A string of great vintages with a slowing economy has put a lot of wine in the pipeline that needs to be moved. - Loren Sonkin is an IntoWine.com Featured Contributor and the Founder/Winemaker at Sonkin Cellars.

The Piemonte is one of the finest wine regions in the world.  Wine is made there utilizing so many different grapes.  This column has discussed Barolos (made from Nebbiolo), Barberas and the light sparkling wine Moscato d’Asti.  This article will examine another great Piemonte wine:  Dolcetto. 

The fourth most widely planted grape in Italy is Barbera.  In the Piemonte, it is the most widely planted grape and accounts for over 50% of the annual DOC red wine production and 35% of the vineyard area.  Thought to be native to the Piemonte, Barbera has been grown there for centuries.  It is most likely the grape written about by Paul the Deacon in his description of the Battle of Refrancore in 663 when the Longobard troops of Grimaldo defeated the Franks after getting them drunk on wine.  He confirmed that the Longobards filled amphorae with wine and scattered them around the surrounding fields.  The Franks found these jugs and drank voraciously from them making them unfit for battle.