Wojciech Bońkowski
Master of Wine

Mendek Plavac Sv. Jakov 2006

Another exciting wine from Croatia. Rethinking its commercial warhorse: jammy Shiraz-like Plavac Mali.

In Apulia (4): Three wines that work well

In my recent series on Apulia I have been fairly critical of some aspects of the region’s winemaking. Back at home I sat to a relaxed tasting session with some potentially controversial wines, to see whether my feelings have softened. 
Feudi di San Marzano is a large commercial winery making wines in a very fruity style (they’re high on the list of favourites of Luca Maroni, Italy’s most controversial critic), including the Primitivo Sessantanni that embraces the grape’s excesses I mentioned here. ‘Sud’ is San Marzano’s range of everyday varietal wines, and includes (interestingly) a white Verdeca alongside a Shiraz, Primitivo and Malvasia Nera. This latter grape is ubiquitous in Salento, the southern part of Apulia, but has always been used exclusively as a blending variety for its deep colour and lush fruitiness. (I’ve heard a theory that it belongs to the Grenache family). It allegedly lacks structure to be bottled on this own. Well, this Sud Malvasia Nera 2007 works very well indeed. It is a simple wine with not much bouquet to speak of, but making a statement about Apulia as a serious source of irresistibly tasty ripe fruit. The New World inspiration is very obvious here but the whole has a natural freshness and joyfulness that is rarely seen in an overseas wine. Unsophisticated but delicious, in a word. (It’s about 8€ retail).
With the Santa Lucia’s 2000 Le More, I wanted to double check my mixed impressions from a Nero di Troia tasting organised for us at Canosa by the Radici association. This grape is another former blending variety that has quickly risen to fame in recent years. But it’s still much a work-in-progress as producers are trying to figure out what winemaking styles suit it best. Rosés, light unoaked reds, classic long-aged large-oak examples, as well as turbocharged new oak modern fruit bombs are produced. The latter solution is the least interesting, the general feeling about Nero di Troia being that it tends towards overextraction, and doesn’t digest new oak well at all. The 2006 Riserva Le More from Santa Lucia was a case in point, and I much preferred their lighter Vigna del Melograno bottling. Well, I was proven wrong with the 2000 vintage of this wine. Time has been gracious to it, and it’s showing brilliantly. It has two major merits today: it has totally digested its oak, and shows Nero di Troia’s exuberant floral profile well. Colour is still dark, bouquet only mildly evolved, softly olivey, rather simple as befits this rustic grape variety, but with good overtones of violets and other flowers. On the palate this still is quite dynamic and bit of tannic-punchy, with Nero di Troia’s typically moderate acidity. Modern and dark-fruity but with really good structural balance, and more seriousness than most Troias. 
Leone De Castris is one of Apulia’s veteran wineries, but with a recent change of style with the hiring of consultant Riccardo Cotarella I have been very underwhelmed by their wines. Especially by the Salice Salentino Riserva 2006, and all-time classic of traditional Apulian balsamic evolution, and following the Cotarella ‘revolution’ more of a blueberry muffin milkshake Mendoza Malbec-wannabe. (It is declared to be 100% Negroamaro grape aged in large oak; judging by what’s in the glass I have every reason to question both claims). So as a consolation I opened my last remaining bottle of the pre-Cotarellean Salice Salentino Riserva 2001. What a delightful wine! An unashamedly evolved, transparent ruby colour and an engaging bouquet of ripe cherry and red berries, with a hint of Salento stewed fruit preserve character, with minor herbiness for complexity; no oak, no tar. The real interest is on the palate with excellent volume of ripe and fleshy but vibrant fruit. And there’s quite some tannins on the finish. Still too young, should wait another 2–3 years at least. Where the latest vintage is flabby and boring this is poised and refreshing, structured and drinkable, sturdy and elegant at the same time. If you have bottles left, cherish them. This wine is no more. 
Source of wines: Feudi di San Marzano own purchase, Santa Lucia, Leone De Castris samples provided by the producers (back in 2004).

In Apulia (3): A good… beer

The only bottle I brought from Italy this time: it’s actually beer!

In Apulia (2): Black and bitter

This gate in the old part of Lecce is a good metaphor of Negroamaro’s current condition.

Besides Primitivo (on which I’ve blogged here), Apulia’s other major grape variety is Negroamaro. It’s by far my preferred of these two. In many aspects, Negroamaro is the exact opposite of Primitivo. It ripens notoriously late, producing wines that are high in acidity and with nervy tannins but not very deeply coloured, with less sensual fruit than Primitivo. While Negroamaro can be harnessed to make some attractive unoaked, early-drinking, fruit-focused modern wines, its major interest in the past have been its ageworthy versions released after years of cask ageing, not in their primary youth but in the glory of their balsamic tertiary evolution. Aged Salice Salentino, the best appellation for this style of wine, as well as Brindisi, Copertino and several other DOCs have been, for me, some of the best wines of Italy’s Meridione.

I approached this trip to Apulia with excitement, therefore, but came back rather disappointed and worried. Old style Negroamaro is an endangered species. The ruthless modernisation of vineyards and cellar practice has swiftly relegated the traditional style to the antic. And there is a wave of Parkerized (or rather ‘Gambero-Rossoed’) Negroamaro that are really some of the most disgusting wines I’ve had of late.

The problem is that Negroamaro doesn’t really lend itself to modern vinification: it doesn’t like new oak, loses its vital freshness quickly when picked late in search of the elusive ‘physiological ripeness’, while its fierce tannins that formerly melted with years of large oak cask ageing, easily become exasperatedly drying when submitted to the Cotarella-style heavy-handed extraction. (Riccardo Cotarella is Italy’s most influential ‘flying winemaker’, and while long absent from Apulia he’s now consulting for some major wineries).  

The Darth Vader of Apulia.


An eloquent example of Negroamaro’s collapse in the hand of the modern style was Leone de CastrisEloveni, supposedly an everyday easy-drinking example of the grape (which it was in the past), now overconcentrated and overextracted through some cellar tricks it’s better to ignore, and made to taste like a soupy ‘forest berries’-infused red that could with equal plausibility be a Colchagua Merlot or a Bulgarian Syrah. To cater for the alleged ‘consumer taste’ it even comes with a generous dollop of residual sugar, for which Mr. Cotarella has even coined a deliciously cynical euphemism of svinatura dolce (‘racking off while still sweet’: this clumsy translation does nothing to communicate the oxymoronic panache of the original). We’ve also had a series of revolting Negroamaros from youngly established wineries such as Antica Masseria del Sigillo, L’Astore, Menhir or Santa Maria del Morige.


New blood lacking, it were the old classics to solitarily defend Negroamaro’s honour. I was lucky enough to attend two mini-verticals of Apulia’s standard-bearers. Duca d’Aragona from the large winery of Candido is a blend of Negroamaro with 20% Montepulciano, aged in small oak. It’s a powerful red that needs plenty of bottle age to mellow, as shown by the tight, iron-cast, minty, aromatically still somewhat vague 2003, which I however trust will join the good vintages of this bottling: the purity of fruit and overall balance are quite fine (though my Apulian hosts dismissed it as ‘too international’; it’s now made by Lombardian consultant Donato Lanati). The 2000 is still too young, though slowly revealing the cherry core of real Negroamaro and its acidic drive, and taking on chocolatey, meaty notes of maturity; it’s another wine where the extract (not speaking of oak) is perfectly gauged, and impressively backward for 9 years of age. The 1998 (still made by Severino Garofano, the dean of Apulian winemakers) is brilliant, with a lovely complex nose full of green notes of mint and camphora, less solar, more mineral than the 2000 or 1997, with wonderfully preserved primary fruit and still some power to go. My preferred vintage was 1997 (my host Franco Ziliani preferred the 1998) that was lighter than the 1998 but had a supreme effortless elegance: fresh, poised, pure, tonic, delicate, still with a kiss of tannins, it was a majestic bottle.

Gratticciaia from Agricole Vallone was introduced in 1996 as an innovation: instead of softening Negroamaro’s rough edges with the soft fruity Malvasia Nera grape and long cask ageing, the grapes are given a few weeks of amarone-like drying on reed matts. The result is an individual, expressive wine with the pruney dried-fruity notes of an amarone but also the Mediterranean herby twist of Apulia. The 2004 (first vintage by new consultant Graziana Grassini) is just a little underwhelming at the moment, showing good depth and harmony on nose but rather simple and short on palate. The 2000 (which I’ve tried in Warsaw not Apulia) is tight, powerful, expressive and impressive but would best be kept for another 5–6 years. The 1998 is a great wine, with a lovely nose less driven by appassimento, flowery, mildly green too (a recurrent characteristic in this vintage), greatly long on palate, quiet, elegant, opening up nicely in the glass over 40 minutes or so, with fantastic firmness and poise on the finish. It can still go on.


I have a weakness for the third of these Negroamaro musketeers: Patriglione from the Cosimo Taurino estate. Made from a lateish harvest but no drying of grapes, Patriglione comes from very old Negroamaro vines and sees some small oak which it digests very well. Here, too, a new winemaker has recently joined: Massimo Tripaldi, and his first vintage, the 2003, is very convincing with richness, power and structure to age well. I’ve recently also had the opportunity to taste the 2001 – more elegant than the 2003, with a textural finesse I found enticing; the slightly less convincing 2000; the 1994 that was a little tired (and had big cork problems with 2 out of 3 bottles tasted) but still showed the Patriglione character; the 1975 – actually the first vintage ever made: read here; and the 1997 which was a unforgettable bottle full of regal fruit, power and elegance at the same time. Patriglione is really a wine to die for, and at only 35€ it’s also quite affordable.

In Apulia (1): Neoprimitivism

I’m in Apulia, the Italian boot’s heel, to have a look at the current wine scene and the recent developments. The tour is organised by Radici Wines, an innovative mini-competition devoted exclusively to indigenous varieties, and my gracious cicerones are renowned wine writer Franco Ziliani and Enzo Scivetti of the Apulian branch of ONAV.

Fellow tasters Kyle Phillips, Rosemary George and Patricia Guy enjoying Pichierri’s Primitivos.

This lowland region is one of Italy’s largest producers of wine, although you’ll be excused for not being familiar with its produce as much of it is sold in bulk and much is of unexciting quality. In fact, Apulia conveys a sense of hopelessness as it has so far failed to create any romance associated with its wines. Sicily generally is jazzy and its Nero d’Avola wines just feel fashionable while Apulia, although its production structure is similar (co-ops, large latifunds, bulk production), is really stuck with its provincial image.


Well, there’s one wine that has managed to emerge from the Apulian magma of no less than 26 obscure wine appellations and as many grape varieties: Primitivo. This grape has been vehicled to fame by its discovered genetic link with Zinfandel and it’s been steadily gaining market share since. 

Manduria’s period of prosperity was the 19th century.

Primitivo yields a controversial wine with massive colour, hyperintense fruit and limitless alcohol. While in the past high yields and conservative harvest times kept the wines within reasonable limits, the modern tendency towards higher concentration has generated wines that are absolutely outrageous. On this tour we’ve visited two Primitivo strongholds, Manduria on the Ionian coast next to Taranto, and the more obscure Gioia del Colle in central Apulia, and on both comparative tastings there were many wines above 15%. One of dry wines was 18.2% while several scored 16% with over 10g of residual sugar. More frighteningly still, Apulia still abides by the old Italian tradition of indicating total potential alcohol on the label (fractioned into svolto – the actual fermented alcohol – and non svolto which effectively is residual sugar). A Primitivo Dolce Naturale from producer Attanasio thus boasts 19.5% on the front label, while the off-dry and semi-sweet wines from veteran Pichierri are 19, 20 and even 21%.

And this even isn’t Polvanera’s strongest wine.


For those port drinkers among you this might not sound all that outrageous but remember that half of a port’s 20% alc. is added in the form of grape spirit. Indeed the sweet Primitivos share many characteristics with port (and at the same time, amarone, being more often than not produced from slightly dried grapes) but have much better balanced alcohol. Semi-sweet red is a marginal style anyway. But the big problem comes with those 16 and 17% dry reds. If you agree that a wine’s primary characteristic is drinkability, Primitivo is born with a serious handicap.



It’s not the grape’s only problem. Naturally low acids and an obvious simplicity of bouquet are another. Combined with the modern tendency towards interventionist viticulture to increase concentration, late picking, heavy extraction, short ageing to boost primary fruit, and new French oak, all this results in Primitivos that are one-dimensional and really rather tiresome to drink. Sure, they have some of the most sensually compelling fruit profiles to be found anywhere, and when skillfully made can provide spectacular wines. Out of the 120-odd we’ve tried I’ve enjoyed those of Fatalone, Plantamura, scJ’o and recent star Polvanera (all from Gioia del Colle) as well as the very amaronish Attanasio, the superconcentrated Mille Una, the meatier, more rustic range of Accademia dei Racemi and the polished Duca Guarini. But a good half of those Primitivos were just too heavy, tiresome and barely drinkable.

Vittorio Pichierri drawing 22-year-old Primitivo from clay amphora.


Although it can be argued that Primitivo as a grape can digest the modern style better than many (surely better than Apulia’s other main grape, Negroamaro), there’s something unique to traditionally-made old-style Primitivo that is sorely missing in the modern examples. A visit to the cellars of Pichierri in the town of Sava (formerly the heart of Primitivo cultivation) was an eye-opening revelation. Produced largely from bought-in grapes from free-growing old vines (alberello), slowly fermented in concrete tanks, largely unoaked, bottled several years after the harvest, and sold ridiculously cheap, Pichierri wines are unlike anything else I’ve tasted. Here, Primitivo reveals an unexpected depth of aroma, a compelling bitter chocolate texture that has nothing to do with the jammy flabbiness of the modern style, and the alcohol – although often even higher than its peers’ – is miraculously well balanced. Everything here is honest, wholesome and dangerously drinkable, from the basic 1.10€-a-liter bulk wine sold to locals in plastic containers (this is an important part of the business in Apulia, and most wineries we visited still sell a sizeable part of their production this way) to the trio of vini dolci naturali, unfortified semi-sweet Primitivos of wonderfully balsamic fruit and staggering expression.


The fun at Pichierri continued with the desealing of a traditional clay amphora called capasone, containing a 22-year-old Primitivo that was fresh as a daisy and deliciously juicy (if a little unclean and bretty), and then the 1975 Primitivo di Sava, one of the great wines of my life. 18% alcohol and a fair bit of sugar, black as ink after 34 of ageing (22 of which in tank), with a fabulously complex bouquet of grand cru chocolate, balsamic vinegar, dried fruits and Christmas spices, and a palate of such vibrancy and unadulterated, fleshy fruit that was beyond the reach of many vintage ports at age 10 and modern Primitivos at age 2.


Pichierri sell quite a bit on export markets and although largely ignored by the press and critics, they seem to be in good commercial shape. I truly hope they can continue to make Primitivo as they have for 30 years. When they stop, it’s one of Italy’s best kept classic secrets that dies out. 

See another report on this visit by Franco Ziliani

Revisiting Accademia dei Racemi

A political bottle

A busy day today, tasting 50 wines for the WINO Magazine here in Warsaw. We continue tomorrow with what should prove an interesting panel: wines from the Dolomites (Alto Adige and Trentino). Today, we had a mixed bag of market debuts.

There were 5 bottles from Accademia dei Racemi, a leading producer in the Italian region of Apulia. Since the late 1990s, it has operated as a club (or super-coop, if you like) of several smallish estates in Manduria, the hometown of Apulia’s leading export grape variety – Primitivo. Bush vines growing at low altitudes on rocky soils, in an extremely hot climate, give birth to very powerful, supremely fruity wines. With more than a hint of affinity with New World red wines, reinvented Primitivos scored a roaring success among the younger Italian public, and abroad. But this success had a price: too many examples were aping Shiraz and Zinfandel, losing their regional identity, and southern Apulia quickly became the playground of large industrial producers from the north of Italy.

Accademia’s outspoken boss Gregory Perrucci, fully aware of the huge potential of Manduria’s vineyards (with many old, naturally low-yielding bush vines, called alberello – a key term here), created this small group of independent estates, allowing them to get their message across more easily. The style of the wines was deliberately kept more traditional and elemental: bursting with ripe fruit flavours, but juicier and fresher than many other Primitivos, wines such as Felline Primitivo di Manduria or Sinfarosa Zinfandel were quickly established as new regional classics. With time, Perrucci has extended the portfolio with other appellations and grape varieties: Negroamaro and Malvasia Nera (from the Casale Bevagna estate), and the extremely rare Ottavianello and Sussumaniello from Torre Guaceto.

I first became acquainted with these wines in 2002, and for several years was absolutely hooked on Sum, the 100% Sussumaniello wine. It is a weird wine, chocolatey, bitter-spicy, narcotic, with an amazing freshness for the hot climate of this part of Apulia. As proudly ‘regional’ as the entire Accademia project. But on our panel tasting today, the Sum 2005 didn’t shine. The show was stolen by Dèdalo 2005, 100% Ottavianello. This obscure grape, on the verge of extinction until very recently, is believed to be derived from France’s Cinsault. This is another freakish wine, transparent, airy, crisp, young and evolved at the same time, with again a freshness that makes the stereotyped ‘Pinot Noir of the Mediterranean’ comparison sound spot-on.
Accademia dei Racemi also produces an entry-level wine, a blend of various grapes and origins that is sold for the price of a take-away pizza: Anarkos. I absolutely adore this wine for its back label, which is an angry manifesto of regional pride and empowerment. It pretty much sums up my opinions about the modern winemaking in Apulia, and tells you why I so much like the whole Accademia project.

So I’ll leave you to decipher this brilliant piece of Socialist prose, while adding that for its agenda, the wine itself (vintage 2007) tastes perhaps a little too fruity and ‘international’ to be really credible (there is some residual sugar, notably). Or perhaps it was just my palate. The biodynamic calendar wasn’t looking too good today.