Over the holidays, I had the fortune to sample a wine hand-carried all the way from Tuscany to Kentucky: A 2011 “La Roccaia” Vernaccia di San Gimignano. Our host opened the wine with some ceremony, poured it, and gave it a sniff. “It’s different,” he noted, rather dubiously. He took a sip, and I asked him what he thought. He replied, quite undubiously, “Well, it goes to show Italians don’t know s— about white wine.”

It’s a shame that the wine he transported so carefully for thousands of miles was so disappointing, but I must admit I couldn’t wait to see what this apparent train wreck of a wine tasted like. The nose didn’t seem so bad: Green, citrusy, and minerally. But I could see why our host, a fan of fine Rieslings, would find this wine so unpalatable.

It tasted bracingly tart, with very focused, limey acids. The wine didn’t unclench until the very end, when it broadened a bit, finishing with a bit of stone. What distressed me was its watery underbelly. The tight acidity may have been what the winemakers were going for, but I doubt that they intended the wine to have such flabby fruit.

Fortunately, we were having some classic cheese fondue for our main course, and the fondue saved the day. The pointy acids of the wine cut right through the richness of the cheese, clearing the way for the next bite. It was quite a fine pairing, in fact! I don’t necessarily relish the prospect of drinking this wine again on its own, but the acids made it undeniably food-friendly .

If you go out looking for some Vernaccia to pair with a rich cream sauce or some cheese, note that Vernaccia di San Gimignano is only one of several very different-tasting Vernaccias produced in Italy. And it’s not just a matter of terroir. The Vernaccia grown around San Gimignano isn’t even the same variety as the Vernaccias grown elsewhere. According to The Oxford Companion to Wine, Vernaccia di Serrapetrona is a fizzy red, for example, and Vernaccia di Oristano is almost sherry-like. The name “Vernaccia,” it turns out, means essentially “indigenous,” and it can refer to the indigenous varieties found in a number of Italian localities.

Vernaccia di San Gimignano won’t please everyone, if this bottle is any indication, but if you’re planning on serving something like fondue, brie en croute, raclette or fettuccine alfredo, its crisp acids might just make it a perfect match.

When I see an older bottle of wine, I usually can’t help but feel impressed by its age and desirous of sampling the liquid inside. Older does not usually mean better, however. Most wines should be consumed shortly after you purchase them, especially if you, like me, lack a uniformly dark and cool space in which to lay down a few bottles.

But every once in a great while, the opportunity arises to try a wine that has been aged properly, and by all means, you should take advantage of that opportunity. I remember dining at Aureole in Las Vegas with some friends a few years ago, and I was having trouble wading through the hundreds and hundreds of wines on the list. Then I spotted an Austrian Riesling that was about 10 or 15 years old.

Only a handful of whites can age well, but trusting that a wine-focused restaurant like Aureole would provide optimum conditions, I took a risk and ordered it. My friend took a sip, and though she wouldn’t profess to know a lot about wines, she always seems to be able to encapsulate the character of wine with just a word or two (as a blogger seemingly incapable of writing posts of fewer than 500 words, that’s something I envy). She said, “This wine tastes wise.” And so it did. Not big or flashy, but well-balanced and smooth, with impressive depth of flavor. I can’t imagine having an experience like that with a wine just a year or two old.

Frequently, older wines will also go through more of a change in the glass as they breathe. Sometimes this can be problematic. A few years ago, my father gave me several bottles of 1975 Inglenook Charbono, and even then, you had to drink the wine within about five minutes of opening the bottle. After that, whatever fruit and structure that remained simply fell to pieces, resulting in a drinkable but flabby, watery wine. This wine has aged too long.

More recently, I received a 2003 Banfi Chianti Classico Riserva from a friend with a well-constructed wine cellar in her basement. Because it had aged in the proper conditions, it remained in excellent shape. But I didn’t think so at first — the aroma was fruity and meaty, and though the wine still felt tight, with red fruit and iron flavors, I felt flab in there as well. After 20 minutes or so, the wine had a chance to unwind and pull itself together. The flab disappeared, replaced by some pleasantly dusty tannins, deeper fruit and some real structure. After slumbering so long, the wine just needed a chance to wake up and remember who it was.

I don’t advocate aging wines on purpose unless you have one that needs to be laid down and you have a properly dark and cool place to do so. It’s too easy to simply let bottles collect dust. Before long, they’re too special to open, and then they just die a slow death on the rack. But if you do have a chance to taste a properly aged wine, don’t pass it up. And don’t decant it. You wouldn’t want to miss out on how the wine changes in the glass by over-aerating it in a decanter.

Most important, if you don’t have place in your basement to age wine, don’t age wine. Drink it now! It won’t taste any better tomorrow than it does today.

When 90 degrees feels like relief, there’s nothing to do but break out a bottle of rosé. It’s almost never a mistake to turn to one of Provence’s renowned pinks, but fine dry rosé can come from any number of wine regions these days. While shopping at In Fine Spirits recently, I came across a bottle of rosé Montepulciano d’Abruzzo, and since I didn’t even know rosé was allowed in the Abruzzo DOC, I couldn’t resist snapping it up.

But “Montepulciano” can be a confusing term in Italy. In this case, if refers to a late-ripening grape variety grown throughout much of central Italy, most notably in the southeastern province of Abruzzo along the Adriatic Sea. “Montepulciano” also refers to a celebrated wine town in Tuscany, but the wine there is made mostly from Sangiovese, not Montepulciano.

Now that we’ve got our Montepulcianos straight, let’s investigate further. Abruzzo, at least according to The Oxford Companion to Wine, seems to be a region of great but unrealized potential: “Despite the presence of one of Italy’s better grape varieties Montepulciano d’Abruzzo, despite the warm climate, and despite favorable vineyard sites where hills descend towards the Adriatic and enjoy the benefits of summer heat and solar radiation from the sea, most of the region’s production is undistinguished…” Why? Because Abruzzo has ill-conceived DOCs promoting quantity over quality.

And how does rosé fare in this potentially excellent terroir? Does it shine through in spite of the poorly designed regulations? Official opinion is split. The Sotheby’s Wine Encyclopedia notes that “A lighter style called cerasuolo exists for cherry-pink wine with fresh fruit, but it is seldom as exciting [as red Montepulciano d’Abruzzo].” But The World Atlas of Wine praises Cerasuolo d’Abruzzo, calling it “satisfyingly full-blooded.”

I’m delighted to say that the one I found at In Fine Spirits, the 2011 Valle Reale “Vigne Nuove” Cerasuolo d’Abruzzo, turned out to be satisfying indeed. The winery uses a “low-spurred cordon” vine training method, which is notable because it results in significantly lower yields (and therefore more concentrated flavors) than the overhead “tendone” system strongly encouraged by Abruzzo’s regulations back in the 1970s.

A beautiful deep salmon pink, this wine had an enticing strawberry nose and bright flavors of watermelon and bubble gum. On the palate, the wine moved from fruit to prickly acids to bracing minerals. It tasted especially zesty when paired with a simple dinner of beans, rice and fresh vegetables.

Once again, a risk on an unknown rosé pays off. I don’t have any hard evidence to back this theory up, but I suspect that because rosés tend to be less popular than reds or whites, they are often a labor of love for a winemaker. The pink sugar-water of White Zinfandel aside, you’ll be hard-pressed to go wrong with a rosé this summer.

SUMMARY

2011 Valle Reale “Vigne Nuove” Cerasuolo d’Abruzzo: Fruity, dry, juicy, minerally and beautifully pink. In short, just about everything a good rosé should be. Perfect for a picnic, a barbeque or a light summer dinner.

Grade: A-

Find It: I purchased this bottle for $13 at In Fine Spirits in Chicago. If you don’t mind abysmal service, you can also find it at Binny’s.

Until relatively recently, Italy’s Maremma region was better known for poverty and malarial swamps than fine wine. Mussolini drained the swamps, solving the malaria problem, but the region didn’t achieve much viticultural fame until the 1970s, when Sassicaia hit the scene (now it’s one of Italy’s most well-known and expensive wines).

One little region rose above the swamps, however, allowing vineyards to be cultivated well before Mussolini intervened. Morellino di Scansano had a fine reputation at least as far back as the 19th century, according to The Oxford Companion to Wine. Nowadays the area has achieved DOCG status, a significant vote of confidence for its wines.

On hillsides near the sea, vineyards planted with Morellino (the local synonym for Sangiovese) flourish in “balmy conditions,” notes The World Atlas of Wine, and “a host of outsiders” such as Antinori and Frescobaldi have invested in wineries here. But Maremma didn’t quite turn out to be the next Chianti, and the lack of pedigree along with the economic downturns in the last decade “left many a producer with a large hole in their bank account,” according to the Companion. That has left consumers with some “interesting bargains” on their hands.

And goodness knows I love a good bargain. I wish I could claim to have known about the value proposition of Morellino di Scansano before I purchased a bottle of it at Urban Orchard, but no. I bought the wine because I’d never heard of Morellino di Scansano before, and because it was only $15. That’s a buck or two more than I usually like to spend on an unknown, but hey, it was DOCG, and there were two creepy-looking peasants with scythes on the label. How could I resist?

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