Wine: Excellent Italian White Wine

For very good reasons Italy is known predominantly for its red wines.  In my cellar Italian reds outnumber the Italian white wines by around 20 to 1.  But there are some very good Italian white wines: Gavi, Vernaccia, and Falanghina are some good examples and maybe a blog on Italian White Wines should be on my To Do list.  If I do that blog however, Pino Grigio would make that list only if I include one from the Alto Adige because I consider the rest of Italian Pino Grigio to be just Plonk.  You are welcome to disagree with my lowly opinion of Pinot Grigio. I am only saying that almost all Pinot Grigio is not to my taste.

But there is one Italian white wine that is very much to my taste and it is from my favorite vineyard in Italy, Tenuta Guado al Tasso, the Antinori owned winery in The Bolgheri valley of Tuscany.  It is their Vermentino, and that is the only white wine that they make.  Vermentino is a widely grown grape with lots of it from Sardinia and up the Italian coast into Southern France.  I have tried it a few times before the tasting I had with Guado al Tasso and Vermentino was solidly on my list of “Not Very Exciting”. 

That changed instantly when I had the Guado al Tasso Vermentino a few months ago.  When I recently shared with some family members who are not big white wine drinkers, they said it was the first white that was worth paying attention to.  The wine is straw yellow in color with greenish highlights. Excellent aromatic intensity with pronounced green fruit aromas of pear and grape with just a gentle touch of grapefruit and secondary aromas of cheese and wild flowers.  On the palate it’s dry and savory with the body and complexity that are generally only found with white wines at two to three times the $25 price tag of this wine.  It has medium acidity and alcohol with good persistence of flavors and a long pleasant citrusy finish. 

It is very good with seafood, including very flavorful dishes like Paella or Cioppino, which makes sense for vineyards right on the coast, as well as with white meats like Chicken and Pork.  We had it recently with our favorite chicken recipe, Ina Garten’s Roast Chicken with Bread and Arugula Salad shown in the picture to the left, and it was a perfect match.  While it is probably not likely to be on the shelf at your local liquor store, both Wine.com and Total Wine carry all the Guado al Tasso wines. 

It is no accident that the Vermentino from Guado al Tasso is very different from the Vermentino made in the vineyards of Sardinia and most of the others up and down the coast.  Guado al Tasso does not make any wines that are typical or expected from a Tuscany winery.  Because of the terroir in the Bolgheri Valley, they do not grow any Sangiovese grapes.  Their black grapes are Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot, Syrah, Cabernet Franc, and Petit Verdot.  The “Bolgheri Blend” that they make compares very favorably with the blends of those same grapes from a highly regarded region of France. Their Bolgheri Superiore gets 98 points from Wine Spectator and is worth every penny of the $130 price tag it carries and it is one of the featured wines at Antinori’s lovely restaurant in Florence, Cantinetta Antinori.  Their Bruciato Red in the $ 23-30 price range stands up to any Cru Bourgeois from Bordeaux.  While Guado al Tasso is in Tuscany, their wines are totally unlike any other Tuscan winery and well worth getting to know.

DOC Bolgheri was only approved in 1995 and since then its wines have gained international recognition. The Bolgheri Amphitheater is surrounded by rolling hillsides that faces the Tyrrhenian Sea which sits between Tuscany and Corsica. This has created a unique microclimate with constant breezes that mitigate both the summer heat and the harsh winter weather and ensures a clear sky that gives excellent exposure to the sunlight. It is one of the most picturesque vineyards in Italy.

Beth and I joined a virtual wine tasting with Guado al Tasso put on by Wine.com in the summer of 2020 and then had the pleasure of following up with a visit to the winery in November of last year.  We enjoyed several of their wines in their lovely Tasting Room and then moved into the adjoining restaurant for a delicious dinner.

The challenge with visiting Guado al Tasso is that it is a 2 hour drive from Florence or 3 hours from Rome and there is really nothing other than Guado al Tasso worth visiting in the Bolgheri Valley. That is a long trip just to visit a winery.  Since you will be tasting some great wines, you don’t want to be driving.  My suggestion would be to hire a car and driver for the day to get you to Guado al Tasso by mid morning.  Their Tasting Room opens at 10:00 AM every day but Tuesday.  You could do a tasting, possibly a vineyard tour, and then have lunch at the restaurant there.  You can then have the driver take you to San Gimignano and get there about 2:00 when the crowds really start to thin out so you can walk that lovely town for a few hours, sample the lovely Vernaccia, have dinner there, and then get driven back to Florence to your hotel.  If this idea appeals to you, I suggest you make a reservation for lunch at the restaurant at Guado al Tasso.  I highly recommend either their daily special or their Steak Florentine which you can watch them grill on the fire at the back of the restaurant.