The lion of Gradisca
Marco Felluga passed away yesterday. He was 96 years old and went to join his brother Livio who left years ago at more than 100. Marco was one of the giants of Italian wine. He founded the winery in Gradisca...
Author: Daniele Cernilli
French suicide
We are witnessing in France a penalizing attitude toward wine, both promotionally and culturally. Is there a risk that such a "vision" will take hold in Italy as well? All wine lovers, even Italian ones, if they have not started...
DoctorWine’s selection for Vinitaly
As we do every year, DoctorWine will have its own booth at Vinitaly (April 14-17) where we will hold 12 seminars featuring the best Italian wines and offer a selection of about seventy wines to dispensers. All this for Vinitaly...
The three wine fairs
Wine Paris & Vinexpo Paris, Prowein and Vinitaly within two months. Are three wine fairs in Europe too many? It is too early to tell, but it does not seem that Vinitaly, the Italian trade fair, is being challenged. We...
Francesco Dammicco, one of us
I have known Francesco - Franco - Dammicco since the mid-1980s. At the time, he was working for the Manifesto, which was the newspaper that hosted the first Gambero Rosso-branded inserts. Today, having concluded his decades-long relationship with GR, he...
Always the familiar
To those who claim that the guides always review "the usual knowns," I softly point out that in decades of critiquing wineries we have truly discovered many. And the work of discovery never stops, because we taste thousands of wines...
For a fistful of yeast
I am reposting, after what was recently stated on television, For a Fistful of Yeast, an old editorial that was even corrected to me by Professor Luigi Moio, since I at most divulge and have no scientific expertise on the...
Long live Banfi and long live Ezio Rivella, 20 years later
I republish an editorial I wrote in the Gambero Rosso almost two decades ago. I do this by remembering Cavalier Ezio Rivella, my friend Ezio, who left us a few weeks ago. At the time I was harshly criticized for...
The oenological case
Roberto Di Meo is currently one of the best interpreters of Italian "bianchista" oenology. This is demonstrated by many wines, but the last one he let me taste is a real oenological case: a Fiano with a stay of almost...
Interpreting wine
Only by knowing how to interpret a wine will I be able to understand it, in a kind of dialectic in which the characteristics of that wine and my ability to analyze it organoleptically can enable me to recognize it...
American wine criticism between expertise and competition
Evaluations of Italian wines by major American critics diverge strikingly. It comes to mind that this is a kind of score marketing, that is, they take into account principles governing competition and editorial positioning. American wine critics who cover Italy...
Old Raspa
Edoardo Raspelli, the "Raspa," one of the historic leading signatures of Italian food journalism, was fired by Gedi (publisher of Repubblica and La Stampa) via pec, without even a phone call of notice. Where did respect go? Especially since we...
Talking about wine
Parlare di vino senza essere fraintesi non è facile, bisogna cercare di spiegare questioni anche tecniche in modo che siano di immediata comprensione per tutti. Parlare di vino è difficile, su questo non c’è dubbio. Provare a spiegarlo, soprattutto a...
The bad vintages
Woe to generalize. The pretense of judging an absolute vintage can lead to considering as bad vintages that in some areas are not bad at all. Because of the shape of Italy, the climate can be very different from one...
To celebrate New Year’s Eve
The midnight toast is somewhat of a rite of passage, although it is now increasingly commercialized. We like to imagine it at home, among friends, with an unassuming, special bottle that can be the emblem of a different, better year....
Pergole Torte vertical tasting
An iconic Tuscan wine that Sergio Manetti first and his son Martino later stubbornly made since 1977, against the Chianti Classico specification, to exalt pure Sangiovese. It all began in 1977, when Sergio Manetti, in controversy with the Chianti Classico...
The adventures of DoctorWine
A very difficult year is drawing to a close, one of high inflation and an economic crisis at home, along with wars and an environmental crisis abroad. It wasn’t easy for anyone but we at DoctorWine can be satisfied over...
Mediterranean Rosé wine
San Salvatore 1988 winery is offering a new rosé wine from Aglianico grapes this year, Il Bufalo Rosa, which is pleasant and centered in price. Peppino Pagano is one of Cilento’s most famous entrepreneurs. Since 1988 he has been producing...
Putting the cart before the horse
This is custom heading element I am taking up, expanding on, an old editorial from 2017 that I feel is really very timely. During one of the last visits to the Cote d’Or, the true Eldorado of Burgundy, one of...
The misunderstanding about the Top Hundred
This is custom heading element The ranking of this year’s top one hundred wines on Wine Spectator, the so-called Top Hundred, has come out, and the press-especially the national press-is competing to call the winning wine “the best in the...
Chardonnay, Sauvignon and Pinot Grigio
If we take a look at the white wines spread worldwide, we find that Italy is known for Pinot Grigio, much to the chagrin of our native grape varieties. I consider the readers of DoctorWine to be experts and knowledgeable,...
Too much wine?
The stock figure in Italy is really worrying, not even a poor harvest like the one that just ended can balance the situation (at what price then?). It is time for the industry, with the support of policy, to plan...
Josko’s Ribolla
Gravner's 2015 Ribolla Gialla is a total, extraordinary wine where everything is in the right place, a wine that allows one to fully understand Josko Gravner's professional and even human journey. The personal story of Josko Gravner, his wife Marjia,...
The service temperatures
That of wine serving temperatures is a topic, in my opinion, that is little covered and much more important than people think. I begin with a little illustrative story. Giorgio Grai, who was a famous South Tyrolean winemaker and winemaker,...
10 top Chianti Classico 2021
It is thanks to the numerous tastings carried out for the Essential Guide to the Wines of Italy 2024 at the Chianti Classico Consortium-Black Rooster that we can present our ranking of the best 10 Chianti Classico 2021. I would...
Classic or Charmat?
These two methods of sparkling wine making are not to be considered one better than the other in an absolute sense, but to be considered in relation to the type of sparkling wine to be tasted. During a splendid seminar...
The time capsule from Ca’ del Bosco
Franciacorta winery Ca' del Bosco presented a Special Reserve of its iconic Franciacorta Annamaria Clementi: vintage 1980, among the greatest tastings ever. In 1980, more than 80 liters of wine per capita was drunk in Italy, roughly twice as much...
Those who … amatriciana.
A pasta dish that is considered typical of Roman cuisine but actually has Abruzzese-Latium origins, in the town of Amatrice, from which it brings two key ingredients: guanciale and pecorino cheese. Amatrice is, but perhaps unfortunately after a terrible earthquake...
The Trojan Horse
Apparently, dealcoholic "wine" travels a parallel road to traditional wine. But are we sure that tomorrow the beverage giants-the only ones who can afford the expensive process of dealcolare wine-won't try to supplant our beloved wine? A Dec. 2, 2021,...
Wines and ratings
Assigning ratings to wines is the most concise way to state their quality but in our Essential Guide to Italian Wine we go beyond this: we describe the wines we evaluate, we say what grapes and aging method were used...