faires of verona

How much Emidio Pepe is in the '83? I assume only very little because they needed to keep some around for later vintages.

Very scary sort of a TN, as I see it.
 
originally posted by Matteo Mollo:
faires of verona1983 emidio pepe with emidio pepe.

'nuff said.

more later.
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You should be ashamed to drink the '83 now.

'67, '75, or '77, Sir.

Just kidding, wish I had been there.
 
Interesting, I find the '75 to be drinking younger than the '77, which I have actually had several times. But bottles are to bottles as apples are to oranges in Emidio land.
 
I was joking too!

I did have '78 a couple of months ago and it was DELICIOUS - a reminder that I need to devote a significant amount of time to drinking and thinking about Italian wine.
 
originally posted by Bryan Garcia:
I was joking too!

I did have '78 a couple of months ago and it was DELICIOUS - a reminder that I need to devote a significant amount of time to drinking and thinking about Italian wine.
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It seems like you have done alright in the Italian department when I have seen you. Maybe you save the Bea moments for when I am around.
 
Levi, or Matteo, or anyone, I would love to get your opinion on why E. Pepe is able to milk such an unbelievably large amount more nobility out of Multipulciano than any other producer in Italy.

It just seems a strange relationship between quantity grown and how he is high-end Multipulciano. The wine seems to exist in two states: $8-11 dollars a bottle for some no-name producer and Emidio Pepe. Between them is no-mans land. At least, with my more limited knowledge of Italian wine available on the market here on the East Coast and in NYC, that's my perception.

I'm not poo-pooing anyone's opinion, nor do I claim to have any expertise on Multipulciano, but it seems rather a singular situation.
 
originally posted by Morgan Harris:
Multipulciano and trickle-down economicsLevi, or Matteo, or anyone, I would love to get your opinion on why E. Pepe is able to milk such an unbelievably large amount more nobility out of Multipulciano than any other producer in Italy.
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Hermitaged.
 
originally posted by Morgan Harris:
Multipulciano and trickle-down economicsLevi, or Matteo, or anyone, I would love to get your opinion on why E. Pepe is able to milk such an unbelievably large amount more nobility out of Multipulciano than any other producer in Italy.

It just seems a strange relationship between quantity grown and how he is high-end Multipulciano. The wine seems to exist in two states: $8-11 dollars a bottle for some no-name producer and Emidio Pepe. Between them is no-mans land. At least, with my more limited knowledge of Italian wine available on the market here on the East Coast and in NYC, that's my perception.

I'm not poo-pooing anyone's opinion, nor do I claim to have any expertise on Multipulciano, but it seems rather a singular situation.
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Well Morgan, I think the simple answer is that high end or low end will work and sell through in the world marketplace, but middle will not. Of course there are other people who make expensive Montepulciano d'Abruzzo. There is:

Valentini (as Yule mentioned)
Illuminati
Cataldi Madona
Torre dei Beati
Fattoria Nicodemi
Masciarelli
Plateo

All of those producers make a Montepulciano d'Abruzzo that you can find on a shelf for over $50/bottle. Several of them also make a Montepulciano d'Abruzzo that you might find on the shelf for closer to $12/bottle. These are sort of the price points at which Montepulciano d'Abruzzo sells to an audience. As pizza wine for people who buy on the "Montepulciano" name, and as a serious wine demanding serious prices from wine folks and people who like a "big" wine. I think the reason that you haven't heard of many of these is that several of them make wines more modern in style than those you find yourself often around. Also, some of them make wine that is imported in rather minute quantities, such as Valentini.

The other thing is that Pepe commands a high price because they aged the wine themselves. The is basically a tied up investment for them. And they aged large quantities of bottles for later release. You can find Valentini or Illuminati "Zanna" from the '80s, but you have to pay considerably for it as well, and it is much harder to find because the winery isn't releasing much or any of it direct. Pepe is ageing the wines and releasing them late, and then charging people more for that. It would be like Lopez de Heredia. Most producers don't age that many bottles that long, because they can't tie up their revenue like that.

Anyway, if you should try Valentini Montepulciano d'Abruzzo 1985, or Illuminati "Zanna" 1993, I'm guessing that you would like them. And it would have cost you at least a $100/bottle (at least), which would have been a good price. In fact, in terms of the American market, Valentini was thought of as "the" Montepulciano d'Abruzzo long before Pepe was.

And there is a lot of the Montepulciano grape elsewhere. For instance in the Marche and in Umbria. Bea Montefalco Rosso has Montepulciano in it, as an example.
 
Valentini for $100 would really be something, wouldn't it.

When I was first getting into the wine business in the early 90s, Valentini was considered sui generis, and priced that way. Things crested a few years ago when it was released at close to $500 retail.

I've had some bottles of Masciarelli Marina Cvetić that I thought was really good and not modern in a tarted up sense, but modern in the Eric Texier sense.
 
While we're on Italian grapes... Is there any high-end aglianico? I know there's plenty of cheap and a few middling (e.g., Paternoster, Macarico, Mastroberardino in Taurasi).
 
Since you didn't specify that they had to be good, we tasted some pricey Cantina del Taburno Bue Apis at the Pie Franco tasting. Montevetrano is also high end.
 
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