ROSÉ WINES BY TINAZZI
Quality flanked by terroir and tradition
Rosé wines have many characteristics that make them an excellent, versatile choice: easy to drink and often with moderate alcohol content, they make ideal aperitifs and also pair very well with both meat and fish dishes.
Which is why Tinazzi believes that the comeback and rediscovery of rosé in recent years is no passing trend.
With its historic headquarters near Lake Garda in the Veneto region,
Tinazzi has also been active in Puglia for the last ten years with Cantine San Giorgio, located in the Taranto area. Their rosé wine range includes wines from both regions.
“Let’s not make the mistake of thinking that rosé is a wine just for summer drinking,” says Giorgio Tinazzi, the company’s sales manager. “Instead, it is an increasingly universal wine, with seasonal characteristics that are very close to those of Champagne. Young people love it, and Italy can justly claim it as one of its own styles, because of the presence of ideal locations for its cultivation.”
VENETO
One of the best locations for the production of quality rosé wine is, without a doubt, Bardolino, a small town on the Veronese shore of Lake Garda where the Tinazzi family have their origins. Chiaretto di Bardolino DOP, one of Italy’s best-loved rosé wines, has been made here since the 19th century.
The creation of Chiaretto is traditionally attributed to Pompeo Molmenti, the Venetian senator, lawyer and writer who was a frequent visitor of Lake Garda towards the end of the 1800s and apparently learned the technique of “in bianco” (without skin contact) vinification of red grapes in France.
Tinazzi has been producing the “Campo delle Rose” Chiaretto di Bardolino DOP for more than 50 years. The traditional varieties – Corvina, Rondinella and Molinara – that make up its blend grow on estate vineyards on the hills around Bardolino. The proximity of Lake Garda creates a microclimate, with stable temperatures and mild humidity, which promotes steady, balanced ripening.
Tinazzi’s Chiaretto, largely made from Corvina, is refreshing, supple and well-balanced, with attractive aromas and acidity. The nose is floral and fruity with hints of strawberries, raspberries and cherries. What’s its best food match? Paella, sushi, black summer truffles (scorzone) or fish from the lake.
PUGLIA
Negroamaro Rosato Salento IGP is a stand-out wine in Tinazzi’s portfolio. If
Chiaretto is a child of the lake, Negroamaro Rosato is a child of the sea. It hails from the area of Alto Salento, where Tinazzi has had its new home for ten years.
When you think of Salento, the expanses of vineyards planted with bush-vines, trained low to protect the ripening grapes from the sun’s rays, immediately come to mind. From Taranto and Brindisi, shaping Italy’s heel, this is the land of Negroamaro, an ancient variety which was already present at the time of Greek colonisation.
Negroamaro Rosato is one of the most traditional expressions of the grape, vinified by Tinazzi as a monovarietal and producing an elegant, coral hued wine with brilliant luminosity. On the nose there are aromas of wild berries, blackberries and pomegranate, with floral and mineral hints. The palate is refreshing and tangy, with excellent balance and pleasing softness.
Here too, the wine is very versatile:
excellent as an aperitif, perfect with fish starters, especially shellfish, as well as with mixed cold cuts.
The three Negroamaro rosés that Tinazzi produces in Puglia come from different vineyards and therefore show interesting variations in profile. Still, they all share the same quintessential character that speaks of their origin in Salento. All you have to do is try them all, to find your favourite!