Sagrantino di Montefalco 'Duca Odoardo'. DOCG. 2005. Terre de la Custodia

How do you pour a bottle of wine ? Grab it by the neck and slosh it into the glass, onto the table, and over anyone who happens to be sitting nearby ?

Seize it firmly around the middle; tilt your glass and gently trickle in a thimbleful ?

I ask because this bottle of Sagrantino di Montefalco has got a generous thumb-shaped indention low down underneath the label and a similar, finger-size groove on its reverse, which makes the insouciant palm-underneath-the-bottle transfer of wine to glass perfected by sommeliers worldwide an absolute doddle.

You can decide for yourself whether this is all irredeemably precious, or an actually quite clever piece of wine bottle design.

A talking point then before we've even pulled the cork !

This Sagrantino di Montefalco is a dry, red DOCG wine from Umbria made from the Sagrantino grape.

Oddly, there's no necessity for the wine to be produced in – or even near – the original production area in the comune of Montefalco. As long as it comes from Umbria and is made of 100% Sagrantino grapes – that's good enough.

It's very tannic; very long-lived and actually rather good.

Don't confuse it with a sweet passito wine of exactly the same name (and also with DOCG status) also made in Umbria from semi-dried Sagrantino grapes

This particular bottle comes from the well-regarded Terre de la Custodia winery near Perugia under the Duca Odoardo brand-name.

It gets between a year and 15 months in wood and then sits waiting patiently before it's released 30 months after the vintage.

The makers confidently assert it'll last well in bottle for 15 years and more and with the tannins in evidence here, you wouldn't disagree.

A word of reassurance in case all this talk of tannins makes you nervous. There are tannins that make your mouth feel as though it's been coated in finely-powdered sawdust; then there are tannins that just dry and concentrate the fruit flavours into a delicious long finish.

Luckily, we're dealing with the latter here.

The colour is a deep garnet. In the glass you get wafts of violets and bramble fruit. Very classy. A sip reveals black cherries and mulberries which then linger a long, long time.

This 2005 vintage is hardly yet hitting its stride and as it will just go on improving. By the time it's run the course recommended by its makers – and provided you haven't succumbed to temptation and opened it – it will be a very special bottle indeed.

Not for drinking on its own. Roast red meats, game and strong cheeses are suggested. Or you could make a proper Welsh Rarebit – and I mean a proper Welsh Rarebit, not just slapping a slice of processed cheddar onto a piece of pre-sliced bread and sticking it under the grill – which would accompany a glass or two of this excellent wine to perfection.

At A Glance…

• This month's "Special Italian Wine": Sagrantino di Montefalco 'Duca Odoardo'
• Vintage: 2005
• Designation: DOCG
• Grape: 100% Sagrantino
• Strength: 13.5%
• Closure: Cork
• Producer: Terre de la Custodia
• Website: www.terredelacustodia.it
• This bottle cost: €16.29

Next Month…
The region of Alto Adige in north-east Italy is producing an increasingly interesting and impressive range of white varietals. We sample a Riesling from one of the area's best producers. It's a wine you're going to enjoy trying at home – and in your Abruzzo holiday villa !

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I don't want you to think we do nothing except go and watch resurrected rock stars and take bookings for our Abruzzo holiday villas. 

Far from it.

We've been to the opera too.

Not exactly the opera, or even an opera. More like bits of operas. Those greatest hits that you can never put a name to – and don't even realise you know – but which you can hum along to as soon as you've heard the first couple of bars.

Once a year, the town of Casalbordino – about an hour to the south of us – stages a full bells and whistles evening of opera, with a full orchestra, a choir and a palette of talented singers.

And on this occasion, not a fat lady in sight. 

Casalbordino's a pretty town and was dressed to the nines for the evening. A huge stage was set up at one end of the Piazza Umberto I right in the town centre, with the beautifully-lit church of Santo Salvatore providing a perfect backdrop.

This being Italy, it was hardly a surprise to see the names of Verdi, Puccini and Rossini writ large and the rest not exactly writ small, but more like left out altogether to make room for Donizetti and Leoncavallo.

This parade of national heroes was broken only by one grudging nod in the direction of Bizet and another to Orff. No Mozart ? No Mozart. Boo !

The talent was impressive, with the unfortunate exception of the Bass, who had what can most kindly be described as a bad day at the office. Happens to us all. But rarely as publicly.

Happily, tenor Giuliano di Filippo and mezzosoprano Chiara Chialli were both in thrilling voice and while their talents kept ears and eyes busy, touch enjoyed the feel of the chilled bottle of sparkling Pecorino; and taste and smell were more than happy with the delicious nibbles we'd brought along.

All five senses contentedly occupied. Can't often claim that.

So I've inched forward towards a full-blown, full-on opera experience. Preferably at that fantastic open-air arena in Verona.

In the meantime, Casolbordino opera on a summer evening – even with a dodgy Bass – is a pretty good alternative.

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This little corner of Abruzzo is in danger of becoming Resurrected Rock Star Central. I've already blogged the astonishingly good Elvis tribute band we saw in Casoli a couple of years ago – but who are making a long-overdue reappearance on Wednesday !

I now blog – with ears still slightly ringing – a truly memorable Friday night in nearby Palombaro being blown away by Queen tribute band Regina.

Now Queen were – are – Pauline's absolute most favorite band in history. Ever. Utterly.

So this wasn't a case of "Oh look at that poster. There's a Queen tribute band in Palombaro on Friday. If there's nothing on telly, fancy going ?"

It was "OHMIGOD LOOK A QUEEN TRIBUTE BAND AND THE SINGER LOOKS JUST LIKE FREDDIE MERCURY WE JUST ABSOLUTELY MUST HAVE TO GO".

And thus it came to pass that we sat eating very good char-grilled sausages and scamorza, while I drank beer and Pauline peered moodily at a glass of that famed Abruzzo favourite sangria, while wondering why this was the only festa in Italian history where you couldn't buy a bottle of wine.

Luckily, an SOS SMS reached our friends Michele and Nick just as they were leaving home and they arrived with a bottle.

Just one unfortunately, which gave Michele and Pauline – and our other friend Ruth – just the excuse they needed to buy a round of industrial-strength gin and lemon-soda cocktails.

A couple of tables away, Freddie Mercury look-alike Diego Regina and the other band members, (who – not that it especially matters, but I mention it in passing – looked nothing like Brian May, or Roger Taylor, or the guy who played bass), prepared for the gig with practiced indolence.

Red wine. Hangers-on. Photos for fans. Cigarettes. Giggles and In-Jokes.

Rock'n'roll never changes.

Irritatingly, a well-meaning but utterly dire Abruzzo folk ditty chorale – the world's most incongruous-ever warm-up act – over-ran interminably, due mainly to some fool in the crowd who persisted in applauding them. Which of course encouraged them to do more.

Regina finally appeared just after 11.00. An hour-and-a-half of classic hits later, later they triumphantly wound it up, segueing from Radio Ga-Ga into We Are The Champions.

Now…anyone can dress-up to look like Freddie Mercury. Diego Regina clearly believes he is Freddie Mercury. And he's not being all that delusional.

He can sing. That's for sure. Like his hero, he also plays keyboards and guitar. And for ninety minutes, as he strutted his stuff onstage, he was his hero.

To back him up, the boys in the band had that razor-edged quality that sets genuine musicians apart from a bunch of guys who happen to own guitars and know a couple of chords.

No surprise to discover then that Regina were finalists in this year's Italy's Got Talent TV series.

They really are that good.

Killer 'Queen' in fact.

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Pecorino Frizzante, Terre di Chieti IGT. NV. Cantina Colle Moro
Rose Veneto Frizzante 'Duca della Rocca' IGT. NV. Colombara

Let's once and for all debunk the dictum that when it comes to 'special' wine, the higher the price, the better the quality.

This month we have a bottle of one of the best summer wines you're ever going to find at a scandalously low €1.45; and a bottle of the best Italian sparkling wine I've ever tasted, at a princely €4.

We discovered the sparkler on the last weekend in May, when wineries across Abruzzo open their doors and invite you in to have a look round; sample their wines; and enjoy a few nibbles.

At the Cantina Colle Moro in nearby Frisa, we were offered a taste of a wine introduced only this year, a sparkling Pecorino.

Now, as we've mentioned here before, the Pecorino grape is an old Abruzzo heritage variety, rescued from the brink of extinction in the mid-90's.

Happily, we're right in the middle of its production area and the still white has not only become a firm personal favorite, but has also replaced Trebbiano as our 'house white' that you'll find waiting for you on your arrival for a Villasfor2 holiday.

But a sparkling variety ? Using the 'Charmat Method' – in which a natural sparkle to the wine is developed in a tank, rather than, (as with champagne), in a bottle – Cantina Colle Moro have with brilliant success transformed their pretty good still Pecorino into an absolutely outstanding fizzer.

Unlike Prosecco, which at its best from the Vadobbiadene – Conegliano area of the Veneto is a wine of lightness and delicacy, Colle Moro's Pecorino Frizzante is rich and full-bodied, not a million miles away in taste from a Pinot Noir-laden champagne.

There are other similarities. A yeastiness on the nose of fresh-baked brioche and a long, dry, tingly and almost spicy finish.

Absolutely vice-free and absolutely delicious.

The only thing that made me blink was the crown cap closure – rather like a bottle of Coke. But I guess it's a logical extension to the screw cap. Regard it as a conversation piece rather than a deal-breaker.

And if that's good, wait till you taste the rose frizzante sold under the Duca della Rocca brand.

From the Colombara co-op based in the small town of Cazzano just to the west of Venice, this is a mongrel of an IGT wine containing heaven-knows-what varieties which, due to the angelic skills of a blender, have been transformed into the ultimate summer gulper.

There's not even the tiniest hint of the mean, thin, sharpness you might expect from a wine this cheap. Nor of an excess dosage of sugar to mask its deficiencies.

Instead, there's a riot of strawberries, raspberries, cherries and redcurrants, beautifully dry and silky, cascading into your glass in a fun, frothy, pink cascade that's utterly beguiling. And at only 10.5%, it won't leave you feeling sandbagged on even the most scorching summer's day.  

€1.45 ? Yes, €1.45. Silly, isn't it ?

Both this month's recommendations can happily be drunk on their own, or with any light summer food. Both are extraordinarily good and I recommend them to you.

At A Glance…

• This month's 'Special Italian Wines': Pecorino Frizzante, Terre di Chieti & 'Duca della Roca' Rose Veneto
• Vintage: Both NV
• Designation: Both IGT
• Grape: Pecorino is 100% Pecorino; Rose Veneto blend is not stated
• Strength: Pecorino – 12%; Rose Veneto – 10.5%
• Closures: Pecorino – Crown cap; Rose Veneto – Cork
• Producers: Pecorino – Cantina Colle Moro; Rose Veneto – Colombara
• Website: www.collemoro.it
• These bottles cost: Pecorino – €4; Veneto Rose – €1.45 

Next Month…
From Umbria, we sample Sagrantino di Montefalco, a much-praised DOCG red from one of the region's best producers. It's a wine you'll enjoy drinking at home – and in your Abruzzo villa for two !

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Back in May, I wrote about our vegetable plot. Now, belatedly, it's time to run the rule over the orchard.

The Italian word for orchard is frutetto. Nicer I think. The frutetto is about 250 square meters and like the veggie plot – or orto – faces due south.

English varieties predominate. Are they suited to a central Italian climate ? Only one way to find out…

Apples
Italian apples look great and taste of nothing. Modern hybrids engineered to provide huge yields capable of sitting on a supermarket shelf for weeks on end.

I'm growing four English heritage varieties: Laxton's Epicure; Egremont Russet; Blenheim Orange; and Ribston's Pippin. The plan is that these'll provide a continuous supply of apples from August through until about March.

Have absolutely no idea how they'll all stand up to the rigors of an Abruzzo summer – but so far so good.

Greengage Early Transparent and Damson Farleigh
I've grown both before. Again, both are heritage varieties. The Gage is a lovely translucent yellow-green and tastes wonderful; the Damson's for turning into jam and crumbles.

Because I can be a ham-fisted idiot, I recently split the trunk of the Gage while spreading out its branches. So I've screwed it back together. Should work. I once Duck-taped a wind-split trunk on a Cercis Canadensis 'Forest Pansy' and that bonded together just fine.

Redcurrant Laxton's No1
Produced four currants in its first season this year ! Next year – summer puddings and jars of redcurrant jelly !

Figs
One named variety – Brown Turkey – plus five others growing away merrily from cuttings I took from unnamed trees growing outside the rental property where we spent our first 18 months in Italy while Villasfor2 was being built. These produced excellent black and green fruit. Pruning these as bushes rather than letting grow into unmanageable trees.

Grape Italia
A muscat type being trained using the splendidly-named 'Four-Arm Knipf' system. Should get a bunch or two in 2011.

Apricot Reale di Imola
Good crop of a about a dozen large fruit this year. Sensational taste and texture.

Yellow Peach Flavor Crest; White Peach Maria Delizia
The yellow peach, cloaked in a deep red velvet skin, is of unsurpassable sweetness and lusciousness. There are about 18 fast-ripening fruit which I should've thinned a bit more but, being greedy, didn't.

The white peach seems to be a white nectarine. Hmmm… Then again it suffered badly from Peach Leaf Curl this spring so maybe the fruit went bald. About six rock-hard little fruit stubbornly hang from its branches. We'll see what develops.

Rhubarb Timperley Early
Bit of a challenge this as the dormant crown promptly broke into three pieces as I unpacked it. Our soil is too heavy and claggy even for rhubarb, so it's spending its first summer in multi-purpose compost in a 12" pot. Took ages to get going, but  it's developing nicely and in the autumn I'll transfer it into an 18" pot with some good soil and hopefully it'll produce a few usable sticks next year.

The one fruit I'd like to grow in our Abruzzo garden, but won't even bother to try, are raspberries. It's just too hot. Everything else I wanted is here.

The peaches, apricot and grape were sourced from specialist fruit-growers local to us in Abruzzo; the Apples, Currant, Rhubarb, Gage and Damson were shipped from Deacons Nursery on the Isle of Wight in England, arriving in very good shape and happily spending most of the winter heeled-in in a big bucket of peat.

Next: The Flower Garden  

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Lunch was at La Cantina di Biffi in Sulmona. Not because George had lunched there a few days before, but because it looked nice; and it was lunchtime; and the only other choice seemed to be a Chinese restaurant.

Yes, there are Chinese restaurants in Abruzzo. And though I'm sure this was a crackingly good establishment, based on our experiences so far, Chinese restaurants in Abruzzo are unremittingly awful.

Aside from being a pretty town in the mould of many other Abruzzese pretty towns, Sulmona has two key selling points: Candy and garlic.

Sulmona's justly-famous red garlic is a real garlic-lovers' garlic. Pungent and powerful. At La Cantina di Biffi they chop it – not too finely – fry it, and stir it into polenta of a sublime creaminess.

Then they spoil it by rationing you to a meagre little portion – and anything less than a kilo of this delicious unctuousness counts as 'meagre' – as part of a really rather good antipasti platter.

Quite pricey at €13 each and contributing to a bill of €70-odd. But you can't expect my good friend and distant dining partner George Clooney to eat anywhere cheap for heaven's sake.

But this – and other touches of creative pricing – might've explained why George looked a little…well…gloomy in the photo proudly produced by the cantina's owner.

He'd probably just been given the bill.

That's enough precious blog space devoted to Gloomy George. Think instead of sweeties of an almost unnatural gloss and colour artfully fashioned into cute little flower shapes.

When it comes to confectionery, what's more important: eye appeal or taste ? Whether you're an aesthete or a glutton, you'll be thrilled that Sulmona's sweeties score highly on both counts.

And not as avariciously-priced as a Cantina Biffi starter either. Had George lunched on chocolates, sugared almonds and nougat instead of fancy antipasti, he'd have been all smiles come the post-prandial photo-call.

We again contributed significantly to the profits of Sulmona's hospitality industry with sloppily-served drinks in the smart bar right opposite the Chiesa della Annunziata, watching its medieval facade getting a quick scrub-up in preparation for a visit from Pope Benedict two days later.

A visit to anywhere alongside George Clooney and the Pope. Not many people can say that.

Anyway, here's the plan: Wander round undeniably delightful Sulmona and take in the sights; buy candies and garlic. Then get in the car, drive 15 minutes or so to the lovely little village of Pacentro; and have lunch.

Osteria Maggiore and Taverna de li Caldora, though as yet untried by us, have been sampled by Vf2 Guests and given top marks. And I don't think Gloomy George has discovered them yet.

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Colomba Platino 2007

This is one of those ultra-delicious Italian white wines that can only be drunk when it's at least 90˚ in the shade. And preferably eating outside.

And also preferably eating – or rather extended snacking – on vast plates of prosciutto and salami; artichoke hearts; ricotta made just hours ago and cut with fresh herbs and garlic; good bread; with salsicce and little lamb cutlets sizzling away contentedly over charcoal and a big bowl of fresh figs, cherries, white peaches and those little golden coscia pears.

Which is all very fine when someone else is preparing this idyllic feast. Less appealing when it's you.

That classic old Italian summer standby Tonno e Fagioli, which I've now proved you can assemble from start to first forkful during halftime in a World Cup football match, was an entirely satisfactory alternative.

And the wine. Outside high summer, it just wouldn't taste the same.

A pleasant lemony tang rises from the glass. The colour, appropriately, is of sun-bleached hay. The taste is citrus with undertones of melon and green fruit and there's a lovely long finish, dry and quite sherbet-like, which cleanses and refreshes the palate on a scorchingly hot day – but in cooler climes, might seem just a little on the sharp side.

Colomba Platino is a brand-name Sicilian white from the much-respected Duca di Salaparuta winery, which has holdings all over the island.

This comes from vineyards on the south coast of the island around the towns of Cattolica and Ribera in the province of Agrigento.

It's made from 100% Insolia grapes and though this particular bottle is from the 2007 vintage, I'd suspect younger would be better, even though this certainly hasn't suffered from hanging around in the couple of years since it was released.

It's true that if you limit your choice of Italian wine to DOC/DOCG examples, you might reckon a few centesimi shy of €10 is stiffish to pay for an IGT wine. But ignore the ratings and just ask yourself if you like it. And if the answer's yes, a case should see you through the next few hot weeks rather nicely.

At A Glance…

• This  month's 'Special Italian Wine': Colomba Platino
• Vintage: 2007
• Designation: IGT
• Grape: 100% Insolia
• Strength: 12.5%
• Closure: Cork
• Producer: Duca di Salaparuta
• This bottle cost €9.13

Next Month…
Not that I'm given to sweeping statements or anything, but I'll be featuring the best Italian sparkling wine I've ever drunk. Period. And a pink, fizzy, thirst-quenching, summer gulper from the Veneto. Both fantastic – and fantastic value – wines that you'll certainly enjoy drinking in your Abruzzo villa for two !

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Fiano di Avellino DOCG, 2008. Aminea

Here's a little winey conundrum.

In April 09, we featured a bottle of Italy's new superstar DOCG white, Fiano di Avellino. From one of Campania's finest producers, this bottle cost €10.65 in a specialist wine shop.

Under the spotlight now is another bottle of DOCG Fiano di Avellino. Not from one of Campania's finest producers, this bottle cost €4.49 in a cut-price supermarket.

Question is, are they comparable ?

The expensive Fiano was a truly delicious summer white, reminiscent of a good viognier, with the same hints of peach, apricot and melon and a long, dry finish.

To be honest, the cheap Fiano doesn't suffer too much in comparison. It too is made with 100% Fiano grapes, though if your palate is as finely-tuned as Eric Clapton's Stratocaster, you might just possibly judge this a little less refined; a little less full; and with marginally shorter finish.

On the the other hand, that you can buy two bottles of the cheaper stuff for less than one bottle of the expensive brand and still have enough left over for a bag of crisps could perhaps be the crucial clincher.

Quantity and quality – not something you come across too often…

So how come one bottle costs €10.65 and the other only €4.49 ? I suspect this may be a rebottling/rebranding of a job-lot of this wine bought-up by the cut-price supermarket.

It doesn't carry the usual labelling you'd find on a 'regular' bottle of Fiano di Avellino from the producers Aminea and the fact it has a plastic cork – highly unusual for a DOCG wine – indicates it may have been round the block more than once.

Not that this in any way detracts from the wine. Let's not be wine-snobbish here and equate price with excellence.

If you're happy to pay €10.65 for a top-quality bottle of DOCG white – go right ahead. But don't turn your noses up at what's basically the same wine and, irrespective of its provenance, a rare bargain.

If you're looking for a dozen bottles of a really good Italian summer white for sipping in the shade and are prepared to stray from the well-trodden path of Pinot Grigio and Frascati, you won't find a better wine, with a better pedigree at a better price.

At A Glance…

• This month's Special Italian wine: Fiano di Avellino    
• Vintage: 2008    
• Designation: DOCG    
• Grape: 100% Fiano    
• Strength: 12.5%    
• Closure: Plastic cork    
• Producer: Aminea    
• This bottle cost: €4.49

Next Month…
It's been a while since we featured a Sicilian wine, so we'll be sampling a bottle of an IGT white from one of the island's oldest and most respected producers. It's a wine made for summer drinking that you'll enjoy sampling at home – and in your Abruzzo villa for two.

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Our life in Abruzzo is taking a tasty turn with a selection delicious crops growing in our Abruzzo vegetable garden !

A chunk – quite a large chunk – of our acre of Abruzzo is given over to the vegetable garden and the orchard.

Another chunk – quite a large chunk – of our life in Abruzzo is given over to looking after them.

Our Abruzzo vegetable garden – or orto, to give it its more succint and evocative Italian name, is about 100 square metres. It's on an open, unshaded slope facing due south and the soil is heavy clay.

I probably should've already done a soil test to discover the ph balance, but I haven't. Mea culpa.

The planning, which pleasurably occupied most of last summer when the plot was a weed-infested tangle, was to grow vegetables that a) we like to eat (obviously); and b) weren't readily available in our local shops.

Runner Beans. Variety: White Lady

We actually grew these last year. It took a while for Abruzzo bees to cotton-on to the fact that they were the key element in pollinating the flowers, but once they'd grasped this, we had the start of a promising crop. Then it was August and the heat turned all our beans into wood. A smaller crop in the comparative cool of September and October was delicious.

This year, I started early. The beans are already planted, twining up their poles and flowering and the plan is to get the crop over and done with by late July. When I'll already have planted the seeds for a second flush in the autumn.

Brussels Sprouts. Variety: Seven Hills

You can get imported Dutch sprouts, but they're not especially nice. This is a robust old-fashioned variety with a proper sprout taste. Love or hate. Pauline hates, so one plant will be more than enough. But I've put in two. Just in case…

Purple Sprouting Broccoli. Variety: Rudolph

Now of course this is a hugely popular autumn vegetable here, but what you see in the shops always looks…limp. Freshly picked just has to taste better. Gently steamed and finished with a drizzle of oil; a hint of garlic; and a fleck or two of dried chilli.

Celeriac. Variety: Diamant

I'd actually planted the seeds before realizing that celeriac was available throughout winter from our our local fruit'n'veg emporium. But I'm growing a few anyway – just to see if I can.

Sweet Corn. Variety: Indian Summer

This is an award-winning American variety with multicolored cobs and a wonderful sweetness, which is accentuated by cooking it on the barbecue or a cast-iron griddle. My twenty plants should provide 20-30 cobs – plenty for eating fresh and freezing.

Potato. Variety: Maris Piper

Italian spuds are terrific. Sweet and flavorsome. They make good mash; bake well; and if you can find ones that are young enough and small enough, they boil nicely too. But they disintegrate if you try and make 'proper' roast potatoes. It was toss-up between Maris Piper and King Edward as the two very best traditional English maincrop spuds. The former's a bit more disease-resistant and my two small rows, which should yield about 15-20lbs, look encouragingly good so far.

Tomato. Varieties: Golden Cherry; Brandywine Red; Costoluto Fiorentino; and 'unknown'.

More than any other vegetable, the tomato is an Italian obsession. But with the exception of the Italian heritage 'beefsteak' variety Costoluto Fiorentino, my crop, however bountiful and however delicious, will be be treated with suspicion and disdain because it's a known fact here that only Italian tomatoes of the type grown since the dawn of time are worth the effort.

Golden Cherry is Japanese (I think) and the essential ingredient of our own 'house pasta' – try the recipe ! Brandywine is an American Amish heritage 'beefsteak' of great reputation. Have never tried it before. The 'unknown' tomato came from our friend Ruth last year – yes, from an Italian market – and was simply the very best I'd ever tasted. The few seeds I kept last autumn obligingly came up like mustard-and-cress this spring and have grown into vigorous, good-looking plants. But I hope they've come true…

Pumpkin. Variety: Potimarron

In the autumn you'll find huge chunks of appetising-looking pumpkin on sale everywhere. All I've tried so far have been watery, fibrous and tasteless. More in hope than anything else, I planted a few old seeds of the variety Sunshine last year and was rewarded with a dozen or so scrumptious fruit.

I'm trialling a French variety this year which allegedly has a sweeter, denser, nuttier flesh with hints of chestnut. (Hence the name Potimarron – an amalgam of potiron – pumpkin; and marron – chestnut). Three plants should provide another dozen fruit.

Melon. Variety: Charentais-type

Too early to say yet as the seedlings are still being nurtured. A demanding plant to grow, but like celeriac, trying it to see if I can…

Shallot. Variety: French 'long' type

Can you buy shallot sets here ? No. So these were supermarket-bought and the smaller ones planted out. Two rows of 10 have sat and sulked for three weeks with just one boasting a rather half-hearted green topknot. Failure could be looming here…

Parsnip. Variety: Guernsey Half Long

It came as something of a surprise to discover that Italians – or at least Abruzzese – regard most root veggies like parsnips as animal fodder. If you want parsnips – grow them yourself. Our clay soil is way too heavy and impenetrable for impressionable young roots, so I'm growing these in a big tub of multi-purpose compost and will sow the seeds just as soon as it brightens up a bit.

Into every life, a little rain must fall. Even life in Abruzzo…

I'm also toying with Swedes. (Now there's an image…)

But I rather think there's enough already happening in our Abruzzo vegetable garden for this year.

Next – news from the orchard…

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Taurasi 'Radici' DOCG. Mastroberardino. 2005

Taurasi is the wine that finally dispelled the old myth that no Italian red wine of any note is produced south of Tuscany.

Aglianico del Vulture from Basilicata is good; Taurasi, from neighboring Campania and also made from the aglianico grape, is better. Much better.

Taurasi owes its name to the region where it's produced within Campania and this particular offering comes from the Mastroberardino winery that for years, practically single-handed, carried the banner of Campania wines into the worldwide market.

Taurasi was awarded DOCG status in the early 1990s and since then, its popularity – especially outside Italy – has soared, with a corresponding hike in prices.

It's not a wine for the faint-hearted. Rich, powerful and profound. Think of a kind of southern Barolo and you won't be far wide of the mark.

Scents of mulberries and black pepper provided the initial impression. The first taste was tannic – a legacy of the 18 months this wine spent in oak before bottling. It really will repay decanting a couple of hours before drinking to soften the edges a little and this bottle of the (pretty good) 2005 vintage could quite easily have lain in a rack improving for at least a couple more years before opening.

Once those tannins have been allowed to mellow a little, you're left with a wine that simply improves with every sip. That first impression of mulberries and pepper developing with hints of dark chocolate and wild mushrooms and lingering with a long, dry finish.

Definitely not a wine to drink on its own. Definitely a wine to partner roast meat and rich braises. Or in this particular instance, a perfect medium-rare sirloin steak. With chips. (And why not ?)

Once upon a time, Taurasi was a pretty decent – and much cheaper – 'secret' alternative to Barolo. The best Barolo still fetches nose-bleedingly high prices both retail and restaurant, but lower down the pecking order, prices between the two wines is now much of a muchness.

It basically comes down to personal preference, but if you haven't yet tried Taurasi on the basis of an unbroken loyalty to Barolo, give it a try – and do it soon.

At A Glance…

• This month's Special Italian wine: Taurasi 'Radici'
• Vintage: 2005
• Designation: DOCG
• Grape: 100% Aglianico
• Strength: 13.5%
• Closure: Cork
• Producer: Mastoberardino
• Website: www.mastroberardino.com/eng/index.asp
• This bottle cost: €21

Next Month…
We're staying in Campania to revisit the region's best white wine Fiano di Avellino DOCG. And with a specific question in mind. Can a bottle of this wine from a cut-price supermarket chain possibly compare with another costing virtually twice as much ? Is it really a wine you'll enjoy drinking in your Abruzzo villa for two – or one to forget ?

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