Wineclub Histoires

First of all, let me say that a wine in itself is nothing without context and on the other hand a wine can be everything thanks to the context. The stage, where you are and above all, who you are with. Being expensive, rated with 100 points, even being on a 'Top' list won't always make it a great or memorable wine. In this ranking I will only mention the 5 best Italian Wines I have drunk in the last 4 years, because four years ago I completely changed my perspective on drinking. Each bottle has taken on a different meaning since August 28, 2015. It was no longer the wine itself but the wine because and above all, with whom. These may not be the 10 Best Italian Wines in existence but they have made impressions on us in many ways despite their price, their top rank.

One of the simplest definitions of a natural wine is: nothing added, nothing taken away. Although there is no legal definition of how a natural wine is made, there are a few principles that consistently abide to the basic idea that wine should be made in the vineyard, not the cellar: no added chemicals, no added sulfites (or just the bare minimal amount), no temperature control during fermentation, no added yeast, no fining or filtration, and no pesticides or herbicides in the vineyard. By reducing the winemaker's intervention to a minimum, what is left in the glass should be the purest expression of the grapes and the soil, not a manufactured product built scientifically to appeal to the mainstream palate. This often results in wines that can be cloudy and rustic in appearance, and that may display very earthy and funky aromas on the nose. While these traits may be off-putting to some, it is precisely this raw and direct approach that is particularly appealing to natural wine aficionados.