Wine Club 22 May 2021

I haven’t been to Le Marche for yonks. Heck, I haven’t been anywhere for yonks. Who has? My last jaunt abroad was an overnight flit to Paris in February last year. It was huge fun, with the opera followed by such an exhaustive bar crawl that I needn’t have booked a hotel. I only went there to retrieve my bag and have a pee before legging it to the Gare du Nord.

I pine to go away properly and I pine for Italy’s Le Marche especially. Sandwiched between the Apennines and the Adriatic, Le Marche has everything that Tuscany and Umbria have, minus the crowds and the prices (I’m talking pre-Covid of course).

The scenery is dramatic, the food — such as brodetto fish stew and herb and fennel-stuffed porchetta — is superb, and the wines are extraordinarily tasty, made from grape varieties you’re unlikely to encounter anywhere else. If wine’s your thing, you’ll love them. Dip your toe in with this delectable selection exclusive to our chums at Honest Grapes and dream of drinking them on a sun-dappled Marchigiani terrace.

The 2019 Terre di Serrapetrona ‘Un-bianco’(1) from the Graidi family (wine-makers for four generations) is a deliciously uplifting half’n’half blend of Sauvignon Blanc and indigenous Pecorino (yes, yes, clever clogs, the grape not the cheese). Soft, smooth, lemony, spicy, herbal and slightly creamy, it makes a first-class aperitif. £13.80 down from £14.80.

Although the local DOC of Falerio Pecorino permits the modest addition of other grape varieties, the 2019 La Torre del Nano ‘Contetinelli’ (2) sees Pecorino in all its unadulterated glory. Produced from organically farmed vineyards near Offida, an exquisite town celebrated for its three-sided Piazza del Popolo and remarkable 700-year-old brick church, it’s aromatic and inviting on the nose and fresh and lively in the mouth.