Ripasso is often called “baby Amarone.” I’ll be honest: I can’t remember anyone saying this to me at a table or in a wine shop. This nickname shows up constantly in wine writing and almost nowhere else. That’s exactly why I wanted to dig into where it comes from, rather…
Ripasso and Amarone both come from Valpolicella in Veneto. Both lean on the same traditional grapes, mainly Corvina, Corvinone, and Rondinella. They can sit right next to each other on a wine shop shelf and look equally Italian. They still hand you two completely different evenings. One is richer than…
Ripasso is what happens when Valpolicella decides it wants a little more drama. Regular Valpolicella is bright, fresh, full of sour-cherry energy. Amarone is richer, warmer, and considerably more intense. Ripasso sits comfortably between the two. It carries more body and depth than ordinary Valpolicella. It’s usually easier to drink…
Imagine having a genuinely good harvest and being told: excellent, now don’t sell all of it. That’s more or less what’s happening in Valpolicella this year. The 2026 harvest started early, nearly two weeks ahead of the historical average. Corvina is already in. Corvinone and Rondinella are close behind. Despite…
Bardolino and Valpolicella both earned DOC status in 1968. Same year. Same handful of grapes, mostly Corvina, with Rondinella and a bit of Molinara rounding things out. The vineyards sit close enough that you could plausibly see one from the other on a clear day, across the top of Lake…
I need to tell you something I only properly understood recently, even though I’ve lived twenty minutes from the source for years now. Amarone was never supposed to exist. It’s a mistake. A genuinely accidental wine. Sometime in the 1930s, a producer left a barrel of Recioto, a sweet, dried-grape…
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