Irecently did a straw poll of a dozen or so friends in the drinks trade. If, for whatever strange reason, you were condemned to drink the wines of just one country for the rest of your life, I asked, which country would it be?
Confident that the answer would be France, I started writing up some Gallic-slanted copy as I waited for the answers to trickle in, leaving gaps here and there for the dazzling chablis- and champagne–eulogising quotes I expected to receive. Darn me, though, if I hadn’t completely and utterly miscalled it. What a bloody idiot! Every idle, booze-loving one of them, apart from an avowed Francophile and a bribable floating voter, said Italy.
If I can summarise, the general gist was that Italy produces the most diverse and versatile of wines and the most food-friendly ones too, and it would be a mug who looked elsewhere. Not for nothing — as one correspondent pointed out — is Italy known as Enotria, the land of wine.
The answers forced me to stop being so Francocentric and look at this wonderful country again, and I’ve loved rediscovering some wonderful wines.
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