Robe — Deep purple-black, one of Italy's darkest pours
black cherry
violet
plum
liquorice
cocoa
Palate
Plush and round, soft tannin over generous dark fruit
Ageing
2–8 years; great Teramo bottlings 15–40
Serving
15–17 °C
Between the Gran Sasso massif and the Adriatic, Montepulciano — the grape, no relation to the Tuscan town — gives Italy's great value red: deep purple, plush, violet-scented, generous without pretension. The DOC dates from 1968, and mountain air funnelling down to the coastal hills keeps the wines fresher than their colour suggests.
Its range is unusually wide. At its humblest it is the trattoria carafe, poured with whatever the kitchen sends; at its peak — in the hills of Teramo, and above all in the legendary, slow-evolving bottlings of Valentini — it stands among Italy's longest-lived reds. The grape also makes cerasuolo, a cherry-bright rosé so distinct in character that it has held its own DOC since 2010.