Vigneti del Salento Zolla Salice Salentino 2023

Vigneti del Salento is part of the Fantini group, founded by Valentino Sciotti in 1994 to make serious wine from Abruzzo and, later, from southern Italy more widely. The Puglian wines are produced at two wineries in the province of Taranto, on the western flank of the Salento peninsula, by resident winemaker Danilo Gizzi with Filippo Baccalaro consulting. Filippo is a native of Piemonte who has now spent nearly two decades working in Puglia, drawn there by the ripeness of the fruit.

Salento is the heel of Italy, a long flat peninsula with sea on both sides, and its heat is tempered less by altitude than by that maritime exposure. The signature grape is Primitivo, genetically identical to Californian Zinfandel, which ripens early and to high sugar and gives the dark, sweet-fruited, generous reds the region is known for. Negroamaro, the other native, brings more structure and a bitter edge that stops the style becoming cloying.

The vineyards are concentrated around Manduria and Sava, worked by growers who have supplied the group for many years, and yields are held below the regional norm. The best parcels go into the old-vine bottlings, drawn from alberello bush vines up to a century old, which is a training method suited to heat and wind and almost impossible to mechanise.