Fattori Amarone Della Valpolicella Gregoris 2008: Deliciously smooth, semi-bold for Amarone (but bold for any other wine), opulent fruit, plum, sour cherry, hint of vanilla; fresh, clean, elegant; balancing acidity. Amarone is made from corvina and corvinone, helped by rodinella and molinara, grapes found only in Valpolicella. After harvest, grapes dry on bamboo racks from October to February, a process called appossimento that reduces water by 40 percent. When crushed, the almost-raisin results make wine beautifully fruity, wonderfully smooth, famously high alcohol (this is 15%). Fattori’s effort is crushed and fermented with natural yeasts in wood barrels, then aged almost three years in barrels before bottling to add structure and complexity. All this effort makes amarone a pricey wine, so this delicious effort is real value. You can find bigger, bolder, more-wow amarone, but this excels at $40
