VinItaly

 VinItaly Fair, Verona. 

www.vinitaly.com/EN

VinItaly is an International wine exposition held annually in Italy's Veneto region since 1967. It is thought to be the world's largest wine fair with more than 3000 to sample. The resounding theme of the event was the Italian mantra, “Do what gives you pleasure”, repeated again and again by winemakers telling us about their business. As always Sara and I found ourselves matching in black blouses, jeans and high boots as we headed to Italy’s biggest and most glamorous Wine Fair to join some friends and embrace the tradition of wine tasting.

 The crowd were all beautifully dressed, sun-drenched Italian families in the uniform of tailored blue blazer, open shirt and dark jeans. The wine-producing regions like were all divided into different buildings like Toscana, Sicilia, Campania, Veneto where you could wander around and taste anything you pleased, (with the added delight of being served charcuterie and cheeses at charming little tables). 

Our guide and friend was thankfully a restaurant owner from Bologne, so we were lucky to be well looked after by all his wine sellers especially Michele Chiarlo, the well-renowned owner of a spectacular vineyard who gave us the most headily delicious red wine, ‘Barolo, Cerquio 2010’. He was correct in his assertion that, “this red must be drunk with emotion, it will overpower you”. 

As a lover of ‘Vin Rossi’ it was the the most fabulous way to better understand the importance of wine in Italian culture. It was also unimaginably wonderful to spend an afternoon tasting a range of delicious wines from all of the Italian regions (my allegiance to French Wine has wavered). Admittedly, we did have to rather toddle out of there towards the end.