THE WINE SHOW: TUSCANY SPECIAL PART 1

The poet Browning famously said, open my heart and you will see, graved inside it, Italy. Now when I've uncorked my last bottle, it'll be Yorkshire they find on my ticker, but I do understand why Browning felt this way. Italy in the autumn sunshine is somewhere that stirs the soul like few other places. After what's been, let's face it, a pretty difficult time for everyone, I couldn't be happier to be back on my travels. And I've come to Tuscany, a region that's home to some of the greatest names, not just in Italian wine, but wines recognised as truly world class. I've asked our newest hire Dominic West to join me as a bit of a treat. The last time I saw him was in Portugal, where he joined me and James Purefoy as the latest member of the wine show gang. Don't say that I don't get you along on a nice jolly every now and then. It's the nicest thing you've ever done. Oh bless you. Hello Joe, how are you? Hi Joe, hi. I have a new pupil. I'm a vessel that wishes to be filled. But he was confined to the Quinta and I thought it would be nice to get him out and about. Tuscany is an enormous winemaking region. There is one particular corner of it that really does punch above its weight. Although it's a magnet for serious wine collectors now, it hasn't always been that way. Despite the Etruscan coast's ancient history, this region has only really been renowned for its wines since the 1970s. And I've asked Dominic to meet me in the village that gives this region its name, Bulgari. Dom, I found you. What the hell are you doing here? Hello. How are you old chap? I'm very well, I'm very well indeed. Welcome to one of, well this is possibly my favourite wine region. Well this is the most beautiful place. You'd get old here quite happily couldn't you? Well I can see us both sitting like sort of two elderly Italian pensioners with coffee. Playing petanque. Petanque or cards, discussing the state of the world. So this is not a wine, historically a wine region? No, not at all. But I mean how could anyone have sat here for hundreds of years and not thought about wine? We're in Italy for goodness sake, in the beautiful, the most beautiful square I think I've ever seen. Throughout Tuscany people made wine, often actually mixed agriculture and the vines would grow up trees and it wasn't noted for it, it was just local wine. Now it's very, very famous and it's that shift. Because they've changed the grape. Well what we should go and do is try some. Sounds good to me. Take it. Dom might have just had his morning coffee, but this is the wine show and it's about time he learned that there are sacrifices to be made. And one of them is going wine tasting in the morning. The Cantinetta di Bolgheri has a great selection of wine from all over Italy and the world. Which is fortunate because I'm about to take Dominic on a journey and we're starting just over the hills in Chianti. So we're going to start you off with Chianti. Which is wine you've tried, I'm sure, in the past. It's the way I like to start things off. Yeah, absolutely. Breakfast of champions. And actually I'm taking us back in time because Matthew and Matthew in series one went to visit Vignemaggio in Chianti Classico, which is possibly the most famous of the regions in Tuscany. Let's have a taste before we do anything else. This is Sangiovese? This is mostly Sangiovese. You can add a few other bits and there is a reason for that. So you have a swirl and a sniff. Not necessarily very aromatic. No. Sometimes cherries, that kind of thing. Bit of grip there. You see? Oh, now then. So what's happening in your...? It's leathery and it's quite... Tannin seems to be gripping me. So far back as the, what would it be, the sort of 18th century, people were saying it's not very good on its own. What you have to do is have other grapes to make it a bit more aromatic, make it a bit softer, make it slightly less tart. But it does thrive very well up in the hills. People have learned over time how to go and make a nice wine. But it's always had this challenge. These estates have been here for a very long time. This one, it was the family Lisa Gherardini who became Mona Lisa. She was always complaining. And she would stay regularly at this. I think it was a family estate. It's the most beautiful place. Really? Absolutely glorious. This is what the Mona Lisa drank. No wonder she had an enigmatic smile. Time to leave the Italian Renaissance behind. Now, ready for the next stage in this. And take a trip forward in time to the 1940s and across the globe to California. I've got three wines because this is how we're going to go and learn about it. There's lots of very nice aristocratic families around this part of the world. And one of them... You know all of them. I know all of them. You're related to them. We have dinner regularly. Are there fattorinis from around here? There are lots of fattorinis around here. They're not noted for being aristocrats. It's mostly as a haulage company. Right. Now that I think about it, I might be more use as a truck driver the way things are at the moment. But leaving that thought to one side, we're starting our own story of wine renaissance in the Napa Valley with a great wine, Duckhorn Decoy Red Blend. Now what's this? So Marchese Mario Incesa della Rocchetta in the 1940s has this lovely estate here. Not a wine growing estate. And he decided that he would just plant some vines for his own consumption. He was going to go and make his own wine. What he does is he looks and he can see the topography. And he looks and he says, well, there's a row of hills. I'm just on the sort of bottom of those. I'm looking out over this plain that's been recently sort of drained, if you like. And then there's the West Coast. There's the sea. Very, very close. So he thinks, well, where else in the world that he's been to has this? Now have a swirl and a sniff of this. He thinks the Napa Valley in California. There's rows of hills. There's then the valley. There's this sort of alluvial soil. And then the coast that cools it off. So we're going to have a swirl and a sniff. This is a Merlot blend. So actually what starts to recreate is this blend of wines that are like you get in Napa Valley. Have a taste. Go on. Soft, more aromatic. Is this a Napa wine? It is. Yes. Pass me another couple of glasses. Fruity. Because then he looks at one of the great wine regions of the world. And he says, let's have a look at Bordeaux. And Bordeaux, which is also... Exactly the same. Yes, our well-travelled Italian aristocrat was also inspired by the wines of Bordeaux on the Atlantic coast of France. And I'm sure he'd have loved this classic blend from Clos des Demoiselles. So have a try of this. This is from L'Istrac, so a little village in Bordeaux. Also a Merlot blend. Now it's similar in shape. It's got more tannins. It's blended with Cabernet, is it? When you're trying this, you're thinking this has got more... It's still soft. It's not got quite that tartness. More aromatic. Do you like this more than the Sangiovese? Very much more, yes. You could drink far more of this. So what we're starting to see is he's... There's the Marchese and he's looking and he says, well, we've got this little row of hills that sort of protects us from winds in the interior. We've got this nice drained area in front of us, which has got these alluvial, sandy, clay soils. So you get clay soils in this part of Bordeaux, particularly actually very good for Merlot. Merlot quite likes clay, likes to keep his feet wet. Oh, he does it. Absolutely. And look at the sea. And it's looking out over the sea and you get these cool breezes that come in. Tess, now I need another couple of glasses. Here's two I made earlier. So now this is actually almost identical in price to the two wines that we've got. This is Greppi Canti. Finally, we're back in Bvlgari. And while this wine isn't made by the globe-trotting Marchese, it is Greppi Canti made by local winemaker Igreppi. Have a swirl and sniff of this. So now what you're going to be able to see is this evolution, same sort of topography, same soil types, warmer, we're further south, certainly than Bordeaux. Get your nose into that. Mainly Merlot, is it? Yes, similar blend, mainly Merlot, Bordeaux blend. Oh, yeah, different league. You're enjoying that, aren't you? Wonderful. And what I like particularly is here's a map. So this has got this sort of map which is showing these lakes and the lakes act as a sort of moderating influence because water is a moderating influence on vineyards. So we've got the sea that's... It's not the coast. You can see it. Well, keeping the frost away. Yeah, and particularly in the evenings, you tend to find that the sort of heat rises and you sit at Igreppi. You can sit there in and amongst the vines. And as the heat rises in the middle of the country, there's this gentle breeze that gets sucked in exactly the same way that it does in the Napa Valley. It draws in this cool wind. So it's a point of the day where it would potentially be too hot, creates a sort of struggle. Sit in the estate there and there's just this lovely, gentle, cool breeze. You want to go and visit it, don't you? I desperately want to go and see. So I want to go and take you to Igreppi and to go and see for yourself exactly what this topography is like. We'll look up at the hills and we'll look out at the sea and take you there tomorrow. I should dream about it all night. You can just enjoy drinking that. It's delicious.