2012 Villa Annaberta Amarone Della Valpolicella – LCBO 433961 – $38.95 – **** – Drinking Amarone feels like drinking a decadent dessert. It’s rich and concentrated, loaded with very ripe fruit flavours and whispers of cocoa, or coffee. Amarone is made by drying the grapes before pressing them. The winemaking process is called Appassimento. It’s kind of the same principal behind making icewine but under very different conditions. When you make icewine you let the fruit sit on the vine so the water in the fruit evaoprates concentrating the sugars and flavours in the fruit. With Amarone you harvest the fruit and let it dry on racks letting the water evaporate concentrating the sugars and flavours. The only difference is that Amarone is made into relatively dry wine. I say relatively dry because this wine does have a bit of residual sugar (13 g/l) but for the most part the “sweetness” in Amarone comes from the concentrated fruit flavours. The by-product of the higher sugars and more concentrated juice in the fruit is that you end up with a wine that is very rich but also a little higher in alcohol. Now this wine from Villa Annaberta has very strong Cocoa notes on the nose with Black Cherry and Strawberry. The concentrated flavours on the palate are Cherry, Strawberry, Cocoa and hints of Spice on the finish. Amarone (as with Icewine) tends to be a little pricier than your regular table wine but just like with a decadent dessert sometimes you just need to splurge.
