I was down at the NJ Shore over the long holiday weekend, and out at a pretty nice Italian spot (Stella Marina) in the spiffed up town of Asbury Park. Being at the beach and all, I was feeling like a lighter bodied red and ran across a Valpolicella on the wine list. Even knowing that these are usually cheaper, quaffable light wines I felt like giving it a try since I hadn't had one in ages. Our waiter, however, (who claimed to be in sommelier training) steered us away from it. He said that it was a "Ripasso", explaining that this meant that the wine is made with grapes from only the second pressing and it would be a very light, thin wine. Honestly, I didn't really believe this... I've never heard of any wine using only second press juice.
Anyway, as chance would have it, the New York Times has a great article today in the dining section: Wine of the Times: Valpolicella: An Italian Mystery, Explained by Eric Asimov. Among other things it cleared up my doubts about what Ripasso really means in this context. "Ripasso" does indeed mean "passed through again" but the article explains that in looking for bigger, richer Valpolicella wines the producers would add semi-dried grapes that could have been used for making Amarone or would ferment their wine with the skins and sediment of the semi-dried grapes used for Amarone. And these methods refer to the Ripasso or Ripassa style.
Anyway, check out the article. It's a good read and they rank their top 10 from a group tasting. The #1 is the 2007 Vaona Valpolicella Classico ($16), and #2 which was also the "best value" the 2006 Tommasi Valpolicella Classico Superiore ($12).
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