The Black Bee

Torrevento
Puglia IGT "Il Filare" Rosato
2008
12.0% ABV | Price: about $12

I'm gonzo about this wine. I've been drinking it all summer. It's so simple, so juicy and bright, yet it has a serious, Old World core.

Brilliant jewel pink, it smells like strawberries and fresh-cut grass. Dry as bone with brilliant minerality, it has beautiful fruit and acidity and finishes clean. It pairs effortlessly with fresh summer fare: a handful of green beans, some fennel, a few orange tomatoes, fresh rosemary, fresh goat cheese. "Il filare" means "the row" in Italian, suggesting that the vineyard and the garden share this structure, this idea. They are kindred.

A rosé of 80% Bombino Nero and 20% Montepulciano, it's not a heady wine, not intellectual. It makes no demands. No multi-syllabic adjectives need apply (except that one).

Maybe I just love drinking a wine made from a grape called the "black bee."

 

Comments

[vintuition]

Bombino Nero. Who knows, Meg, you just might like the wine and vine even more knowing that the etymology, actually, points to ... Bambino (alternatively, Buonvino) http://tiny.cc/m3vqt

[Meg Houston Maker]

Fascinating. I'd done a bit of research to try to suss the etymology, and while I learned that it's known by myriad other names, including Bambino Nero, I'd not found the full story. Thank you!