#19- Fiano

Viva Italia- usually. I think this wine was a bit of a miss. We didn't have a problem drinking it, but it certainly was nothing of note. In other words, pass! The poor Italians- first they lose in the World Cup and now this- a disappointing wine. Tsk tsk.

The Italian wine I tried was a Fiano, from the Mandra Rossa Winery in Sicily. The Fiano grape is a fairly rare grape, mainly because it grows a very small yield. The Fiano is only grown in Italy and Australia. You'd think with it being such a rare wine that it would be expensive, but you'd be wrong. This bottle of wine was on sale for $14.99 from the Liquor Depot in West Edmonton. I literally walked into the store, saw the wine on display, checked to see if the Fiano grape was on my list, and when confirmed, bought it! The whole transaction took me less than two minutes.

I had high hopes for this wine, with it being Italian. Maybe they should stick to red. Anyway, I drank this wine with a nice vegetarian salad. I was still eating salmon from my barbeque a few night before but I really felt I needed just a good plate of vegetables. So a beautiful salad was on tap for dinner. The wine was chilled, the sun was shining, the salad calling my name- so I ate outside on my patio to enjoy the wine...

And was disappointed. The wine itself tasted like fortified apple juice. To me, it was very fruity and flat. This wine may have been not half bad had it been carbonated. Reading about this Fiano in particular, it mentions that their is a strong taste of tropical fruit. Is apple tropical? It also mentions it goes well with white meat and fish so I guess it was okay to be eating left over salmon again...

I took the wine over to my brother's house a couple of days later and he drank it prior to a couple of the others (and a big steak dinner). He didn't mind the wine but had similar thoughts on it about it tasting fruity. He was able to drink it just as is, with no food accompanying his drinking so it couldn't have been that bad. But it certainly wouldn't be a wine I'd recommend any time soon. I'd like to try a different Fiano (maybe when I'm in Italy in the fall perhaps?) to compare.

The next wine is #20!! I think we're doing a Zinfandel or Primitivo (same grape) as we have a couple of bottles that we're eager to try. So maybe #20 will be a comparison of two wines, two names, one grape!