I started wine blogging in print and on video after arriving in Italy in late 2007 – partly for something to do while waiting for Villasfor2 to be built; and partly to cope with the withdrawal symptoms of not being a journalist anymore – and in the process, I must’ve drunk, written and filmed my way through something like 150 different Italian wines. Not all were good, in fact, I found some really bad wine.
And I’ve told you about those which – to a greater/lesser degree – I’ve enjoyed.
Now I’m going to tell you the tiny handful of bad wine which was awful.
It’s Bad Wine – But It’s Cheap…
I’ll start with a story. For a while after we’d arrived in Italy in late 2007, we bought our everyday wine where we’d bought it in England. At the supermarket.
One day I came across a bottle priced at €1 – at that time the equivalent of about 70p. It was called ‘Maestri Cantinieri’ and it was red. From where ? Haven’t a clue. The label didn’t say. Come to that, it might not not have even been Italian. What grape variety ? Er…a red one. Vintage ? Don’t be silly.
Having never actually seen a bottle of wine this cheap before, I was studying it with the same kind of reverence and attention I’d have given to a bot of Ch. Haut-Brion when I noticed another potential customer alongside me.
“Is this any good ?” I asked hesitantly.
“At €1 a bottle,” he replied, “does it matter ?”
Not the sort of ringing endorsement you’d ever find in Robert Parker, but he was spot-on. At €1 a bottle, you weren’t exactly risking a lot to find out if it was any good.
And it wasn’t. It redefined ‘horrible’. Thin, harsh, pungent and sharp. In short, bad wine.
You know that once wine’s been made, all the pips, stalks, skins and general leftover crud are turned into grappa, or marc, or some other digestivo ? But I wonder if in some instances there’s a kind of ‘second pressing’ in which every last drop is wrung from the wreckage and bottled-up as something akin to ‘Maestri Cantinieri’…
There’s an odd end to the story. Of all the wine blogs I’ve ever written – and there’ve been a lot – the one about this wine was read and shared more than any other.
So you can’t say you haven’t been warned…
And Here’s Another Bad Wine Horror Story…
Of course there are more ways than just tasting vile in which a wine can be termed as ‘awful’.
Have you ever come across a ‘corked’ bottle? You’d know if you have, because the first scent that hits you once you’ve opened the bottle is a musty, deeply unpleasant one of mould, with undercurrents of rotting vegetation.
It’s caused by microscopic fungal spores on the cork reacting with the wine and making it undrinkable: what posh sommeliers are checking for when they sniff the cork after taking it out of the bottle.
With big improvements in wine cork technology; wine bottling hygiene; and the advent of synthetic corks and screw-top bottles, ‘corked’ wine is happily much less of a problem than it once was.
But it hasn’t been eradicated entirely…
Sod’s law maybe that the one and only ‘corked’ bottle I’ve had during my seven year Italian sojourn – bearing in mind my maybe less-than-enthusiastic relationship with Chianti – has been, yes, a bottle of Chianti Classico.
A bog-standard, generic, entry-level Chianti Classico it’s true – but still Chianti Classico; still a DOCG wine; and priced accordingly. And as such, even though a ‘corked’ bot isn’t really anyone’s ‘fault’, I’d have hoped for maybe a little more care and attention to detail in the production process to ensure it hadn’t happened.
To put it another way, I wouldn’t have been in the slightest bit surprised if the €1-a-bottle stuff had been ‘corked’. I was extremely surprised – disappointed too – that this was. Another bad wine, alas.
And here’s the thing: if this misfortune befalls you in a restaurant, the fact the wine’s corked is so immediately obvious, you’ll instantly be given another bottle (And if you aren’t – walk out).
But if you’ve bought a bottle somewhere; taken it home; maybe even kept it a while before opening it; and then discover it’s corked – you’re basically screwed. Some retailers might refund you, or give you a replacement. Provided you have the original receipt. Many more won’t.
Go Est Young Man…
Another disappointment that’s best avoided? From Montefiascone, north of Rome, comes the intriguingly named white wine Est ! Est !! Est !!! (Complete with requisite exclamation marks).
As to why this wine has such an unusual name – and for a critical appraisal from infinitely more distinguished critics than me – take a look.
Est ! Est !! Est !!! isn’t a bad or even unpleasant wine. Can’t be either if it doesn’t actually taste of very much. It’s just desperately, disappointingly and dispiritingly ordinary, with local production cashing-in on its celebrity status.
A lot of ‘celebrity bottles’ are bought as take-home gifts or souvenirs. (Hence the many unusually decorative labels you’ll come across). Many never actually get opened and everlastingly gather dust on a shelf. And that’s probably the best thing that can happen to a bottle of Est ! Est !! Est !!! because if it is opened and is drunk, the expectation of Italian nectar will be replaced by, “Is that it? What’s all the fuss about?”
The same, though to a marginally lesser degree, applies to other Italian wines like Lacrima Christi del Vesuvio and Vernaccia di San Gimignano which owe much of their status to geographical or historic quirks, rather than pure excellence.
That’s not to tar all these ‘celebrity bottles’ with the same brush of criticism. There are some decent (even outstanding) examples – though these are far too heavily outweighed by those that sell on the label on the bottle, rather than the quality of wine inside.
But as for Est ! Est !! Est !!! No ! No !! No !!! Bad Wine!
And The Undisputed ‘Bad Wine’ Winner Is…
Which leads us finally to another Italian wine name you’ll know.
Lambrusco.
Go back a while and Lambrusco was probably the wine you took to parties when you were younger. Cheap, fruity, frothy, fizzy and of such low alcohol it could’ve probably been sold legally in America during Prohibition.
Maybe not too fanciful, because during the 1970’s and 80’s, Lambrusco was America’s biggest-selling imported wine.
Lambrusco comes from around Modena in the Emilia-Romagna region. Not a part of Italy I’ve visited, but I have it on good authority that in Modena, you can buy surpassingly excellent – and correspondingly pricey – bottles of Lambrusco, so at its very best, clearly it’s not an inherently bad wine.
On the other hand, this bottle from Chiarli Cleto and Sons – complete with fake-aged, medal-bedecked label – was by some distance the worst; most unpleasant; most downright awful bottle of wine I’ve ever drunk anywhere. Really, really, bad wine.
Worse by some distance than the €1-a-bot red I mentioned earlier; worse too than my previous absolute worst wine nominee – a half-bot of New York State ‘Burgundy’ at a trendy Manhattan eaterie in 1972, which conclusively disproved my Dad’s imparted wine wisdom that local is always best.
Not in New York City in 1972 it wasn’t, Dad.
Part of the problem was I don’t think the NY State Burgundy was supposed to be fizzy, whereas Chiarli Cleto’s Lambrusco clearly was.
Fizzy. Nicely chilled. Pretty colour. High hopes…
Then the initial vaguely chemical bouquet set the alarm bells faintly tinkling in the background.
Have you ever gone into an office that’s just been deep-cleaned? Yes? Then you’ll remember a strong first hit of cleaning products, quite heavily overlaid with ‘Scent of Tropical Beach’ or somesuch to disguise the aroma of bleach, upholstery cleaner and floor polish.
Reproduced here with impressive accuracy.
Then the taste. You’ve probably never tried one of those tablets you drop in the loo to sanitise it. Neither have I. But if I had, I’m pretty sure it would’ve tasted like this – though possibly not with an overpowering synthetic Raspberry Flavouring.
But don’t let anyone tell you this was just a one-dimensional wine, because it had a secondary experience in store for me. A huge wallop of sugar. Which conflicted interestingly with background hints of boiled-sweet sherbert.
Of finish, thankfully, there was none. Except for a growing sense of disbelief. Did I just drink what I think I did? Teeny weeny sip. Why yes ! I did !
And is it really that bad? Teenier, weenier sip. No. It’s worse…
To be honest, the (very) occasional bad wine experience makes me all the more appreciative of what’s good. And with giant improvements in viticulture and wine-making techniques worldwide in the last quarter-century or so, the good stuff’s just gone on getting better.
Question is though – will I ever stumble unwittingly across anything worse that Chiarli Cleto’s Lambrusco? The baddest of bad wine?!
By David Brenner
In 2007, after a lengthy career as a television broadcast journalist in the UK – latterly with BBC World – David, his wife Pauline and their three cats moved to Abruzzo , where they now run Villasfor2, providing three holiday rental villas just for couples. Wine lovers who go stay with David, will be able to have long, interesting chats with him about Italy’s many wonderful wines. If you are not a wine buff, David may well end up converting you!
In addition to his passion for discovering and promoting Italian wine, David’s regular AboutAbruzzo blog charts daily life in this little-known region of Italy.
Why not send David Italian wines for him to review? He can also run tasting sessions with his guests and write about his findings either on Italy Chronicles or on his own blog.
David Brenner says
Well…yes…I don’t think there’s any dispute that the awful bottle of Cleto Chiarli wine I was unlucky enough to come across was a one-off. But I’m disappointed the Cantina has thus far declined my request to point me in the direction of a southern Abruzzo stockist of their range so I can buy a bottle and review it. Hopefully with glowing compliments.
And irrespective of whether the Chianti Classico I mentioned in the same article was ‘very generic’, or from a winery so small it didn’t register when you tried to find it online, it was *still* a Chianti Classico and it was *still* corked.
Again, doubtless a one-off – but too many ‘one-offs’ might start me thinking dark thoughts about industry-wide quality control…
Marco says
I understand the other, though the corked one can happen to every produced, you for sure picked up a very generic Chianti Classico since I never heard or that winery, no website, nothing official found online.
But on Cleto Chiarli sorry, you must have found a bad bottle as others told you here. new wave of old style Lambrusco producers is actually really high quality for a low price type of wine. I highly recommend you to try again that producer or any other from Modena or Reggio Emilia (also part of Mantova is included in the Lambrusco DOC area), another suggestion, NOT amabile (semisweet).
David Brenner says
My best guess is that I’ll have bought and opened this contentious bottle of Lambrusco sometime in 2010 – but who knows when the contents will have been actually produced and bottled, or why they were so awful ?
Was it simply a single bad bottle even when it left the winery ? Not entirely inconceivable, because it does have to be said that even the best producers can release the occasional dud.
More likely however, the fault will lie with the retailer, who in all probability will have stored the bottle badly – and for too long.
In any event, regardless of the cause and responsibility, the ultimate misfortune to come across this one example was mine, and in this particular instance, I’m happy to accept Sofia’s elegantly-worded assurance that as far as Chiarli is concerned, the bottle I described was very much the exception.
I’m grateful for the kind invitation to visit the Chiarli cellars in Modena. While my own business tends to keep me tied to Abruzzo, hopefully at some point it’ll be possible for me to accept.
But in the meantime – here’s a suggestion. If Sofia can tell me a reliable stockist of Chiarli Lambrusco in southern Abruzzo – Lanciano perhaps ? – I’ll be delighted to buy a bottle; taste it; and review it here in Italy Chronicles.
Sofia Rocchelli says
Dear Mr Brenner,
I have been working for Chiarli for ages and luckily it has never happened to me to read such a misleading article about Vecchia Modena…. I have shown it to Mr Anselmo Chiarli and this is his reply:
“The bottle of ‘Vecchia Modena’ Lambrusco which draw the attention of Mr D Brenner and his comments is a 2011 Vintage bottle or possibly coming from earlier vintages. This is confirmed by the picture shown for in 2012 the label went through a restyling. it is therefore quite obvious that our ‘Vecchia Modena’ was more ‘aged’ than this typology of wine can afford. It is well known that Lambrusco wine is expressing its characteristics at the very best when it is drunk within the year following the vintage. For this reason, the lot code (Production code) should be checked prior a tasting of Lambrusco. The date is encoded according to the Julian calendar or by the vintage if indicated and this is generally acknowledged by the wines’operators.
The ‘Vecchia Modena’ is a DOC Lambrusco di Modena, Sorbara varietal as per a traditional Lambrusco such as the ‘Vecchia Modena’. The Sorbara variety is just the varietal which suffers the aging and bad storage conditions to a greater extent than the other Lambrusco varietals. Unfortunately, the management of both logistics and sales points of our customers is beyond our control so that the quality of the wine is deteriorating because an aging which is not due.
This kind of problem happens with a higher frequency in regions where the Lambrusco consumption is mediocre and the bottles’ turnover is slow.
Therefore, we are serene and only upset for such negative comments which could have been spared taking into account what aboveforsaid.
When we talk about Lambrusco we should know that Lambrusco is not a single wine, but a family of wines which refer to different varietals.The results are wines with specific characterisrics.
That is why we would be delighted that Mr Brenner makes a visit to our place (Cleto Chiarli cellar in Castelvetro Modena) to have a complete picture of Lambrusco hoping this will reconcile him with this wonderful wine! “
I really hope to have the chance to meet you in Castelvetro, together with Mr Charli: I’m sure you will love the wines, the people, the place.
Sofia Rocchelli, press office and public relations
dean gold says
Congratulations! One of the worst articles on wine ever written. Where to start?
Corked wines. Caused by TCA , not spores A chemical sometimes found on cork, but that can be found in nature from many sources. Here is the Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cork_taint. Certainly saying it came from spores may be correct in a modicum of cases, but it is not the leading cause. Wineries may be infected with TCA and it may be introduced thru the cork. Please, the next time you write about something elementary that you have no knowledge of, at least hit the good old wiki if not google.
Corks: “what posh sommeliers are checking for when they sniff the cork after taking it out of the bottle.” If posh sommeliers are sniffing for corkiness on the cork, they need to learn something. A cork’s smell has little relationship with the smell of the wine. And why smell the cork when the wine is in a nice container, easy to pour out, called a bottle. Yes, good sommeliers {who are not always posh} actually check the wine. In my 30,000 bottles of wine I have sampled or opened as a retail wine salesman, a wholesale wine sales man, a regional wine buyer for a gourmet foods company and in my 20 years as a restaurateur, I have smelled corks that are disgusting where the wine was perfectly sound and corks that were perfectly innocuous where the bottle was filled with bilgewater {corked, aldehydic, volatile acidity, maderized, bacterial spoilage of all sorts, mercaptans and more}. One should look at the cork as an indication of storage and no more. And old corks tend to look bad no matter what. Frankly, this article smells worse than any cork I have ever smelled, and et the content leaves an even fouler taste in the mouth.
Your example of one bottle of corked Chianti. Really? Blaming the winery for one freaking bottle when it is an industry wide problem? Should I now avoid all Chianti Classico by Terri di Mastri? Should I now avoid all wines by Terri di Mastri? Should I now avoid all Chianti Calssico?
No! I should avoid the one bottle of Terre di Mastri we know to be corked because you opened it. What is the point of naming a winery because particular bottle wine was corked? I have a friend who has a problem with their Fiat Arbath.. Should we avoid all Fiats?
Next we come to your critique of Est! Est!! Est!!! where you also slam Lacryma Christi del Vesuvio and Vernaccia di San Gimignano. As with any area, there are good wineries and bad. Are you really saying don’t drink this particular trio of DOCG’s in light of the rampant bad wine that should be counted as crimes against nature committed in other wine growing regions?
Est! Est!! Est!!! can be a pleasant thing to go with a light seafood pasta and antipasti on a hot day. And guess what: that’s how it is used in Rome. Are there innocuous bottles of Est^^3? Of course. But there are far more innocuous to down right scary bottles of Chianti or Primitivo. And not to mention the legion of horrid merlots grown everywhere because, well merlot.
San Gim is a tourist town and there are tourist trap restaurants, stores and, yes, wines. But there are fabulous wines being made. San Quirico, Pietrafitta, Le Rote, Teruzzi e Perthod, and more are all fine producers of very good wines indeed. Following your recommendation would deprive these worthy producers the opportunity of showing off their wines which offer a lot of value in most cases. And open minded drinkers of a lot of fun wine at a good price. If you think Vernaccia di San Gim {which here in the states usually retails for $10 to 15} is among the “worst Italy has to offer”, I have to hold your opinion as some of the worst Italy has to offer.
Lacryma Christi del Vesuvio: here you are simply wrong and slanderously so. Terradora di Paolo, De Angeles and the venerable old name Mastrobernandino are all making outstanding wines under this DOC. Where you came up with the notion that this is “among the worst Italy has to offer” mystifies me. Are you just pulling it out the lower end of your alimentary canal? I pity anyone who reads this article and follows the advice herein.
Your 4th example is Lambrusco, with Chiarli Vecchia Modena shown and described. You may have had a bad bottle. But you do know that it wins Tre Biccherri year after year after year. Now usually I am not a big fan of scores and competitions, but here is a wine that has been recognized by Italian wine professionals as an outstanding achievement and you call it “was by some distance the worst; most unpleasant; most downright awful bottle of wine I’ve ever drunk anywhere.”
I have served this wine in my restaurant for years, and have never had anyone so describe it. I have had a few people send it back as it is aggressively dry and has high acid, as it should, to go with prosciutto, parmesan and the other fat-rich dishes of the region. Every top restaurant in Modena has it. Perhaps it is not you your liking, but the worst Italy has to offer?
Eremete Medici, Venturini, ohhhhh, I give up. You clearly show no evidence of knowing good Lambrusco.
Thanks for letting us know how wrong we are!
And now let us come to the biggest joke of all…. A 1 euro wine is bad? I’m shocked, shocked to find that gambling is going on in here!
David Brenner says
I’m flattered my blog aroused such a reaction in you – even adversely – that you felt compelled to respond so strongly, (if a touch selectively), and at such length. Also have to wonder, if you so highly rate the wines I don’t, why so few (one ? two ?) seem to be featured on the wine list of your Italian restaurant in Washington DC ? In fact the wines I’ve criticised are heavily outnumbered on your list by several I’ve actually highly recommended in previous blogs !
Anyway – here’s a suggestion: next time you disagree with what I say about a bottle of wine, just send me another bottle and convince me otherwise. More fun; less time-consuming; and maybe more productive in the long run than firing-off long mails. Who knows ? Maybe we’ll find we agree about more wines than you might think…
DC says
Three cheers for David!
David Brenner says
Spot-on Stephen – the producer/grower’s take after everyone else has had their cut must be miniscule. On the other hand, if the rest of Italy follows the Abruzzo model – in which the major proportion of wine goes into blends, rather than bottled and sold in its own right – (and not forgetting – leaving aside 2014 – Italy’s huge wine production) – there must be an awful lot of stuff sloshing around that the producers are happy to shift for a couple of cents a litre. And when you’re talking in terms of millions of litres, that’s a tidy sum…
Stephen says
Nicely done, David. It’s the old ‘you get what you pay for’ syndrome, eh!
Makes you wonder why they bother: the cost of the bottle, the cork, boxing, shipping etc plus allowing a retailer’s margin must mean they make nothing or perhaps even lose?
KareninCalabria says
Hi Dave,
I think we’ve all fallen for the 1 Euro temptation at least once in our lives, although it would seem that inflation has more than doubled that price even on the biggest markdowns. I must admit, though, that I’m a little afraid of a commercial bottle of wine for less than 5 Euros.
I’ve spent quite a bit of time in Calabria over the past 6 or so years and mom-and-pop groceries often carry liters of bulk red table wine for 2 Euros/bottle. At times I’ve been quite pleasantly surprised.
Cin cin!
KareninCalabria
David Brenner says
Hi Karen – we’re actually going to take the, “Is cheap wine really any good ?” question further very soon. IC supremo Alex is funding a wild spending spree of €20, out of which I plan to buy at least 5 bottles – and then put life and liver on the line by drinking them.
But you’re right about ‘bulk is best’. We buy our everyday wine in 5L jugs from one of the local cantina. Works out a bit over €1/bottle, but immeasurably better than a pre-bottled wine at the same price.