With rosé, as with red and white, Italy has a large variety of wines, and their respective styles vary tremendously, reflecting the diversity of grape variety, soil type, climate and regionality across the country. The varying degrees of ‘blush’ give you some impression of how different they are. Among the wines we have chosen to taste, some are at the baby-pink end of the spectrum, others a shade or two deeper. Rosés taste more like a white than a red – light, refreshing, fruity, rather than ‘heavy’, and almost certainly chilled – and are made by pressing the juice from a red grape variety and then allowing the juice to ‘sit’ on the grape skins for just long enough – usually between 6 and 24 hours – to pick up a hint of colour, a tiny bit of texture and a strawberry-fruit taste.
The grape varieties used vary too: many producers use a local base grape type from which they produce their reds (Corvina in Bardolino or Pinot Grigio in Veneto, for instance) and make a small amount of rosé from those varieties. Pretty much anything can be used, albeit with degrees of success, but some red grapes wouldn’t work – Nebbiolo, for instance, is too heavy. We’ve chosen a range of rosés – still and sparkling – with varying price points in mind this month, and something to suit every budget.