Amarone della Valpolicella DOCG Riserva “Decem” 2013
Wine Description
Decem is Pietro Zardini's most patient wine, an Amarone Riserva whose name is the Latin word for ten, a fair measure of the decade it needs from harvest to full readiness. The blend is Corvina 70%, Rondinella 20%, Molinara 5% and Croatina 5%, dried on racks for about four months, and the raising is unusual for Valpolicella: three years in raw clay amphora, three in oak barrels and three in barriques before a rest in bottle.
At 16.5% it is a large scale Amarone, yet the clay leaves a savory, faintly mineral edge under the ripe fruit: coffee, cocoa, spice and a garnet tinged depth that the producer's own notes trace back to the amphora.
The 2013 is now past its tenth year and sits squarely in the window the name promises. Decant for an hour and serve at 16 to 18 °C with food of matching weight: braised beef cheeks, pastissada de caval, or a long aged Monte Veronese at the end of a Venetian dinner.
Winery
Pietro Zardini founded his cellar in San Pietro in Cariano in 2000, but the roots go deeper: he grew up at Corte Zardini in San Floriano, studied agricultural science, qualified as a sommelier and worked with several large Verona houses through the 1990s before setting out under the name of his grandfather. The vineyards lie at Monte Mattonara in San Floriano and Valfiorita in Negrar, in the heart of the Valpolicella Classica, and the cellar holds sixteen amphorae of raw clay alongside oak of every size, a combination that gives the wines their warm, spiced and quietly old fashioned character.
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