Amarone della Valpolicella DOC Riserva Mattonara 2009
Wine Description
La Mattonara is Zymè's Amarone Riserva, named for the quarry locality in San Pietro in Cariano where the cellar stands, and it is made only in small quantities from the strongest lots. Like the house Amarone it rests on the old Veronese field blend of Corvina, Corvinone, Rondinella, Oseleta, Croatina and Molinara, dried through the winter and given a long, unhurried education in wood before release many years after harvest.
The 2009 is now a mature Amarone at the height of its powers: dried cherry and fig, tamarind, leather, sweet tobacco and cocoa on a palate that has turned silky while keeping its spine. Stand the bottle up the day before, decant gently for the sediment, and serve at 18 °C. It asks for slow food or none at all: braised beef cheeks, pastissada de caval, aged Monte Veronese, or a quiet hour after dinner.
Winery
Zymè is the project of Celestino Gaspari, who learned winemaking at the side of Giuseppe Quintarelli, his father in law, before starting his own label in 1999. The cellar sits at Mattonara in San Pietro in Cariano, built into a sandstone quarry worked since the fifteenth century, and draws on about 30 hectares scattered across the Valpolicella Classica, the Soave and Durello hills and the Colli Berici. The name is Greek for yeast, a nod to ferment and transformation, and the wines follow suit: native grapes, patient aging and around 150,000 bottles a year across a broad range.
