Your Orlando wine diva here, for what I hope will be the first of many articles about one of my true passions.  So you know, I am not a sommelier, I have learned everything I know about wine from drinking it.  Being in the restaurant business since 2000 I have been fortunate enough to have the opportunity to meet and work many wine makers, and to sample a wide variety of wines from regions around the world.  Over the years I have tasted thousands of wines, from regions all over the world, which has given me a very unique perspective and helped me develop my palate.  My experience with wine allows me to help take people from Amarone to Zinfandel.  Whenever possible I like to let people sample wine if it is new to them.  Being in the restaurant business there are, of course wines for which that is not practical.  That is where my ability to accurately assess what someone wants and to describe the flavors of the wine have helped me tremendously.  This month in our quest for only the best wines we travel to Valpolicella, Italy and to the Tedeschi family winery.

Home of the wonderfully unique Amarone della Valpolicella wine, Valpolicella is one of Italy’s most prestigious winemaking areas.  Valpolicella’s red wines have been popular since the time of the Roman Empire.  Comprised  of a myriad of lush, fertile valleys that spread like the legs of a fine wine across a glass, the valleys stretch out of the Lessini Mountains, Valpolicella is an intensely beautiful region, whose name comes from “val polis cellae” and means “valley of many cellars”, and is characterized by the steep, vine-laced ridges that run alongside its babbling mountain brooks.

At the Tedeschi winery, wine is still made using some of the same traditional techniques used since the winery was founded in 1824.