UPPING THE CHIANTI

In January and February, a series of seminars and tastings was held to promote Italian wines. Neil Beckett reports from Tuscany on the new-found power of the region's big three consorzi.

LIBERTY BECOMES SOLE AGENT FOR AVIGNONESI

CONSORZIO URGES PRICE CUT FOR 1998 BRUNELLOS

By Neil Beckett

SUPPORT FOR TOSCANA DOC WAVERS

By Jo Burzynska

Italy says no to GMO

By Jo Burzynska

Fling or real thing?

As one year slides not particularly memorably into another, Italians are looking back on an age, now clearly on the wane, when the so-called vitigni migliorativi' (improving vine varieties) were something no self-respecting wine could be seen without in polite society.

Liberty demands change over screwcap attitudes

Dear Minister,
I am writing to you regarding an issue that is having an adverse effect on the sales and positive image of Italian wine.

The Analyst

It can't be easy living up to the Chef of the [20th] Century' accolade applied to Jol Robuchon by Gault Millau.

The Analyst - by Neil Beckett

The Bell at Skenfrith (www.thebellatskenfrith.co.uk) has long been known to aficionados, but has only recently started to win the wider recognition it richly deserves, earlier this month beating one of London's best hotel restaurants to win the 2006 Gosset Award for the best Champagne list in the UK.

Wines in the Weekly Press

Moore extols the virtues of English wines; Rose recommends Roussillon; and Atkin, the wine trade's poet laureate, waxes lyrical on Elizabeth Bennett Browning. Meanwhile MacQuitty says Old and New World wines are just different'.
Christian Davis reviews the reviews

Remember Super-Tuscans?

It was only yesterday, it seems, that Super-Tuscans were flying high, write Nicolas Belfrage MW and Franco Ziliani. They were the rebel wines, the ones that broke the rules and whirled Tuscany into the vinous stratosphere of the planet, notching up pundit points higher than all but the best Burgundies and commanding prices that would not have made a second-growth claret producer blush. They were the breath of fresh air in the musty dankness of Tuscan tradition.

Crisis control

As the crisis' in Italian wine sales deepens, the number of ideas about what should be done continues to grow.