Longanesi

I chanced upon this stall in the 2013 Wine and Dine Festival, specializing in unfamiliar Italian wines. It was at this stall that I tasted a dry Cinque Terre wine as well as the white wine from Elba. I tasted this Burson, made from the Longanesi grape. There is not a lot of information about this grape and I cannot find it on the VIVC database, but it seems to be another ancient grape saved from extinction, this time by a certain Signor Longanesi after whom the grape is now named. The grape seems to have existed for centuries in the area around Ravenna, and it was Longanesi who noticed this singular vine climbing up an oak tree in the 1950s. After a great deal of effort, the grape eventually its way into the National Registry in 2000, and the local consortium registered the name of Burson as the wine made from it. Of course there had to be a link with the discoverer of the grape, it was his nickname, which unflatteringly means a bore. I tasted this example of Burson: a deep ruby red with leafy acid berry nose, the acid berry notes on the nose carried through to the palate accompanied by sweetness and lummy notes, beuing well supported by an acid backbone.