Wine Review of a pithy Pecorino

To most of us, Pecorino is a cheese... As in, "Topped with grated Pecorino-Romano".  Pecorino cheese comes from Sardinia, an island off the west coast of Italy in the Mediterranean Sea.  Throughout the ages, Sardinia has been an area rich in cultural and political history due to its unique location.  In this place, the cultures of Eastern Europe, Western Europe and Africa have blended through time to give the place a magical quality.  Consider this: (from Wikipedia): Sardinia shares with the Japanese island of Okinawa the highest rate of centenarians in the world (22 centenarians/100,000 inhabitants). Thus, I expected great things from the Pecorino wine.

Now forget everything you were expecting... Cheese, Islands, maybe crackers, and fine wine...   Because the Pecorino grape is from the opposite side of Italy.... the northeastern coast, and landbound, not from the islands... and tastes unexpected. 

After tasting it, my best description is that Pecorino is an Italian mountain man's (or woman's) wine.  I feel like you can taste the stone in it.  It tastes preserved as if it is intended to be kept by a farmer in his cabin who can't get to town very often.  Therefore, I think it would pair well with beef jerky or kebabs.  The color of the wine is a deep white, pushing on lime green.  As would be expected for a wine with that heft to it, the drink tasted very "wet" on first touch with the tongue, then moved to a "dry" aftertaste.  What  I am trying to explain is the juiciness of the wine when compared to the dryness. The bottle I tried was Monti Guidi Del Carmine Pecorino.  (Under $20 in state stores.)

For another review of this wine, see video from Nathandoesvino.com.   I think he does a great job at describing it as well.   He makes a good point that this wine has a lot of fruit stone taste and smell to it.  Therefore, it is a wine for those who might like sangria, for example, where the fruit flavor is prominent.   Pecorino is a pungent wine that's not for the weak of heart.  To me it smelled of lime blossom and peaches.  I agree with him that there's a small hint of honey in there.   I am not sure that the particular bottle of Pecorino that I tried did justice to the wine varietal, because my experience was not as glowing as Nathan's.  I would try this wine the next time served with tapas or antipasti as opposed to on its own.  The one thing I would comment on in comparison to Nathan's review is that he compares the nose to a riesling.  I want to qualify this statement by explaining that the pecorino is very similar to a riesling in its intensity of smell, its wine body, and and its minerality.  I do think the underlying scents are different, though.  But there is truly a valid comparison here.

Due to the continuing food trend where there is popularity in serving small portioned plates with big flavors on them, I would not be surprised to see the Pecorino varietal popping up more often on menus where I dine out.  Don't be afraid to try it when you're having a rich, spicy or smoky dish.  Do pair with food for best enjoyment though.

Ciao!