The rediscovery of Pecorino
Confusion is usually the first thing that people experience when confronted with the Pecorino grape for the first time. "Isn't Pecorino the name of a cheese?" many ask, and, of course, they're right. Pecorino Romano is the name of a famous sheep's milk cheese made in the Latium and Sardinia regions of Italy, while the Pecorino we're concerned with here is a grape grown on the other side of the Italian peninsula in the Marche and Abruzzo regions. One might be inclined to wonder if the grape and the cheese had something in common given their identical names and the answer is, kind of. Both are derived from the same word, pecora, which means "sheep" in Italian. Pecorino Romano (and Pecorino Toscana and Pecorino Sardo) is so named because it is a sheep's milk cheese. The Pecorino grape is so named not because of any kind of direct link to sheep, but because it is said that sheep particularly enjoyed eating the grapes while they were being driven through vineyards from pasture to pasture.
July 26, 2017
Confusion is usually the first thing that people experience when confronted with the Pecorino grape for the first time. "Isn't Pecorino the name of a cheese?" many ask, and, of course, they're right. Pecorino Romano is the name of a famous sheep's milk cheese made in the Latium and Sardinia regions of Italy, while the Pecorino we're concerned with here is a grape grown on the other side of the Italian peninsula in the Marche and Abruzzo regions. One might be inclined to wonder if the grape and the cheese had something in common given their identical names and the answer is, kind of. Both are derived from the same word, pecora, which means "sheep" in Italian. Pecorino Romano (and Pecorino Toscana and Pecorino Sardo) is so named because it is a sheep's milk cheese. The Pecorino grape is so named not because of any kind of direct link to sheep, but because it is said that sheep particularly enjoyed eating the grapes while they were being driven through vineyards from pasture to pasture.
In the early 1980's, a man named Guido Cocci Grifoni was doing research on native grape varieties on the eastern coast of Italy within the Marche region. Like the researchers in Tuscany who discovered Pugnitello, part of his research was devoted to trying to save heirloom varieties from extinction, but he was also looking for more characterful grapes to make wine from than the local Trebbiano and Malvasia clones. Rather than starting out by combing the fields, Grifoni and his team started going through the written records for the region and in the course of their research, they discovered the presence of a tiny vineyard on the right bank of the river Tronto which was located 1000 meters above sea level and was owned by an 80 year old man named Mr. Cafani. Mr. Cafani's vineyard was purported to have a few struggling vines of the old Pecorino variety and when they visited the site in 1982, they took some of these cuttings home with them.
Grifoni campaigned for official recognition and received it in 2001 as Pecorino was finally allowed into the Offida DOC zone, where wines carrying the Offida Pecorino DOC designation must contain at least 85% Pecorino grapes
Source: http://fringewine.blogspot.nl/2012/03/pecorino-offida-marche-italy.html
Our Vanita Pecorino is straw yellow with greenish highlights. The aromas of this wine remember white pulp fruit, especially pears. You can smell balsamic notes that reveal the good quality of the wood. This wine is good as aperitif and excellent with fish courses.