What a thrill for me to be asked to present a tasting of 13 of Valpolicella’s most iconic wineries in Houston!

The “Famiglie Storiche” association (Historic Families of Amarone) tasting will be held at the Hotel ZaZa Museum District on Wednesday, May 3, at 11 a.m.

Here’s the flight (wow!): Allegrini, Begali, Brigaldara, Guerrieri Rizzardi, Masi, Musella, Speri, Tedeschi, Tenuta Sant’Antonio, Tommasi, Torre D’Orti, Venturini, and Zenato.

Click here to register.

My relationship with Valpolicella dates back to my early university years in Italy when we would drink the wines in the many wonderful old-line taverns that dotted the Padua cityscape in the late 1980s. My Italian “identity” is deeply tied to the Veneto region where Valpolicella is a “local” wine. My spoken Italian, any Italian will tell you, has a strong Veneto inflection. My tastes were shaped by those first tastes.

Getting to lead a guided tasting of these wines is a dream come true. It feels like it’s all come full circle, as they say.

I hope you can join me. Thanks for the support and solidarity. And after all, do I really have to drag you out to taste wines like these? No, I didn’t think so!

I’ll also be presenting an awesome flight of Chianti on Wednesday, May 17, again at the Hotel ZaZa, at 11:30 a.m. More on that event later. In the meantime, here’s the link to register. Thank you for the support!