Is there a better time of year to experience the pleasure and glory of Lambrusco? In a word: No. Italy’s anytime, anywhere, fresh, light, fruity fizz has seen a major resurgence over the past handful of years, and thanks to the work of some stellar producers is no longer the daggy plonk that some readers of a certain age might recall from dinner parties gone by.
Sebastian Von de Sype is one of several makers leading the charge in Italy, a former F1 engineer and disciple of Mt. Etna maestro Frank Cornelissen. His family founded Tenuta La Fiamingina – a 10-hectare estate just south of Modena – in 2020, and the wines just keep getting better and better. Both his pet-nat styles, the 2021 Lambrusco Ancestrale and the 2022 Rosato Frizante, are incredibly refined; the former full of energy and brambly dark fruit, the latter lighter, yeastier and steered by the flavour of tart red berries. There’s a traditional method in the mix, too, the 2021 Rifermentato, which offers more upfront in the dark cherry/plum zone, but like the others has a disarming sense of purity and length.
Back on home soil, pet-nat miracle worker Tim Ward is at it again with the 2022 I’ll Fly Away Red Lambrusco: as pocket friendly ($28) and picnic ready as a bottle of wine gets, all chewy and earthy and ferrous, but easy, dry and uplifting all the same. And young Lewis Martin (son of Ravensworth Wines’ Bryan Martin, who some of you may have seen treading the boards at P&V Paddo) has also thrown a hat in the ring with his 2024 Lambrusco for the Forest Dwellers. Think figs, cherry compote and mulberries, brisk and delicately beaded. Praise be!