Villa Dora, Lacryma Christi Del Vesuvio Rosso, “Gelsonero”

Today’s wine outperformed some more-expensive, more-famous competition at an Italian wine tasting hosted by SommSelect Editorial Director David Lynch. He recounts that below, along with the details behind this southern Italian showstopper.Back in November, the SommSelect team had the honor of pouring wines and hosting some educational tastings at the Napa Valley Film Festival. Ian Cauble led a blind tasting seminar, while I took the crowd out of California briefly for a tour of “Italy’s Noble Red Wines.” I’ll wager that some of my peers would question my putting this wine in a lineup that included the likes of Brunello di Montalcino and Barolo. I questioned it, initially, too: There are more prestigious appellations that feature southern Italy’s Aglianico grape, such as Taurasi in Campania and Monte Vulture in Basilicata, and since it’s hard enough to get people to accept Aglianico as a ‘noble’ variety on par with Sangiovese and Nebbiolo, maybe I should have gone with one of those. But