Thursday Virtual Happy Hour: Fiano

Fiano is a high-quality, white-wine grape variety used widely in southern Italy, particularly in Campania. Commonly found as a varietal wine, Fiano is nutty and textured with floral and honeyed notes, spice and tropical fruit flavors like pineapple. Its main incarnation is as Fiano di Avellino DOCG wine.

Fiano thrives in the volcanic soils of the Apennine Mountains. Terroir is particularly important to Fiano, and can have a big impact on the finished wines, which range in style from taut and minerally to nutty and rich. Fiano can develop a sweetness that makes it extremely attractive to bees, as referenced by its traditional name, Vitis apiana ("the vine beloved of bees").

Many winemakers use various winemaking techniques to enhance Fiano's natural organoleptic properties. The most important of these is lees contact, a process where the wine is left to mature with the by-products of fermentation such as dead yeast cells, seeds and skin fragments. This contact can add texture and weight to the finished wines, as well as added flavor. While Fiano is best known for its dry wines, it is also made into dessert wines, usually through the traditional Italian method of air-drying. Sweet Fiano wines are luscious and textured, developing dried fruit flavors like fig and prune. The best examples of Fiano can improve with 2-3 years of bottle age with secondary characteristics of honey and hazelnuts developing.

Fiano can range widely in style, from wines which might suit a poached fish dish, to richly textured whites which might suit something like slow-cooked belly pork or a hearty chicken dish.

We have a choice of videos to watch including:

1. https://youtu.be/8acW1Ucal7w?si=om1JKhVlFjPniny9 - FIANO, The Next Trendy Wine -
   Bob Paulinski, Master of Wine (12:16)
2. https://youtu.be/jHc1JyU1EKA?si=TGfyz8GvZaNyLaG0 - Fiano - Know Wine In No Time (5:39)
3. https://youtu.be/59NVgxa30UU?si=QPFuiS-ELrpbSli2 - Fiano Intermediate Version - Wine with Jimmy (5:11)

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So, pick up a bottle and watch a couple of videos. Let us know what you’re drinking and eating, and, if possible, the region from which your wine comes. Do you have any comments (positive or negative) about the videos? And, as always, tell us what’s going on in your life - what's happening with you, how you're feeling about things, updates, successes, challenges - as much or as little as you’re willing to disclose. We are in this together. And - thank goodness - we have wine!

Cheers!!