Montepulciano

The Montepulciano grape is native to central-eastern Italy, particularly Abruzzo and the Marche, and has no historical connection to the Tuscan town whose name it happens to share. Where it’s genuinely planted, it produces generous, deeply coloured, approachable red wine: a workhorse variety that Italian growers have relied on for reliable yields and easy-drinking character for generations, closer in spirit to Australia’s own relationship with Shiraz than to Nebbiolo’s cult-like scarcity.

Australian growers importing “alternative” Italian varieties from the 1990s onward picked up Montepulciano (the grape, correctly identified) as part of the same wave that brought Nero d’Avola and Vermentino into circulation, drawn by its combination of heat tolerance and generous, crowd-pleasing style.

Montepulciano gives deeply coloured, medium-bodied red wine with dark plum and blackberry fruit, soft, approachable tannin, and a savoury herbal edge that keeps it from tasting simple. It ripens reliably in warm conditions and rarely struggles the way more finicky varieties do, which makes it a genuinely useful grape for growers wanting consistent quality without Nebbiolo-level risk or Nero d’Avola-level restraint.

McLaren Vale leads the Australian plantings, joined by smaller amounts in the Riverland and King Valley. It remains one of the lesser known of Australia’s Mediterranean imports, in part because half the people who hear its name assume they already know what it is, and are usually thinking of the wrong wine entirely.