BABO Wines’ Prosecco Rosé 2019
- 93
- $28
- Drink by: 2021 - 2023
Share
While we have been able to enjoy Australian-made prosecco rose for a couple of years, the home of the grape – Italy – approved production only last year. The wait, it must be said, has been worth it.
BABO is claiming bragging rights as one of the first prosecco roses to be available in Australia and, what’s more, that it has been made to suit Australian tastes in that it is a brut style (ie. less than 12 grams of sugar/litre).
To label a wine Prosecco rose D.O.C., producers are obliged to follow a number of rules, the most important relating to the grapes. The only grapes permitted are glera (originally called prosecco) and between 10-15% of the red pinot nero (pinot noir) grape which provides the blush. I like the concept of a vintage prosecco rose, it not only gives extra cred to prosecco and the house style but ensures a potentially longer ageing – and therefore drinking – period.
The clear bottle is marketing gold. The wine’s pretty pale, dusty pink blush will walk off the shelves once drinkers catch an eye full. It’s reassuringly classy to look at. Ditto the taste.
This is a delicate sparkling with a pulsating bubble, intense mousse and the lifted scent of musk, nougat, strawberry and red berries. Juicy to taste with a light, fruit tingle sweetness amid the musk-confection, red fruits and nougat. So fine it almost melts in the mouth with a brisk, fine-edged acidity. And it’s well-priced.
Molto bene!
Jeni Port is one of Australia’s top wine communicators. Based in Melbourne, Jeni created the first wine column in the (then) Sun News-Pictorial before moving over to The Age and becoming that paper’s longest-serving wine writer. Over the years she has written for most Australian wine magazines and these days calls WinePilot home. She is also a Tasting Panel member on the Halliday Wine Companion. She was named Wine Communicator of the Year and Legend of the Melbourne Food and Wine Festival in 2014 and in 2018 Legend of the Vine. She is a founding board member of Australian Women In Wine and is the co-deputy chair of Australia’s Wine List of the Year Awards and China’s Wine List of the Year Awards.
