Brachetto

Brachetto makes one of the few red sparkling wines anyone takes seriously, and it does so by being unapologetically sweet. Brachetto d'Acqui, from the hills between Asti and Alessandria in south-east Piedmont, is pale ruby, low in alcohol, gently fizzy and intensely aromatic — rose petal, wild strawberry, raspberry and a touch of peach.

The aromatic profile is not an accident of winemaking. Brachetto is a genuinely aromatic red variety, one of a small group that includes the Muscat family, and its perfume comes from the grape rather than from yeast or oak. The wine is made by arresting fermentation early, which leaves sugar and keeps alcohol down around five or six per cent, and carbon dioxide is retained in a pressurised tank. Nothing about the process is designed to add complexity; everything is designed to preserve the smell of the fruit.

Its natural partner is dessert, and specifically chocolate — one of the few genuinely reliable chocolate pairings in wine, because the sweetness matches and the acidity and light tannin cut through. It also works with strawberries and with simple fruit tarts, and it is very good chilled on a hot afternoon when nothing more serious is wanted.

A small amount of dry Brachetto is produced, and it is a different and much less persuasive wine: the perfume remains but without the sugar it can read as soapy. The variety has also been grown in California, where it is rare.

It is easy to be snobbish about a sweet sparkling red, and easy to be wrong. Brachetto d'Acqui holds DOCG status, Italy's highest classification, and the best examples are precise and lifted rather than cloying.