Campania, the region around Naples, the Amalfi Coast and Capri, is — along with Apulia — one of the two most exciting wine regions of southern Italy: where there were only three main wineries in 1970 there are now more than a hundred, and over a hundred grape varieties, including three of the south's most impressive ancient ('archaeological') grapes that thrive in the volcanic soils of Avellino, northeast of Mount Vesuvius — the red aglianico and the whites fiano and greco.
Aglianico is the basis for the south's most famous red, the DOCG Taurasi: almost blackish in colour, with fascinating bitter-chocolate, leather and tar aromas and flavours, it is one of the only southern wines noted for its capacity to age — a dark, foreboding wine of marked severity (Mastroberardino's Historia is the benchmark example).
Campania's whites are equally fascinating: the region's hilly geography lets white grapes ripen at higher, cooler elevations that preserve acidity, so greco (greco di Tufo) is bursting with cooling freshness, the softer fiano is less dramatic, and falanghina and coda di volpe round out the roster.
Lacryma Christi, from the slopes of Vesuvius, is Campania's most widely known simple, easy-drinking wine (red, white and sparkling).
