At Les Pallières this year we are going to try our hand at making a cask of Gigondas rosé, so Daniel Brunier came down to meet with me and Jean-Marie Peyraud at Domaine Tempier for a serious rosé session. Pick the brain of the master, you know? We began with the Tempier rosé vintages 2003, 2002, 2000, and 1999 while the two vintners talked rosé theory and vinification. Then Jean-Marie dug out a 1990. Hmm, fourteen years old, still good, better than good. Age a rosé? 
     When we got to my place for lunch I pulled a magnum of 1983 Tempier rosé out of my cellar. Spectacular! Believe it or not, it is complex, fascinating, and delicious at 21. It is not old. It is fine with being 21. In this brochure about seven years ago I wrote about draining an old Tempier rosé with Richard Olney, Lulu, and Jean-Marie. It was one of Lucien’s rosés, 1953. We inhaled it. 
    Then to table, where I blew their minds like I knew I would with this amazing Bardolino: Red wine, now. The rosé story was just an opener, an intro. This Bardolino stunned them, folks, and they didn’t even know how low the price is. A luscious red, it is simply overflowing with good things. My guests found some cherries and berries, of course, liked the harmony, the this and the that, but the message is: try one, then come back for cases. 
     It also has, buried in its abundant, dazzling fruit, a tinge of the typical Italian bitterness, and that, I swear, really does the trick at table, even with, especially with, any recipe using tomatoes, like the zucchini/tomato gratin I served them. A good marriage, we all agreed. –September 2004