Black cherries, plums, graphite, tapenade, melted road tar and game hits the palate as Romano Dal Forno's 2009 Valpolicella Superiore shows off its personality. The 2009 brings together the signature richness of a wine made from 100% dried fruit with distinctly wild, almost Syrah-like overtones. Inky and intense, with considerable tannic backbone, the 2009 is really more of a junior Amarone than a Valpolicella. Readers will want to give this super-expressive wine another few years in the cellar, but there is a lot to like, even today.

Built like a tank, the 2009 Valpolicella Superiore Monte Lodoletta is a masterful achievement. This wine shows so beautifully, especially in a warm but balanced vintage like 2009. The fruit is expressive and articulate with deep layers of blackberry preserves, dried cherry, dark chocolate, espresso bean, mesquite smoke and soy sauce. The mouthfeel is super rich and concentrated as the Dal Forno signature style would dictate. The tannic bite is still strong and this wine needs a few more years to stretch out its muscular build. I'd suggest drinking it after 2018.

Impenetrably deep ruby. Super-charged cherry nose with a hint of menthol and garden herbs. Surely these are dried grapes? [Indeed, the bunches were dried for 45 days.] Seriously concentrated palate enhanced by perfectly focused, bright acidity and bags of slightly drying, bitter tannins. Almost Amarone-like in its constitution and concentration. Extreme yet serious stuff. (WS)