Wines made from the lagrein (la-grine) grape have a dual personality, because of the region they’re almost exclusively from. That region is Alto Adige, which borders Austria in northeastern Italy. Alto Adige was a part of Austria-Germany for centuries until 1919, when it was reassigned to Italy after the war; for this reason, it is still referred to as the Sudtirol, and its language and culture is still largely German. Lagrein’s dual personality arises from this Germanic leaning in an Italian region: Cities are known by alternative German and Italian names (Bozen in German is Bolzano in Italian), German is spoken in most areas, and regional foodstuffs include gulasch made from beef, veal, or pork; dumplings called canederli, often flavored with meat; wiener schnitzel; sauerkraut; and wonderful cow’s milk cheeses. It is impossible to think of lagrein as a typically Italian wine—and yet it could be, if it weren’t so Germanic.
The lagrein grape grows well in the basin around Bolzano, the regional capital of Alto Adige and the northern gate of a wine road that unravels south along the Adige river valley and into Trentino. Any wine lover who has tasted Alto Adige’s many high-quality Austro-Italian whites (look especially for those from Hoffstatter) will be unsurprised that Alto Adige is the Italian region with the highest percentage of DOC wines. And yet, a peculiar circumstance is that most of the wine of this region is made in cooperative wineries, usually associated with less developed grape growing areas that are just beginning a quality wine production. The difference, as Joe Bastianich and David Lynch point out in their excellent book Vino Italiano, is that here the co-ops aren’t government run (often with generic oversight and high production incentives), but have been originated by the farmers themselves. Colterenzio is one of the best-known of these, a co-op of some thirty producers that was formed in the ’60s and produces varietal, estate, and prestige bottlings, much as a private producer would.
The lagrein grape produces a deeply colored and traditionally tannic wine. For years, this was used to beef up the color and structure of other reds in the area, and it is still used for blending (in the EU, a varietally labeled wine, such as “Pinot Noir,” is allowed to have 15% of unnamed grapes in it). In the past, most lagrein was grown on pergolas—overhead trellises that allowed air to circulate beneath the leaf mass, and pickers to stand beneath to harvest. More recently, though, producers have begun training some vines closer to the ground using the guyot method, which tends to promote ripeness, as fruit bunches are more easily exposed to the sunlight. Thus, the rustic lagrein, a difficult ripener, can show quite lush fruit and riper tannins in some varietal bottlings.
The three lagreins I tasted lost their initially rough edges after 15 minutes of air. They would benefit from decanting. But each opened up into a very layered wine, with typical forest flavors among the fruit.
Colterenzio Lagrein “Grieser” 2002 is from the cooperative mentioned above, made from grapes from the Grieser vineyard. It smells of black cherry and stewed black plums, with a slightly medicinal edge along with some spice and cedar from the barrels. The cedar carries over onto the palate, while the fruit 
becomes an intense sour cherry, along with dry tobacco and forest-floor notes. On day two, the nose becomes less sweet and more herbal, and the palate intensifies from woodsy to almost piney. The woodsy notes overpower the subtle bratwurst I try with this wine, and even salami can’t quite stand up to it, but the wine complements my strong, Roaring Forties blue cheese and a basic Locatelli Romano very nicely. A puttanesca or the Tomato and Sausage Risotto on www.smittenkitchen.com would probably do quite well with this wine.
Tramin Lagrein 2005 is also produced by a cooperative. It has subdued aromas of general red fruit and plum, with a hint of earthiness. The flavor is of superripe blackberries and black cherries, along with brine-cured black olives, with slight wood notes from 50% barrel aging. It is a youthful wine that shows less woodsiness than the older Colterenzio. It is brilliant with the bratwurst and with Boucheron goat cheese (less pungent than the blue) and excellent with sauteed mushroom bruschetta—subtler flavors for a fruitier wine.
Heinrich Mayr’s certified organic vineyards are right on the edge of Bolzano, in danger of being swallowed by the expanding city. “Nusserhof” Lagrein Riserva 2003 is a deep, opaque purple, suggesting its fuller body and extract than the previous wines. The aroma is so precisely of plum tarts in almond shortbread crust that I turn to the oven for a double-check. There are also chocolate-covered cherries and, oddly enough, buttered popcorn. It is only the nose that’s sweet here—on the palate, a sharp sour cherry takes over, with underlying notes of cocoa, hay, and forest leaves. Each of these three wines has a typical, slightly bitter finish, but the Nusserhof is the only one with any length. It’s also the only one of the three that hasn’t seen oak—the wine is aged in the bottle before release, and is still approaching its peak, in the next three to five years. This, too, is good with the subtler food flavors of mushrooms, Boucheron, bratwurst, and becomes somewhat neutral with the blue cheese.
How to Find Them
Colterenzio: $9.99 in New York at Astor Wines, or contact the importer, Domaine Select Wine Estates, for availability elsewhere
Tramin: $16.99 in New York at Union Square Wines, also available at Harlem Vintage, or contact the importer, Winebow, for availability elsewhere
Heinrich Mayr: $22.99 in New York at Astor Wines, or contact the importer, Louis/Dressner, for availability elsewhere.
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