Walter falls for Albana di Romagna

One of Italy's idiosyncrasies is its two-tier system of quality wines. While Italy has corralled every snippet of vines in a system of denominations called Denominazione di Origine Controllata, or DOC, it additionally has a superior level on top of that, Denominazione di Origine controllata e Garantita, or DOCG in short.

The purpose of this top level, created in 1963 but not implemented until the beginning of the 1980s, was to highlight the very best Italy had to offer, not only by demarcating a specific area but also by guaranteeing, as opposed to merely controlling, its output. Although it is...