Puglia

The region reads from north to south. The Tavoliere around Foggia is open plain. In the centre the limestone plateau of the Murge rises behind Bari, and around the Castel del Monte, Frederick II's octagonal hunting lodge, Nero di Troia and Bombino Nero give the region three of its four DOCGs. Further south, around Gioia del Colle and down on the Ionian coast at Manduria, Primitivo takes over — the same variety, DNA has shown, as California's Zinfandel and the Croatian Crljenak Kaštelanski. Manduria's sweet version, Primitivo di Manduria Dolce Naturale, is the fourth DOCG.

The Salento peninsula, squeezed between the Adriatic and the Ionian, belongs to Negroamaro, traditionally grown as low bush vines. It is also where Italy's first bottled rosé was made: Leone de Castris's Five Roses, from Negroamaro with a little Malvasia Nera, in 1943.