I've not seen harvesting info about Italy, but did see that Bordeaux harvesting this year was (by a day or two), the earliest ever. Similar to early Bordeaux reports, this (Alta Langa - A large area, mostly to the south / south east & south west of the Langhe) report seems to suggest the drought wasn't as damaging to quality as expected, and hot/dry can certainly help avoid a lot of issues, even if I tend to prefer the more grumpy structured wines from less hot vintages
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Ad inizio agosto il pinot nero e il chardonnay per l'Alta Langa docg, da pochi giorni il brachetto per le bollicine dolci e secche del Brachetto d'Acqui e dell'Acqui docg, tra qualche giorno, la ra...
www.saporidelpiemonte.net
The phrase 'in vino veritas' (in wine there is truth), was originally I believe referring to the alcohol relaxing us so the truth came out, but in these situations is nowadays sometimes co-opted to refer to holding judgement until the wines are made, bottled and poured into a glass - only then is the truth revealed
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It will be interesting if you have any producer visits planned, to see what their view on it is. The timing might mean they'll be harvesting the Barbera/Dolcetto/White grapes when you're there. That can be a problem for visits, but provided a lovely highlight when we visited a small family-run winery in Ghemme (Mirù). They were bringing Nebbiolo grapes in that day, and they went straight into the press when we were there. The winemaker (Marco) offered us a glass of the freshly pressed juice to taste. I doubt I'll ever taste a more enjoyable fruit juice in my life!
On a non-wine related note, our local market (in UK) has stocked chanterelles for a couple of weeks, which is very early. Not sure on volumes, but they look (and taste) very good. Hopefully a little rain over the next week might bring the porcini out en-masse. It should be a perfect time of year for them.
I've not specifically hunted out local news online, but this site appears to have decent coverage
Piemonte - ANSA.it: Ultime notizie, foto, video e approfondimenti dalla Regione Piemonte.
www.ansa.it
and I also forgot to say that the
www.langheroero.it tourist office site (and bricks and mortar locations) are very good indeed, with lots of activities and listings.