2022 Vignamato 'Ambrosia' Castelli di Jesi Verdicchio Riserva

This is the white I pour when someone tells me Italian whites don't age.

It comes from one hillside in San Paolo di Jesi, in the old Classico zone of Castelli di Jesi. That is the Marche, on Italy's Adriatic side. Umberto Ceci bought the first plot here in the late 1940s. His son Amato took over in 1952. The family is now four generations deep, and the vineyard is almost all Verdicchio.

Ambrosia is their top bottling. It comes only from the estate's oldest vineyard, 2.5 hectares that Amato planted in 1975. The vines face northeast on clay soil with limestone mixed through it. They are farmed organically and picked by hand into small crates.

The cellar work takes patience. Native yeasts do the fermentation in vitrified concrete. The wine rests on its fine lees, then spends 24 months in concrete before bottling. There is no oak in the process at all, so the weight you taste comes from old vines and time.

In the glass it is deep straw with a green edge. Pear and apple lead, with a bitter-almond lift and some wildflower honey underneath. It is rich, close to Alsatian in weight, and the finish runs long and mineral.

The 2022 is just starting to open, and it has well over a decade left in it. Drink a bottle this fall with smoked fish or a roast chicken. Put the rest away and try another in 2030.