Touring Italy’s wine regions is an excellent way to appreciate different Italian wines and landscapes. Italian vacation farms, called “agriturismi” in Italian, are farmhouses or large estate homes that offer both guestrooms and information about the products grown or made on the property. Oenotria, the Land of Wine, that is how the ancient Greeks called Italy.

Puglia is one of the most important Italian wine region. Pizza and spaghetti are universally considered the most popular Italian dishes around the world, but Italian wines are essential to complete the meal. Puglia is the land of some of the most delicious wines anywhere.

The sunny, warm, ancient earth of Puglia and its particular stones are the main ingredients of its wines. For me, Puglian wines are all about negroamaro from Salento, primitivo from Murgia and ancient Messapia, nero di Troia from Daunia and white wines of Itria Valley. All these are fine, dry table wines, at around 13 percent alcohol, great with roast meats.

Negroamaro comes from the southern end of Italy and Puglia, called Salento. It is a red wine, reflecting the climate of the area, soft and warm. The tannins are soft and very ripe making this a really easy drinking approachable red. Primitivo is grown from vineyards surrounding in central Puglia. The wine has ripe black fruit aromas, with notes of pepper. On the palate, the wine has a robust character, a firm structure, and small black fruit and licorice notes on the aftertaste.

If you’re touring Northern Puglia, the Daunia region is one of Italy’s newest, best-quality wine areas. This landscape act as a pastoral backdrop for the skills of the area’s winemakers. The Itria valley region is very picturesque; it’s fun to park by the road and slide down to the vines on slopes. Here every vineyard has its unique character, each steeped in tradition and history. Sometimes visitors can find a winery that will let them clamber into the concrete crushing tanks and stomp the grapes.

There is something you should know before coming here: in Puglia lunch is the main meal of the day, and restaurants open later than you might expect. It is easy to fall into the local habit of long lunch and afternoon siesta. It is difficult to eat out before 8pm in the evening, but you can eat until late, and enjoy the long summer evening walk, strolling through the streets to walk off any overindulgence.