Read Between the Wines

Due Forni owner Alex Taylor has imbued his new Summerlin-area pizzeria’s wine offerings with as much love and passion as he put into the menu, music and even the lighting. Don’t be shocked when no one plunks a leather-bound wine bible between you and your date, leaving you to sob over the prices. The list is casually printed along with the menu on your placemat, and if you know a thing or two about wine (or know someone who does), you’ll see that hidden gems abound.

“This has been the most fun and the most frustrating thing,” Taylor says of his 37-label by-the-glass list, which features 20 under $15 and 15 reserve wines, $16-$50. But rather than define value as merely easy on the wallet, Taylor looks for wines that are rarely—if ever—offered by the glass and lets his Enomatic wine preservation system do the rest.

You may not be able to afford the ’04 Tenuta Vitanza brunello on the Strip at $120-$140 per bottle, but Taylor is offering this beauty for just $90 a bottle, $20 by the glass.

Though he includes a few domestics and one “smokin’” Bordeaux—a ’06 Chateau Dauzac Margaux—“the Italian varietals is where all the value is.” Like California cabernets? Slip into a nice glass of ’08 Neprica, a negro amaro blend by Tormaresca for $8, $32 by the bottle. Prefer chardonnay? Try the ’08 Villa Antinori trebbiano/chardonnay blend ($9, $36). Taylor selected each wine himself, “and if I only have one, I’m going to have a great one.” So there is even value in the marquee Super Tuscan, a ’07 Antinori Tignanello. At $50 per glass, “it’s not for everyone,” Taylor admits. Then again, he’s already sold upwards of 10 glasses between two regulars who know what the whole bottle would run them just a few miles east. Everything is relative.