ABM IGP Red Label

The deep one: dense, sweet-sour, poured at the end.

"In wine, you go down to the cellar," Cristina Crotti says of her craft. "In our world, you climb to the attic." Under the roof at Albinea, heat does the work cold does for wine — concentrating the vinegar year by year through casks of oak, cherry, juniper, and chestnut.

Red Label is the house's deeper kitchen balsamic: thicker on the spoon, sweeter and slower than the Yellow, made to finish a plate rather than dress it.

Draw a thread of it over Parmigiano or a hard cheese, stir it into a risotto off the heat, glaze roasted onions or pumpkin as they leave the oven, run a line across grilled meat. It goes on last, always.

Yellow is the everyday; this is the depth. The Tradizionale, above both, is counted in drops.

Meet the House: Two sisters in Reggio Emilia making balsamic in barrels from the 1700s.

Complete your table: The Rainbow Orcio, Muraglia — oil and vinegar, the oldest pair on the table · Rigatoni, Mancini — for the risotto rule, applied to pasta · Cantucci, Mattei — cheese course on one side, sweet on the other.