This week, the first official week of summer, has also been a week of sparkling rosé discoveries. First there was the Bugey-Cerdon, the off-dry, pink bubbly from the Savoie in France. Then, another pink came out of the blue the other night. The sommelier recommended it with this pistachio, mascarpone, and cherry sorbet construction I ordered, and not thinking it was going to be fizzy and not white I said, sure. Then out it came: a little glass of dark carmine wine called Brachetto d’Acqui, with bubbles somewhere between the full liveliness of a champers and the slight frothiness of a frizzante. Unlike the Bugey-Cerdon, the Brachetto fully embraced its sweetness, and its residual sugars, along with its fresh cherry and raspberry flavors, made it a perfect match with my dessert. (At only 5.5% alcohol, it didn’t make me sleepy during the opera afterward, either.) It turns out to come from Piedmont in Italy; the winemaker is Giacomo Bologna, and this particular bottling called “Braida” from the 2005 vintage retails for about $23.

But a dry, full-bodied, red, served cold — with bubbles? For my reaction to this unusual suspect, click here:

This bottle I bought on the insistence of my favorite local wine merchant and I have to admit it sat for a couple of months before I dared open it. I mean, it’s not every day you say, “You know what? I think I’ll have an Italian red with some bubbles.” But sparklers-on-the-red-spectrum seems to be the theme this week, and I came home from Iphigénie en Tauride hot and thirsty, so took the plunge. Now this wine, an Oltrepò Pavese “Viti di Luna” 2005 from the Cantine Francesco Montagna in Lombardy in Italy ($14), was a definite departure from the pink sweeties I’d been exposed to lately. Made from bonarda, a native variety very similar to Dolcetto, the Oltrepò Pavese was a dark red wine, dry and tannic, but with the added fun and refreshment of bubbles and a chill. I am not ashamed to admit that I fully enjoyed it with a plate of really garlicky sundried tomato pesto.