VinItaly Day Three

I kick off the day with noble rot tasting - Auslese, Beerenauslese, Trokenbeerenauselese. Although the class is conducted in German with translation to Italian, Joyce from Fishbone joins me for the class so we had fun tasting and joking about the sommeliers.

After the class, I go to meet with Peter Muscet's Italian friend Federico. It is so much easier to navigate the maze of Italian regions with a guide. We taste some top wines from Italian premium regions and I have learnt a bit more about terriors and wine making techniques from different regions.

There are 600-700 different varieties in Italy. Even if the grapes are the same genetically, because of the region they grow, the taste is completely different. I feel for the sommeliers who have to study Italian wines for two years before moving onto the new world.

Towards the end of the day, we start bartering Australian wine for all sorts of things - Pisco sour, craft beer, gin tonic, truffle, olives, biscuit, salami. Australian wine is like the new type of crypto currency that is popular and highly valued everywhere. We are planning tomorrow afternoon, we will start going around with a box of Australian wine and barter for everything and anything.

Learnings:

Like previously mentioned, lots of Italian wineries are family own. A few generations later, children from these families split the property into smaller and smaller patch. Today, most wineries are around 20 - 40 acres and some family members own perhaps 10 vines and make a label out of it.

The Italian spend lots of efforts into making good wines which are not always commercially viable. For example, entry level wines starting from £5 ex cellar whole sale, mid level / blend (normally would have been oaked for 2 years) starting from £10, premium starting from £40+. A lot of overseas buyers are looking for entry level wine that tastes like premium wine to present back to their bosses.

Some of the Italian wineries are so small that they have to host private wine dinners, wine education, tour to the property for perspective buyers to get a feel of the wine, to fall in love with the wine, to "have wine on the lips" [something like "bum on the seat."

The way the trade works here is that a big wine retailer would have hired a number of trusted wine consultants (the prawns) to visit mega wine fairs like VinItaly to look for the gems. These consultants would go back with a few options and the head Buyer of this big retailer will balance the price and the taste with consumer demands to choose which wines to import. Same principle applies to premium hotels, wine bars, and restaurants. Another bonus point is, using words by Jason, head wine buyer from Aldi, "medals are extremely important."

Because of the history and the beautiful renaissance chateau on the property, lots of this wineries venture into functions - weddings, corporate events, etc. to make ends meet. On the other hand, owners of these chateaus (children of the wine family) would have a full time job somewhere else to supplement this money loosing passion project.Read more