On Sunday morning we visited a medium size winery, this time owned by Marco who is a good friend of the Bronzi’s. He is the gentleman who helped Piero and Polly with the renovation of their house and is responsible for the wonderful layout.
The most interesting thing about this winery is that it is contained in buildings that look like normal houses…..you would never know that there was a business taking place there.
Also, the views are great…..
The grapes are harvested, separated from from the leaves and stems and then crushed. The juice, seeds and skins are stored in these tanks to ferment. Marco has developed a special system with paddles inside the tanks so that the mixture gets stirred from time to time to keep the skins from all sitting on top of the juice.
The wine is then strained out and put into storage tanks. The majority of the wine is not bottled but is sold to restaurants or individuals who bring in their own containers to be filled. However, the best vintages are put into oak casks and left to age…..
These are then bottled and sold under the “Robbia” label. He does not sell to the US because he has yet to find a representative there. He gave us a wonderful bottle of red that was a 2006 vintage and another bottle of white….both were excellent!!!
We had noticed that many of the vineyards had rose bushes planted at the ends of the rows. Piero said that there is a particular disease that attacks the grape vines and that the Roses are also susceptible. So, the growers check the roses as an indicator of whether they need to treat the grape vines…..sort of like the canary in the mines!!
After this tour, we returned to the house to find that visitors had arrived….two friends from Belgium (Alain and Frankie) who were also staying in the area…..
Polly served a very delicious rabbit cooked in white wine with sprigs of rosemary, and sautéed carrots. Dessert was vanilla frozen yogurt with caramelized figs on top. It was fantastic!!!!
We relaxed in the afternoon, taking a much desired nap and then enjoyed sitting outside and looking at the tremendous views!!!! For dinner, we traveled to the local village and a very nice meal of pizza, salad and dessert. Michael had his favorite of panacotta, but I had to try “chocolate salami” which is crushed cookies and nuts covered in chocolate, rolled into a sausage looking shape and cut into slices. It was very nice, but was extremely dense when I was already full from eating a pizza!!!!