Day Two at Vinitaly was awesome. So many great wines. Here were my favourites.
Tag Archives: Vinitaly 2014
Vinitaly Day One: highlights….
Well as much as Vinitaly is a slog, it is great to catch up with so many of our producers and taste upcoming vintages and chat about how things are going in our markets. With Australia so far away, it is hard for producers to keep their fingers on the pulse in regards to market changes so it is up to us, as importers to give feedback when we meet.
Day One was focused mainly on seeing our existing suppliers with visits at Fattoria Parri, Salvatore Moliettieri, Le Moire, Traversa, Bruno Porro and Fatalone.
All the upcoming releases look good but special mention to the wines of Moliettieri which was off the charts. The 2010 Irpinia Aglianico, 2011 Greco di Tufo and 2012 Greco di Fufo and Fiano di Avellino were mind blowing. Great things to look forward to Australia.
Also a surprise packed was the 2012 Parri Chianti. We new it was good, but to see it look so fresh, savoury and alive definitely put a small on our faces.
After arriving back to the hotel after 6pm, it was time for a spritz and then dinner at our favourite restaurants in Verona.
In Italia and have hit the ground running….
Well after 30 hours travel time it was good to arrive in Rome Tuesday afternoon and relax before we hit the ground running on Wednesday morning. Our first stop was the headquarters at Farnese in Abruzzo who are the guys behind Pipoli (Basilicata), Gran Sasso (Abruzzo) and Lucarrelli (Puglia) who we represent in Australia.
It was a great afternoon going through all the new vintage wines which will be available in Australia throughout 2014 and also some new wines which I think will be well received in Australia. All the wines focus on indigenous varieties grown in the region they originate from. It is good to see also the names Bianco and Rosso appearing on the label from wines that are a blend of indigenous varieties. It will give us a reason to educate and show why these native grape varieties are so suited to these Southern Italian regions.
After a two and half hour tasting we were off for a forty minute drive up to near the top of one of the nearby mountains for a fantastic dinner that put cheese (from Campania) and local Salami front and centre. I have never tried so much fresh cheese and it was hard to stop going back for more.
However, when we were told that main was a 2.5kg bistecca I knew I better keep some room for this. Whilst the meat was great, the highlight was definitely the antipasto.
After less than 24 hours in Abruzzo, we woke up early and drove up to Vittoria Veneto and onto Le Vigne di Alice which is the home of our prosecco for Mondo Imports. Since working with Alice of the last five years, we have seen demand and sales increase at a massive rate and we now ship straight containers of Prosecco to Australia.
These guys are also part of the team behind Umberto Luigi Domenico Cosmo Prosecco which distribute in the Australian market. The new label (a collaboration between Mondo and Australian artist Meredith Gaston) is on the way to Australia and I can’t wait to see the reaction from those in the trade.
After dinner tonight at Le Vigne di Alice we head tomorrow to the town of San Daniele in Fruili and then onto Trieste.
Off to Italy… See you in Roma…
This afternoon I am off to Italy for my annual buying trip for Mondo Imports. Like every year, this trip is jammed packed. Thousands of kilometers of driving before and after Vinitaly, with lots of producers visits from the middle of Italy to the top.
For those wineries that I cannot physically visit, I will use Vinitaly as an opportunity to see familiar faces and see what is planned for the year ahead. After seeing the wineries we import, we will then use Vinitaly to see what else we can discover.
As per normal, I will post regular updates about what I have been doing and the people we have visited.
il vino da tavola 