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Tag: Sangiovese

  • Frank & Serafico farm

    Selection of beers in the restaurant

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    Having passed the town of Alberese and driving towards Marina, we turned left and arrived at the farm after having gone a short distance on a gravel road.

    “Frank” is the name of a red wine , while “Serafico” is the name of a white wine. Actually, the name serafico derives from a midge, which is called serafico in the local dialect and which lives in the coastal regions of Maremma.

    We met Pier Paolo Pratesi, a young oenologist and entrepreneur who started making beer as a hobby many years ago.

    In 2009 he and his friend Fabrizio Testa, another oenologist, founded this farm. Their objective was and remains to produce their own wines and beers with ingredients cultivated at their own farms.

    The following grape varieties are cultivated organically, among them white ones: Vermentino, Sauvignon Blanc, Fiano  and Petit Manseng; red ones: Sangiovese, Ciliegiolo, Merlot, Cabernet Franc, Alicante  e Carménère  .

    The selection of wines can be found here.

    Cultivation of the grapevines and wine-making are done using both traditional and modern methods. The guiding principle is to make wines in a sustainable way and letting quality be more important than quantity.

    Regarding the beers, all of them have a name beginning with Enki who was a deity in Sumerian mythology.

    As stated in their web site: “Enki is the god of the fresh waters on which the earth floats and gives birth to life. Our dear Enki loved beer so much that his daughter, Ninkasi, became the beer goddess. A superb host of feasts and banquets, when he was too drunk, he was said to give talismans and super powers to his diners, forgetting about it all the next day, hence creating great turmoil. It is to him and his sane folly that we have decided to dedicate our beer”.

    As regards the ingredients for making beer, they cultivate barley, which is turned into malt, and hops whose leaves are dried before being turned into pellets and used for adding a bitter flavour to the beer and for finishing off unwanted bacteria.

    The other necessary elements are yeast, which is bought from a yeast producer and tap water. Thus, malt, yeast, hops and water are used to brew beer in an English way like brown ale, pale ale and India pale ale.

    The beer selection can be found here.

    The wines and beers, which are made at this farm, are exported to Germany, Switzerland and the United States.

    This farm also has a restaurant from which guests can have a look at both beer- and winemaking if they arrive when production is made. In addition, there are tables outside the entrance where guests can enjoy their meals.

    Guests at the restaurant can also order fresh bread and pasta whose flour has been derived from grain grown at this farm together with various jams with berries grown at the farm. Vegetables grown at the farm are also used in the dishes, which are served in the restaurant.

    The walls of the building housing the restaurant, wine cellar and brewery are covered with vines, making the outdoor space green and pleasant. It’s highly recommended to enjoy delicious meals from the restaurant with excellent wine or beer, while at the same time enjoying the greenery and the quiet atmosphere of this place.

  • Farms above Porto Ercole

    An olive tree above a dry stonewall

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    Unfortunately, in the past farmers were quite often growing grapevines of low quality in the hills above the town of Porto Ercole and many of them just gave up, removing the grapevines. However, there are still vineyards and olive groves in active use in this area alternating with forests creating picturesque combinations of colours.

    Having ascended a curvy and steep road, passing various wine cellars which had been closed, we arrived at one which was open. In fact, we followed a man called Miro to his small farm high up on the hill. Miro is aged 70 years and he’s still growing grapevines and he has a small wine cellar in his house where he lives with his family. The farm was founded in 1900 by his grandfather who worked as a mason all his adult life. He built the house with the wine cellar and he excavated a well in order to provide for the need for water by his family and the farm, including a vineyard which he planted and maintained the last years of his life.

    Miro is continuing the tradition started by his grandfather, cultivating Ansonica, which gives a white wine, and Sangiovese, which gives a red wine.

    Since the summer of 2018 was very hot, the grapes were mature in August, leading to that the grapes were harvested before our arrival. However, we were invited to visit his wine cellar where he willingly opened one of the tanks containing wine which wasn’t mature yet.

    Originally, there were other types of grapevines in this area, but Miro told us that in centuries past, pirates arrived, raiding and destructing everything, including native grapevines, which gradually disappeared. However, some of the people of Porto Ercole were seafarers and arriving at various ports in Italy, they discovered a grape which was adapted to this area: Ansonica. It’s a grape which is able to grow in long periods of drought and hit by winds bringing salt from the sea, which encircles this pretty promontory.

    This farm is called Ceciario and it’s specialised in cultivating grapevines and olive trees, harvesting the fruits and making wine and olive oil.

    Until 60-70 years ago, people were practising agriculture from a little above sea level to near the top of the hills looming above Porto Ercole. Naturally, the agriculture wasn’t limited to growing grapevines and olive trees as of now where it’s still practised.

    In fact, families were living on the hill and from watching the few existing farms and abandoned ones, given the steep terrain, it was necessary to construct terraces in order to keep the soil from being washed away by heavy rain after long periods of drought. Unfortunately, most of the terraces are falling down and disappearing, being replaced by Mediterranean maquis.

    Setting up the terraces required almost superhuman efforts. First, it was necessary to dig out stones which were big enough t be used for making stone walls by means of harrows, hoes and pickaxes. Having excavated a large amount of stones, it was time to construct a solid wall, which should be able to withstand the outward pressure of soil and plants on the inside. Since the soil on the hills was thin and poor, it had to be transported upwards from fields at the base of the hills. The workers also had to bring animal dung to the soil in order to use it as fertiliser. In order to provide for a whole family, it was necessary to cultivate vegetables, vineyards, olive trees, fruit trees, cereals and legumes. If they had animals, they had to grow fodder for them too. Naturally, it was also necessary to have a source of water.

    Unfortunately, the stone walls on the farm of Miro are not , in general, in good condition and parts of them have already fallen down. On the other hand, nature reclaims what it has lost.

    Anyway, it’s important and interesting to get to know how things were done in the past before the arrival of machines. For instance, some polished stones protruding from the basement had been put there when it was being made. Miro told us that they were used by his grandfather for grinding tools.

    Next day we went to visit another family who were living higher up on the same hill as Miro: the Giacomini family consisting of Grazia and Massimo. The house was built by Grazia’s great-great grandfather such that Grazia is the fifth generation living in this house.

    They willingly showed us their property consisting of plots being supported by stone walls, while their dog followed us everywhere. Originally, a creek passed this property and a water mill was used to grind grain, turning it into flour. Unfortunately, the creek had disappeared and the water mill had been demolished.

    Instead, the stone walls supporting the plots looked vertical and solid, but they have to be maintained in order to support the weight of the soil and plants, else they will fall down sooner or later.

    The Giacomini family were growing vegetables, aromatic herbs, citrus trees and fruit trees on the terraces. An incomplete list follows:

    • basil
      sweet and spicy chili pepper
      white and black cabbage
      squash
      tomatoes
      fennel
      lemon
      oranges
      peach
      sage
      rosemary
      satureja
      laurel

    The property is quite small and the products from the cultivation are consumed by the Giacomini family and their guests.

    Next, we went upwards in order to visit Emilia, an elderly lady who lives alone after her husband died. As we were approaching her house, we could see a vineyard, which seemed to be of good quality, but Emila isn’t able to maintain the grapevines, like her husband was doing. Thus, the vineyard will gradually be replaced by Mediterranean maquis if not someone else will maintain it.

    Like the property of the Giacomini family, there was a water mill on this property too. Below the house, there was a big arc which supported a cupola with two holes through which water from a creek had been flowing, driving the water mill. There were also workbenches and tools for woodworking and a big saw hanging on the wall. In addition, there were tanks and bottles for storing wine.

    After our visit, we went to a former farm, which had been converted into a second home for people living elsewhere. Only some olive trees were remaining, while the old farmhouse had been replaced with a modern one. The terraces, which had been used for agriculture, had been turned into terraces for sunbeds located around a swimming pool in which a robot was cleaning the bottom occasionally.

  • Monte Argentario farm and guesthouse

    Holding a Vermentino grape cluster

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    We visited this farm where one brother, Marco, runs the farm, while the siblings Mara and Maurizio are running the guesthouse.

    On an area of about 30 hectares of fertile soil, vineyards of white grapes: Vermentino and Ansonica, and a red one: Sangiovese are located between hills covered by Mediterranean macquis.

    Having arrived during the harvest of Vermentino , we could watch Marco driving a tractor very slowly between two rows of vines, while two workers were standing on a carriage mounted at the back of the tractor. As they passed plastic cases full of juicy grapes, the workers put the cases on the carriage in rows and columns.

    In the meantime, we walked along a row where workers were busy collecting grape clusters. First, they cut the stem of the cluster with pliers, next they let it fall into a plastic case. They repeated this procedure until the case was full, then they started filling another one.

    After some time, the carriage was fully loaded with cases of grapes, meaning it was time to return to the wine cellar next to the traditional farmhouse, which has been turned into a guesthouse.

    Having reversed the tractor such that the carriage was located next to a an open metal container with an Archimedean screw at its base. The workers let the grape clusters fall into the container where the Archimedean screw was continually rotating, forcing the grapes to enter a chamber where they were de-stemmed. While the stems were excreted into a box lying below the machine, the grapes were crushed and the juice was pumped into large steel containers in the wine cellar.

    Since Vermentino is a white wine, the must is separated from the skin and the seeds in order to avoid extracting the tannins occurring in the solids. Yeast may be added to the must and in the tranquillity of the container a metamorphosis is occurring: the yeast starts the process of fermentation where the sugars in the grapes are turned into alcohol.

    When all the cases had been emptied into the machine, the workers would put them back on the carriage and Marco would drive back to the vineyards where the empty cases would be unloaded, while the the full ones would be transported to the machine for de-stemming and crushing.

    When the Vermentino harvest would be finished, Marco and the workers would start harvesting Sangiovese. Contrary to production of white wines, the skin and the seeds of red wines are pumped into steel containers together with the must. In this way, the colour pigments and the tannins present in the skin of the grape, are passed to the must.

    As regards renewing the grapevines, it’s common to buy them at nurseries. They become productive after about five years and enter their prime when they are 8 years and they keep on producing at a high level at least until they are 20 years old. However, they can be productive for many more years. For instance, a wine farm I visited in Piemonte  had vines dating from 1928!

    In between some of the rows of grapevines, there were rows of leccino olive trees, all in all about 1000 trees. The row of vineyards and olive trees together with the verdant hills surrounding the fields created a wonderful mix of greens, adding aesthetic value to the fertility of the land.

    According to this web site, this is a tradition which has been practised in the Mediterranean region for millennia. The olive trees shelter the vineyards somewhat against wind, but the most important is that as the wine harvest ends in September-October, the olive harvest begins. Thus, the farmer can let the same workers who have been harvesting grapes go on to harvest olives.

    This land is rich in sandstone and pebbles, making the soil very suitable for growing grapevines and olive trees because the plants get enough nutrients from the soil and it’s able to absorb large amounts of rain. In addition, between the verdant hills of Argentario and the lagoon, the microclimate is perfect for a sound growth of the plants. They are protected against winds from the south-east because of the surrounding hills, while sea breezes from the north serve to give a well-balanced growth of the grapes.