Veneto Workshop
Workshop - Wines Of Veneto
11th - 17th October 2015
Italy
Wines Of Veneto Workshop
Educational Tours & B2B meetings
Veneto Promozione S.c.p.A.invites international buyers and journalists to ‘Workshop – Wines of Veneto’, B2B meetings between Italian wine producers, international buyers and journalists. Three days of the program were dedicated to visits to territories and companies, in order to deepen the knowledge of well known wines and to discover other interesting products. The visits were organised with the cooperation of the "Wine Protection Consortia", which are the organisations aimed at defending and promoting productions and denomination of quality wines.
Almost 35 delegates from Singapore, Vietnam, Poland, Finland, Czech Republic, South Korea, Japan as well as Sweden attended the event. Wine importers as well as journalists were invited. Translators were assigned to the Korean and Japanese delegates. Millie's Enterprise was among the three Singapore wine importers to participate in this event.
Day 1
Piave DOC/Prosecco DOC
First visit to Tenuta San Giorgio winery and next visit to Casa Roma, in Piave. Presentation of wine area and consotia (Vini Venezia Consortium/Prosecco DOC Consortium). Light lunch at Casa Roma.
Day 2 – 1st B2B meeting
Day 3
Gambellara DOC
Visit to Zonin 1821 winery. Presentation of wine area and consortium (Gambellara DOC). Zonin have a large museum and impressive winery stamps collection. Light lunch.
Visited Vignato winery.
Dinner at restaurant Caffe Dante, Verona.
Day 4
Veneto Volcanic Wines: Soave and Durello
Soave DOC/Monti Lessini DOC
Warm welcome from Giovanni Ponchia (Soave Consortium)
Visited Relais Soave where we had presentation of wine area and consortia (Soave DOC/Monte Lessini DOC). Meeting with companies and wine tasting. Light lunch.
Toured the hills.
Visit to Azienda Agricola Coffele winery -
This winery have returned to the traditional Veronese system of drying (‘appassimento’) where the grapes are attached to a vertical framework and left to dry for many months, from September sometimes even until April. They are the first in the area to implement the technique.
This system is much more expensive and requires a lot more space, but the results are far better as the grapes are dried to a higher quality when compared to other drying systems. As a result of this, in 2003 we built a fruit loft or ‘fruttaio’ so as to be able to study this process in more detail. The location is a result of a deliberate choice.
The room was built on a ridge (Sponde) of a hill where there is never any fog and, where we have noticed over the years, has good air circulation. Taking advantage of these optimal conditions, they then looked into a software system that would automatically regulate the opening and closing of the large windows, so that only through the movement of air, they obtained the best level of humidity and temperature within the fruit loft (fruttaio).
This allows an ‘appassimento’, which is more natural (also the characteristics of the winter will pass to the wine) and allows a considerable saving in energy as they are able to do without humidifiers and air conditioners.
Later we visited the Cantina di Soave winery.
Day 5 (Last day) – 2nd B2B
Dinner at Ristorante Pizzeria Acqua e Grano - pairing pizza (Old Roman Style) with wines Chiaretto and Bardolino.
On the whole the event was very well organised. Food catered at the hotels and participating wineries were excellent. Different delegates might go to different wineries in the educational tours. We have seen manual grape harvesting, crushing of grapes and even tasted the first fermentation of wines direct from the steel tanks. We visited the cellars and museums of these wineries and also wineries with organic cultivations. The most unique is the drying of the grapes at Azienda Agricola Coffele. The only thing least expected is the weather - the rain. On many occasions we were drenched wet as the tour buses were parked a distance away and we were not equipped with umbrellas. Roads in the cities of Italy are very narrow!