Gravner: a Divine winery visit in Collio, Friuli, Italy

A pond at the oldest vineyard.

Amber, not orange

Standing here, at the front yard of Gravner winery, in the village of Oslavia, I’ve arrived at the heart of modern orange wine. Gravner’s main building is in Italy, but so close to the Slovenian border that we can see over to the other side: “those trees over there are in Slovenia!” This border region of Italy’s Collio and Slovenia’s Brda is culturally very united. The border has been moved around, and the separation between Collio and Brda (on the Slovenian side) is practically artificial, hence the locals call it Collio-Brda.  Also, this building is the only building in the village of Oslavia that survived the First World War intact – at the time it served as a hospital for the wounded. Today, its peaceful cellar protects numerous gigantic, hand-made clay vessels called amphoras (or kvevris in Georgian) that have been imported from Georgia. They are now buried in the ground, where in their wombs they mature some of world’s most spectacular wines made using prolonged skin contact. I had the privilege to spend an afternoon with Mateja Gravner contemplating the delicate relationship between vineyard care and nature’s balance, discussing Gravner’s ecologically responsible and aware wine philosophy, and tasting their divine wines.

Josko Gravner, Mateja’s father, is the iconic master of wines produced with prolonged skin contact. His uncompromising and bold choices of both wine-making materials and methods have laid the foundations for orange wine culture in the area. Gravner’s wine production philosophy prioritizes the character of the original grape. Protecting nature is important to Gravner, and it is one way of ensuring that the varietal character becomes fully communicated in the final product. The less the wine is disturbed with outside noise (e.g. chemicals in the vineyard, fining, etc) along the way, the more “alive”, nuanced and clearly defined its character is in the end. On that note, Gravners do not use the term “orange wine”, although Mateja agrees that it is useful for marketing purposes as customers are more and more familiar with that term. Instead, Mateja prefers the term “amber wine” because “amber is alive, but orange is already gone”. Orange colour is monotonous, artificial and dead, she explains, while amber is nuanced and alive. Hence, “amber wine”.

Amphoras / kvevris above ground.

At the vineyard

Mateja takes us to their oldest vineyard planted with 7 hectares of white Ribolla (this variety has a thousand year history in this area) and 1,5 hectares of red and unpredictably grape yielding Pignolo (a local variety as well that almost faced extinction, but made it back). And that is it. Gravner has stopped growing international varieties. Although this vineyard hosts only two varieties of grapes, many other plants and species abound. Promoting biodiversity and protecting the surrounding ecosystem from human impact caused by agriculture are of primary concern for Gravner. As planting the vineyard causes the vines to be overrepresented in that particular system, Gravners have decided to plant fruit, olive and other trees in the vineyard, and even build artificial ponds to support the birds and insects. In this area, there has been a loss of bird species in the past decades. However, thanks to ecologically more aware agriculture and these kinds of interventions, the bird populations have started to flourish again. Wine is nature’s product, and Gravner approaches it as a part of the ecosystem. The more ecologically balanced the vineyards are, the more balanced the grapes, and finally, the resulting wine. And along the same lines, the less the wine is disturbed at any point of its production, the more the final product reflects the grapes of origin. All this crystallizes to outstanding quality in the glass.

Although Gravner works with practically biodynamic (and organic) production methods, they haven’t applied for any certifications. Why? Because they want to work only according to the principles they themselves believe are most fruitful for reaching best quality, on the contrary to working according to certificate requirements that would at some instances require compromising from their own standards. The accumulation of copper and sulphur compounds in the soil is currently a common problem in organic vineyards because they are sprayed with these repetitively to prevent fungal disease. Gravner has found a solution in propolis and algae. With the help of these natural fungicides they have been able to reduce the usage of copper and sulphur up to 40%. “Everything that helps lessen the human impact on the soil must be at least tried”, says Mateja.

“How we produce is how we live”

Listening to Mateja, I begin to understand that for Gravner wine is a living organism that develops and grows at its own pace. It needs to be listened to, its process needs to be followed, not pushed. Mateja often compares wine with growing children:  like a child, wine slowly becomes itself, with proper guidance and plenty of time. At Gravner this time is approximately seven years – this is the time a wine needs to mature after prolonged skin contact, and this is the time a child needs to grow before she is ready for school. And like a proper parent, Gravner makes uncompromising choices to reach a wine that reflects the true character of the original grapes: only the healthiest and optimally ripe grapes are picked, the rest are discarded. And only Georgian, hand-made clay vessels will do. Nothing less, no matter how much effort it may require to get the cellar filled with them.

Mateja Gravner and the spectacular Rosso Breg 2004 made with Pignolo.

Before the amphoras, Gravner produced their wines in a manner still very typical to Collio: international varieties filled the vineyards and the cellar was full of stainless steel and modern technology. No doubt, this set produced wines of the highest quality with crisp acidity and fruity freshness – wines with international appeal. However, Josko Gravner didn’t taste the original varietal taste of the grapes in the end product. Further, he noticed that international wines as well as the wines of his own area seemed to lose personality and approach a uniform style. This bothered him.

A turning point was reached in 1996. This was a very poor vintage. Gravner lost a devastating 92% of Ribolla grapes. Josko decided to experiment with the remaining 8% to finally determine what interventions would allow or hinder the Ribolla varietal taste of the fresh grapes to shine through in the wine. He attempted e.g. making Ribolla wine with or without cultured yeasts; with or without prolonged skin contact; with or without sulphites. The final results? Unsurprisingly, Ribolla’s character was the clearest with minimal interventions. As a conclusion, Josko Gravner opted for amphoras as they, without any other technology but a minimal amount of sulphites, allowed for prolonged skin contact and retained the fresh aromas of the wine.  Mateja says: “Amphoras are nothing exotic – they just bring together everything that is required to achieve a high quality wine through extended skin contact without any extra technology.” (An article about Kvevri/Amphora as a wine making technology is available here.)

Gravner's cellar is full of amphoras buried in the ground.

Determined to produce characterful wines, in 1997 Josko Gravner sold his shiny stainless steel tanks and started his challenging journey towards creating a cellar full of Georgian amphoras. Easier said than done. At the time Georgia was still politically unstable. To travel there was a questionable undertaking as such, but to get the actual amphoras to end up in Collio, a herculean task. The first batch of amphoras arrived in no earlier than year 2000. There were eleven amphoras, out of which nine were broken. Naturally, the conclusion was to order more Georgian amphoras! The vintage of 2001 was the first when Gravner produced some wine made in amphoras. Today, all their wine is produced in amphoras, including the red Pignolo. After pressing, Pignolo moves into oak barrels to mature, but Ribolla stays in skin contact for six months in amphoras before racking, and after continues to mature in amphoras until the following autumn. After this period also Ribolla is matured in large Slavonian oak vessels for six years.  

Tasting wines together with Mateja Gravner crystallized the spirit of this uncompromising winemaking philosophy into concrete reality. These wines were outstanding throughout. Each of them would deserve a detailed, in-depth review. Attempting to write a short version would not do them justice. Instead, I will warmly recommend these wines for wine enthusiasts and anyone fascinated by unique wines of outstanding quality. What I took home from this visit (alongside with a couple of lovely bottles to my collection) was the comprehension that a wine is born, when its process is allowed to take place in the right conditions without extra manipulation. My visit at Gravner helped me to trust the process instead of pushing the river – and this applies equally well to life as well as wine making in kvevris/amphoras.

Amber wine.

Coordinates

Azienda Agricola Gravner Francesco
Localita Lenzuolo Bianco 9
Oslavia 34170 Gorizia

tel. 0481 30882

info@gravner.it
gravner.it

 

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Dear friends of wine and Divine Wine. This last article has taken me an unpardonably long time to write. Another project outside wine has become very time intensive in my life. So, dear friends, it is time to say good-bye, and thank you all for reading Divine Wine blog. I wish you all the best wines now and in the future! Cin cin!  

Orange wine part II – Where it all started

Magnificent kvevris (or amphoras) decorate Gravner's vineyards.

Where it all started 

Some argue that orange wine is just a whim of fashion. However, archeological findings from Caucasus, or modern day Georgia, locate the origin of wine making to this very area. The excavated red clay vessels with wine residues on them support the notion of orange wine being the first wine ever made, which took place around 6000 B.C. Furthermore today, the very same type of thick walled, cone shaped, red clay vessels, kvevris (or qvevris), are used for fermenting and storing orange wine in Georgia as they were roughly 8000 years ago. Kvevris surely make oak and stainless steel look like whims of fashion!

In addition to their constant success in Georgia, kvevris have increasingly made their way to Europe since 1990’s. Currently, the heartland of kvevri fermented and maturated wine is in North-East Italy, in Collio-Brda area. This region is situated at the border of Italy’s Friuli and Slovenia. Orange wine is also produced in various vessels (plastic, oak, steinless steel) at numerous corners of the world, including Croatia (the neighbour of Italy and Slovenia), as well as other parts of Italy, Sicily, France, Austria, California and Australia. Kvevris, however, are hardly seen outside Georgia and Italian/Slovenian Collio-Brda area.

What is a kvevri?

Kvevri is a cone shaped red clay vessel lined with beeswax. They vary in size from small (100 liters) to enormous (10 000 liters), and are sometimes also called (slightly inaccurately) amphoras. However, kvevris differ from amphoras in that they do not have handles, and are shaped differently. In fact, at a quick glance kvevris appear really impractical: you can’t carry them and they will fall on their side due to their sharp shape when placed on a surface. Why on earth were they made this way 8000 years ago, and still are?

Kvevris (or amforas) buried in the ground at Gravner.

Kvevri is buried in the ground

Kvevri’s odd shape is geniously functional considering the winemaking circumstances thousands of years ago. There was no technology for temperature control or chemicals available for sanitation (not to mention understanding of microbes). A kvevri buried in the ground provides the wine with steadily temperature controlled, cool environment. Soil in the ground remains cool and in relatively constant temperature year round compared to air temperature, which might vary in Mediterranean from blazing hot in the summer to minus degrees Celsius in the winter. Temperature variation and high temperatures are detrimental to wine aromas. Hence, kvevris.

Lacking tannin, white wine is especially susceptible to oxidation and infection. This is why ancient white wine was made with prolonged skin contact to extract tannin, a natural antioxidant and preservative, to the wine. Although tannin shields white (or orange) wine from being spoiled, extended skin contact is not without risks. Especially stalks and pips are plentiful in bitter compounds and in abundance result in unpleasant, astringent wine. The solution is kvevri’s shape. In the start of fermentation most of the skins, pips and stalk material is floating on the grape juice. As fermentation continues, more and more of this cap starts to fall on the bottom of the fermentation vessel. The first to fall down are pips and the stalks; the skins follow later. In the cone shaped kvevri, these most bitter components of the grapes become soon covered with grape skins. In addition, kvevri’s conical shape nicely limits the contact area between the fallen solid material and the wine, and on top of that, allows only minimal contact between the wine and the bitterest part of the grape material. Genious!

Natural wine

Orange wines are produced in variety of styles – with more or less prolonged skin contact; aging the wine for months or years; in all kinds of vessels including kvevris, stainless steel, plastic and oak. However, practically all orange wine producers are minimally interventionistic, meaning e.g. that they rarely add commercial yeasts to their wines or use herbicides or pesticides in their vineyards, and often use only very small amounts of sulphites to protect their wines from spoilage. Some of them are certified organic or biodynamic producers. This minimally interventionistic approach is rather ambiguously referred to as “natural wine”-movement, and due to its broad definition, covers a multitude of more and less adventurous wine making philosophies. Getting acquainted with orange wine will inevitably bring you in contact with natural wine and its various quality levels as well. So, let’s enjoy this adventure together!

Orange wine part I – It’s your time to shine, orange wine

The colour of wine in 2016 is orange.

It’s your time to shine, orange wine

What are the very first signs of Spring? For a Finnish wine lover they are the increasing amount of day light that makes snow glitter, and wine bloggers’ predictions of upcoming wine trends. My contribution to that discussion can be condensed into two words: orange wine.

Orange wine is making its way forward as a part of natural wine movement. Despite of the criticism regarding their durability, natural wine, similar to all natural and organic in the food and beverage world, is very hip at the moment. During the recent years, orange wine has increasingly attracted the interest of dedicated wine lovers. Finland, however, still remains virtually untouched by this style’s influence. My prediction is that in 2016 orange wine arrives in Finland, and becomes more mainstream among wine lovers elsewhere.

This spring, Divine Wine blog celebrates orange wine with a series of stories. I will start with introducing you to the basics of orange wine. Subsequently, a number of divine orange wines will be reviewed and a wine bar specializing in orange wine recommended. But most importantly, we will continue our vinous journey in the border region of Italy, Slovenia and Croatia, the current heartland of orange wine in Europe. There, I’ll take you to visit an iconic orange wine producer, Gravner. What an excitingly orange spring, dear vinous friends! This time I’ll review the basics of orange wine, and next time we’ll progress into more historic layers to understand the phenomenon.

What is orange wine?

The term ”orange wine”, was created by David Harvey, a wine importer, who used to work at Cornelissen in Sicily, Italy. Cornelissen made orange wine but a proper descriptor for the style was lacking. Not really intending to create a new concept, Harvey just described the product as orange wine. Incidentally, however, the wine loving audience found this term handy, and orange wine has remained in wine vocabulary ever since. Still, it should be noted that orange wine is not an official wine term. This is because orange wine is technically white wine.

So, what makes a white wine orange wine? The answer lies in the orange winemaking technique, which is very similar to red winemaking. During making an ordinary white wine, the juice is pressed out of the grapes, and the grape skins and the seeds are discarded right away. Red wine making is quite different, as red grapes are crushed to release the juice but the skins and the seeds are left to macerate in contact with the grape juice created. While this maceration, a.k.a. skin contact, continues, colour, tannin and flavour components are released from the skins and seeds to the juice/wine. How long this skin contact is allowed to continue depends on the grape variety and the style of wine aimed for. For example, very thick skinned grape varieties with abundant tannin should not be macerated for too long to avoid overtly tannic, astringent and austere wine. Typically, the maceration time for red wine is around a couple of days.

Orange wine is made with prolonged skin contact (as red wine is) but of white grapes (as white wine is). Compared with red grapes, white grapes have substantially less colour, tannin and flavor components in their skins, hence orange wine producers may let the maceration continue for ten days, for months, even for years.

This kind of prolonged skin contact releases colour and tannin from the skins along with bitter components from the skins and especially the seeds. The final colour may be anything from deep gold, via amber, to brown. Also, the structure of an orange wine differs profoundly from ordinary white’s structure due to the presence of tannin. Not all grape varieties are suitable for prolonged skin contact. Only a few grapes are able to give birth to balanced orange wines that are refreshingly acidic, yet tannic, and elegantly aromatic.

The characteristics of a variety, as well as the optimal ripeness of the grapes are emphasized by the long maceration time. Should the variety be very aromatic, there is a danger of aromas overwhelming the wine’s balance. If the grapes are too ripe, there simply isn’t enough acidity left to carry the weight of the tannin. Somewhat under-ripe grapes won’t work either: the bitter components released from the seeds as well as the skins will dominate the wine’s flavour, again throwing the wine out of balance. As a style, orange wine is not for the faint hearted. Producers undertaking this challenge need true skill and determination to accomplish a wine that is elegant. Natural wines have received criticism due to the unpredictability of their quality and durability.

Orange wine is not free of this criticism either, although tannin is a natural preservative, hence supporting the idea of making orange wine naturally. Although there are controversial orange wines of unpredictable quality in the market, the majority of orange wines I’ve tasted are a pure delight. The best producers of orange style make wine that competes in elegance and quality with the world’s greatest wines.

Friuli - the hidden gem amongst Italian wine regions

Friulano grapes in Colli Orientali, Friuli

Delicious autochthonous grape varieties

Friuli-Venezia Giulia, or Friuli for short, is internationally well recognized for its high quality white wines that have entered the awareness of wine world since the 70’s. However, my reasons for travelling to Friuli were different. I was curious of the once nearly extinct autochthonous grape varieties that, fortunately, during the last decades, have again attracted the local winemakers attention. Black varieties such as Pignolo, Refosco ja Schiopettino, and white varieties Friulano ja Ribolla Gialla have become a medium for nurturing the local winemaking tradition, and as they are becoming Friuli’s wine signature, the area is distancing itself from the past neutrality of producing neutral, simple wines from international grape varieties.  

While the white wines made of both international and local varieties in the eastern Collio area  are still getting the most attention as Friuli’s premium wines, the black varieties have made steady progress behind the scenes. Since the 90’s the quality of Friuli’s Bordeaux blends and varietal Merlot has been recognized. Nevertheless, the area’s highest potential probably lies with the fascinating, autochthonous black varieties that are now being vinified using temperature control and thoughtful oak treatment - sometimes in blend with international grapes but more often on their own. The results are top quality red wines with longevity and personality that can’t be replicated anywhere else.

Eastern Collio on Slovenian border is orange wine's home

Orange wine’s home

It wasn’t only the local, obscure grape varieties but also the tradition of orange (or amber) wine making that made Friuli so magnetic for me. This style of making white wine with long skin maceration times, which is normally the procedure in red wine making but not white, is characteristic to the geographical area around the border of Italy, Slovenia and Croatia. Due to the extended skin contact, these wines receive more colour (orange or amber), tannin and flavour extracts from the grapes compared to white wine made in standard style. Consequently, orange wine’s structure and aromatic profile differs from those of conventional whites. Tasting orange wines previous to my travel to Friuli only added to my curiosity towards this particular wine style, and I was very excited to see the European home of orange wine making as well as to visit its top producer, Gravner. I’ll return to this subject and the divine wine visit at Gravner in my later posts.

Friuli is located in northeast Italy. Image: Wikipedia.

Premium wine from the east - everyday wines from the west

After highlighting the Friulian gems of autochthon grapes and orange wine it is only appropriate to finish with going back to the basics - to contextualize a bit. Geographically, Friuli-Venezia Giulia is located in the very north east of Italy, historically at the border region of Venetian and Habsburgian rules. These two historical powers are still influential in Friuli’s winemaking traditions as in Collio region in the very east, on the border of Slovenia, white wines dominate the production - in line with the taste preferences of Habsburg tradition. On the other hand, red wines are in the majority in Colli Orientali, only slightly west from Collio.

Top wines come from Collio (lime) and Colli Orientali (orange). Image: Bigger than your head.

What makes Friuli the hidden gem amongst Italy’s wine areas are its characterful reds from Colli Orientali that are on the rise, Collio’s whites that are regarded the best in Italy, and the uncompromising orange wine making very particular to this area. Oh, and I almost forgot to mention Friuli Isonzo (in dark green on the map) that produces excellent wines despite its vineyards growing on a pancake flat riverbank. Still, the reality is that two thirds of Friuli’s wine production comes from areas to the west of these top quality regions. The monstrously huge Friuli Grave DOC (in blue) covers majority of this production, offering mostly good, simple table wine for everyday consumption.

In terms of classification, to date only four Friulian wines have DOCG classification, three of these being sweet dessert wines made of Picolit and Verduzzo. These wines earned their merits at the royal courts of Europe in 1800’s, and despite of their current minuscule production volumes, they are still the jewels of Friuli’s wine crown. The most elegant expression of Verduzzo comes from Ramandolo DOCG at the eastern corner of Colli Orientali. 

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After this intro to Friuli, the blog posts to follow will take a more in-depth look into Friuli's local grape varieties, as well as orange wine. All this juicy information will be applied to practice on Divine Wine visits to exciting wineries in Colli Orientali and Collio, and enjoying the best local wine bar at the village of Cormons at the heart eastern Friuli. Great times ahead!

Divine Wine on summer vacation

Divine Wine takes a holiday au naturelle!

My vinous readers, Divine Wine will be off the grid for the next few weeks. After this summer break, I’ll be back with new interesting themes and wines - including orange wine. Let’s enjoy the summer sun and refreshing wines until we meet again!