Ep. 4 Monty Waldin interviews Giuseppe Tasca d'Almerita of Tasca d'Almerita Winery | Discover Italian Regions: Sicily / Sicilia

Italian wine podcast. Chinching with Italian wine people. Hello. My name is Monty Walden. I'm with Giuseppe Tasca from the Tasca Delmerita. Do I say that right? Winery in Tasca Delmeritas. Perfect. Okay. Tasca Delmerita, winery in, in Sicily. How long has your family been making wine? We bought the state in eighteen thirty, so it's, I'm not good in mathematics, but more or less, almost two hundred years. And which generation of the family? Yeah. Maybe let me out the age generation. And your brother is called? Alberto. Okay. So who does what? Do you do the cells and he does the vineyards? He do the numbers and I do and I I talk with people to wash their brain, try to say that Sicily is the right place where to be where you have good raw materials, good wines, good everything. But Sicily is getting is getting so not just for Aetna, but but in general, it's getting very renowned as a as a source of very, very interesting wines made from interesting grapes, from an interesting place. I mean, is that also partly the fact that the wines are seen as or have been traditionally seen as kind of good value? Or is it, or is it something more than that? Yeah. I hope there's something more than that. But anyway, Being a good value wines is always, a good, tool if you are not really well known for the wine. So sitting in the last three years, find a, an open door, I can say to, because all the wines were very high prices and we did a good quality wine and introducing the market all over the world. Now we, our average prices, climbing out step by step, making all always better quality, try to do our best. Not not only as old decision. We are very big and nice group of sicilian wineries. Okay. So so when you started thirty years ago, that was sort of at the beginning of the revolution. No, ma'am, I don't know. I can second sign a point when the revolution began. My grandfather started in nineteen fifty, free to export wine. And then, we did our job. My father did his job step by step, and also a lot of other wineries helped us to promote the sicilian brand. Okay. I mean, so what do you think has changed over the last thirties. I'm not just talking about sort of technology, but maybe the mindset of sicilian producers. People making sicilian wines. They're not all actually from Sicline. Yeah. Yeah. Well, the new generation, caring about agriculture and Viticulture in Sicily are much I can see much performing. They, they have a big passion. They have a, and so they, and they travel a lot. We are pioneers. We go we travel all the year along. So I think we, we promote word by mouth what we do and, and people liked it. What what are the main varieties you work with? Are you working with, like, bordeaux grapes and chardonnay? Are you working with traditional, sicilian grapes? We do both. We used to start with traditional grapes then in the late eighties. We start with the chardonnayas and Cabernay where my father was the first in Sicily to plant it. And that was a good weapon when I went to New York. If I go inside a restaurant and said I have a I'm a sicilian producer. I haven't heard about it. They just tell me, I'll get right out of here. I don't have time for you. If I will, the first time I went there and said I have a shutdown SCC and children. They told me, let's try it. That's what the beginning to be better known and now we have the chance to introduce all our grape, native grape variety that are more than fifty. So we we have to work step by step, focus on some of them and then maybe in a couple of generation to make a good work. But do you think do you think almost we're going backwards rather than doing it? Did you say thirty years ago, buyers would only look at your torch if you had merlot, carbonate chardonnay now. Actually, they're saying we don't want chardonnay from Sicily. We want, native grapes. That's that's not, obviously, the trend is always changing. You have native that are now our timing up and then maybe such as can you give me some varieties that are particularly hot at the moment? By the thing that, obviously, Nieraldaba, but, I think Grillo will be, the next one. That's a white grape. Yeah. It's a white grape. Very pleasant, very distinctive. In what way. And then we have a because it's good aroma, typical aroma, and not to have you very fresh to drink with a good deminorality and slightly floral? Slightly floral, and not really a tropical fruit, but very smooth and pleasant. And then, it's a very nice red variety. Yeah. Obviously, obviously on the at night, one of the what season is coming better known for. So you're talking about and you you've obviously got vineyards on Aetna as well. Yeah. We we just bought it in just eight years ago in two thousand and eight. So that that's seen a massive boom, hasn't it? Well, it is the a lot of energy that the quality of the wine is outstanding. We love it because there's they're not big in genuine, like people who are used from Sicily. They're very narrow, straight, and, elegant, naturate of color, guttenants, lung aging, think wine fans should step once in Vietnam. Okay. So when you're at home in the evening, do you just grab the nearest bottle you got on the table and sit down and relax, or do you always use sort of, you know, right? This wine is going to go with this dinner I'm having this evening or you're a bit more relaxed? How do you do it? I'm a my passion are aged white wines. So when I have the chance and I have something already pretty cold, I open a an aged grid low, an aged catarato or something that I have in my suburb. So when you say age, how many years are you talking about? I'm between eight and twenty. Really? So people say, how is it possible that you have a white wine from a boiling hot place like Sessie? How could that possibly age for twenty years? Cisley is a continent. It's not one place. You have very cool places too. You can ski in Sicily. You can do a lot of different things. So we have the chance to to do warm wines and fresh wines at the same time. I mean, do you do you think maybe that's also a problem of perception that people, somebody would think that maybe sicilian wine is, like a picnic wine to be drunk immediately? You're saying that it's actually a very serious wine that's capable of aging just as long as a white burgundy, for example? Perception, obviously, it's important. And I think we are trying to change perception of people step by step. Aetna wines can do that very properly. The DOC where we are, the Contellis Clafani DUC is always is also making a very long agent, Colorado. And, we trust on those, white varieties. I personally are my passion. So what are your favorite dishes with those white varieties? What do you drink? Do you do you a good cook? You like cooking? I love cooking. So what do you what do you cook then with, with those white varieties? I have not, I'm not, the one that say that with red meat, you need red wine or things like that. It depends. I love, obviously seafood and fish and seasonally we have a very good quality of it. And then I love sea orchans. I love oysters, raw fish. I'll absolutely love it. Maybe not in a Japanese style, but in a sicilian style with some, skin of the orange or pepper salt and a little bit of oil. No lemon. I don't like lemon in the fish. Okay. Was it all yeah. It's quite acidic and it maybe upsets the. If the fish is older, you can use lemon to hide it, but if it's fresh, but I think you need to have it without. So how do you how do you unwind? You obviously travel a lot. I mean, you talk about going to New York restaurant. What do you do when you just wanna forget about wine. Well, I almost never want to well, I drink. No. I'm joking. Obviously, I I love to drink. I also drink some beer sometimes. I'm not shy to say say that, I love sports. I love to play tennis, parallel golf. Okay. Same ways. I love a lot of music. I always, I've seen not less than twenty concerts in a year, I think. There's not all jazz rock and no end classic. Everything. But if you if you're, if you're, like, having a travel escape, you have to go to New York, you say, right? I'm gonna time my my visits in New York so I can go to this restaurant and see this person in concert or this band. Do you do it like that? Are you that organized? Not at all. When I am free on vacation, I love to in Italy, we say Navigara Vista. That means that you don't have no aiming, no plans. No plans. Yeah. Just feel what is happening around you and go Mhmm. And go forward. What what what is your next challenge on a personal level? And what is your next challenge on a wine level? You talked about perception Yeah. Then obviously, perception, it's important. My personal, challenge is to make the world know that Colorado, Grillo, and Karicante, they can have a very high and fantastic quality for a long aging wine that you can match with a lot of different foods and they and so that's in the wine what I like to do. In in my dreams, I have a lot of different greens, not only talking about wines, talking about agriculture, talking about style of life. I think Sicily, it's really a place with the very deep culture, very deep roots, that we can match altogether and make a fantastic place for visitors of all over the world. This is my dream bring everybody in Sicily. Okay. Do you say it's been a real pleasure talking to you. Hope to see you in Sicily sometime. Oh, why not and we can drink some, I'd love to try some twenty year old Calicante with you. Thank you. And I hope everybody listening to us will come to see us at once. Okay. Thanks a lot. Follow us at Italian wine podcast. On Facebook.