Ep. 841 Maddalena Pasqua Di Bisceglie | Get US Market Ready With Italian Wine People

Thanks for tuning into my new show. Get US Market Ready with Italian wine people. I'm Steve Ray, author of the book how to get US Market Ready. And in my previous podcast, I shared some of the lessons I've learned from thirty years in the wine and spirits business helping brands enter and grow in the US market. This series will be dedicated to the personalities who have been working in the Italian wine sector in the US, their experiences, challenges, and personal stories. I'll uncover the roads that they walked shedding light on current trends, business strategies, and their unique brands. So thanks for listening in, and let's get to the interview. Hello, and welcome to this week's edition of Get US Market Ready with Italian wine people. This is Steve. Right? And, I'm really pleased to have as a guest this week. Madelena Pascua de Bachella. Did I pronounce that right, Madelena? Yeah. Perfectly. Thank you. Oh, or close. Okay. Yeah. That's not easy to pronounce. So congratulations. No. Not at all. I first met Madelena at Van Italy several years ago, and I distinctly recall when I had asked her question. Tell me about yourself, and you started the conversation by saying, well, once there was a little girl, And, really, that's kinda the intro here. Give us a little background on how your family came to buy the wine or what your role is in it and what your philosophies were and what a challenge that might have been to get started that way. Thank you for the question. Steve. So, Mozilla is the name of any state, not the family name, because my father arrived in Mozilla, almost thirty years ago, having a dream, having a dream to interpret his own place. So he wanted to have a special project for a local traditional wine, and he wanted to to have something very special to represent, is on tradition. And so he found that this is an incredible place in, in the east part of verona. It actually has an estate. He's a sort of a national park. He's a protected park, where animals plans, houses are protected. And, and so he decided to establish there is on a, a winery involved with myself first, and, then my mother, and, and then all the family. Because my cousin is working here too. So it was definitely a family business. And, we try to do our best in, in keeping displays in good health and, keeping these plays available to the people in order to understand what is the and how we were I would the traditional, viticulture is interpreted here. Your, initial philosophy was biodynamic, which at the time, I don't think I can say that it was revolutionary. It was certainly different and not commonly practiced there. I've met and visited and toured a lot of biodynamic producers, but I'm reminded of one particular image, and I have a photograph of we were at your winery and we walked out into the vineyard and you said something like Steve. Now here, I wanna show you something, and you stuck your hand into the soil in between the rows. And the hand went all the way up to, you know, almost to your wrist. Easily without, you know, unlike when you would put a shovel in. You made the point that the tilth of the soil, the word in English is is is shows you exactly what's going on in the soils and the preservation of the microorganisms and all that kind of stuff. But there's a bigger issued to or, philosophy behind biodynamics. Tell me how you first found out about it, why you've embraced it, and how you've implemented that into the wines that you make. So, yes, and we didn't start immediately because here in my, in my place, biodynamic is not that common. People is, still pretty strict to the conventional, all the way to have a pity culture. So we needed to I needed to, to work a lot with my family, you know, to get them closer to this philosophy. And this is exactly what you said. The most important thing is to think about the soil, the renovation of the soil, the possibility of a regeneration of the soil that is a sort of compensation of what the agriculture can do. The agriculture more than agriculture is stress in the soil and the stress in the soil, you will lose all the bacteria, the, the microorganism, everything is able to make the, the humus. And humus is, the fundamental base of everything. Is what is giving the food, the real food to the plant is what is giving the, the out immune system to the plant is able to make, to put the the plants in the condition to protect itself, at least, for a big part. And, once again, what we wanted to do because my father want to interpret her this place was important to me to keep the place in absolutely perked health. And the biodynamic was one of the fantastic way. We had the, the fantastic possibility. We had a disposition to do it. And so, after a bit that we, I need to convince to, to let the people go into the, the, the experience. We are now all happy to follow this, this method that is working very well and it made our soil definitely more soft reach as you said, penetrable And so that means, full of air and air means, life, and life, means, life, good life for everybody else. Insect animals, human beings, plants, is it chain? Yeah. A chain or circle? Yeah. Absolutely. We're not gonna go into the details of biodynamics. People can look that up. Oh, it's very long. One thing that has happened in the US in the last two years and I'm not talking about COVID is, Hollywood celebrity Cameron Diaz came out with a wine, which she termed clean wines. She kinda coined that word. Really, what it was is, she started off with, a cover and a couple of other relatively inexpensive Spanish wines that would maybe have sold for six or nine dollars at retail, but she was selling them at my twenty four. And she talked about clean wines and promoted clean wines. And I thought the the beauty of that was by saying her wine is clean, it means that everybody else is is not. And, you know, by definition, biodynamic, I think fits in the category of natural wines, clean wines, and so forth. So there's this kind of issue in the US about what the definition of terms mean. Organic is something that means something very special in the US and it's regulated by the USDA just because you're organic. In Europe, whether you doesn't mean that you're organic here. So talk about her thing about clean wines and how it's become very public and, people are talking about it and your view of natural wines produced through the biodynamic process. Okay. So this is a very long long argument and not that very easy. I mean, I try to make it very short because it's a data listening to the story, organic, biodynamic, and natural. So what does it mean natural? I don't want to stay here and explain it that no one can be called natural when you have, a vineyard, but this is, a sort of polemic. And the reason you say that is because it's a monoculture. Right? Exactly. If I plant a thousand of plants in one hectare with, with no other plants, that is not natural. A natural wine would be a vine in the in the forest, and I pick up one after, you know, looking for like mushrooms. So apart this, Natural wine means normally that they don't add any solfids into the wine. Bella dynamic wine are different because they are more, we are more worry in, in the soil regeneration than effect because when you have a fantastic, good, soil regeneration, you have a lot of substances and natural, elements into the wine, starting from the, the anthocyanis in the skin that are able to create a process in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, not solfits, but sulfur, the steam of sulfur in a very small quantity in order to have a wine able to travel. So, yes, it's a natural wine with a little bit of sulfur that it make, make a dense wine able to travel for a long time. Then there is also an effect with this salt, sulfur because the, all the life is into a biodynamic wine is able to eat the bad part of the sulfur. So, for example, if you have a ten of sulfur, today, in six months, you'll have four because the wine is able to eat it. So starting from this point is a norm that if you have not, a very rich, a live grape, not very powerful instance of life, it's difficult to have in the cellar, the possibility to work without, products that can keep clean the wine. If you don't put any solfids in a wine that I've been, a poor or not a very rich, regeneration in the in the vineyard, it's a, you risk to have some bad smell Or for example, people is not, making it, the, the, the, the, the, the place of the wine, avoiding the receipt that the smell coming from the receipts could have this kind of, bad smell. At the beginning, let's ten years ago, it was a sort of, identity for what it was not, industrial from the factory. So if it's, let's say, dirty or maybe not clean, let's say that. You are sure that it's an artisanal wine and is, not if, why it's coming from the industrial factory or when production. Now, people is a bit tired to taste this, to accept these, not clean wines, because they see people is able evolve within the wild, they see you can have a natural biodynamic, whatever is wine without bad smell simply because they learn better how to do vinification. And so, yes, I think in twenty twenty two, the smell it, the bad smelling wines are less susceptible knowing, even, when you work in, biodynamic or natural wine, you can, have a very good result. So when you say bad smell, are you talking about, like, Brena Mices or? Exactly. Then, but the question is, what do you mean for not clean wines? We would have to open a big, it began for, because it depends, you know. Brett is, not that terrible. If he's in a quantitative, very small quantitative balance with other other elements and a keep, keeping the balance, and also can make a, a richer complexity, for example. Of course, when it's too much, is, unacceptable. Volatile, again, is not that bad. It is in a, acceptor or rate balance with other elements. All of these can create a lot of complexity and is not exactly, mistake. But always depends from the balance that's important, like the alcohol, You can have a very alcoholic wine, but if he's supported by a greatest structure, is not a problem, is, in elements making the wine richer. So the, the, the answer is always balanced. So speaking about high alcoholic wines. One of the things you're famous for is amorone. Oh, yeah. Can you tell us a little bit about the way you make amorone? And when we're done with that, we'll talk about the thirteen families. But tell us, your philosophy on making amorone and, alcohol lab. Amarrone is a fantastic, amazing wines, wine, born here from a different experience. The history here talked about, two millennium of, a wine history in my area. And, the grandfather of Amarrone was called Rachoto, and it was, sweet wine produced by drying the, the, the grapes for three or four months. So you reduce, you can center a lot of the sugars, and you reduce the, the, the, the water inside. And so if when you press, when you fermented it. You have a very intense and rich consent with the master, becoming more than a sweet wine or in the last, seventy years, we are able to have the amarone because we are able to understand how when to stop the the when to stop the the the the the the drying process to have the right quantity of sugar in order to have a rich, powerful wine, but not sweet, right. So our philosophy is actually that. We like to have a biolone with zero sugar resins in order to make a wine able, to stay in every kind of table and very easy in the, in the, in the match with the food. We consider a more all and not a wine for after dinner, but a good, companion for many kind of different food enjoyable today or in twenty, twenty five years. Because having this kind of alcohol structure and, and intensity, you can, you can stop, you can age for, for decades in the right place. So it's a different kind of Ameroni. I personally had the chance to taste most of your wines, and, I can vouch for that. One of the things I had the pleasure of is is dining in the cellar at Botega Vini and, having some friends there and sharing your Ameroni, which fun. Tell us about the family, Astoria, Famoria, and your role there in bottega Nini. Eleven or twelve years ago, we decided to to found this association, put in together, now we're up thirteen different, families, families related, of course, of the wine production. So historical families working in the Amaroniaria because we wanted to, to promote, to, introduce the Amaroni stories, and verification to the world, where sometime, the Avaroni is not, the, is not understood, very well. And, so we wanted to explain the process, the area. And so we put all together even if we are thirteen, located in different part of the Barpolish area. Indeed with different, size of business, of actor, and Viticulture, and also soil. So I found this very interesting because, we have a big scenarios of, amarone production. And, so we can, better talk, better explain all the, the, the, disappearances. And this group of people in twenty eleven decided to, to by this Gottega Delvino. That is, one of the most restaurant, most famous restaurant in my city in Verona. This sort of wine museum is very, very old. We're talking about five hundred years old. Of course, not in this form, but started in that, in that far time. Being a place where, mostly we drink wine. Of course, there is food now as a restaurant. It's very famous, but the, the, the real fame is, for the the wine list, talking about four thousand and seventeen hundred of, more than twenty thousand bottles in the, in the cellar. So for who is interested in that is, is an amazing and, forgettable experience. Yeah. If you're ever in Verona, go to Boodega Divino or Delvino. Yes. Delvino. Sorry. We were so lucky to have the possibility to to be part of this part of history and, of our city. So when you're talking about the thirteen families, one of the things I think that's distinctive about, the Valpolice area is the presence and significance of female principles and owners and winemakers. Marisa Allegrini is one that comes to mind. You as well. You kind of have a a reputation in the area. Can you comment on that? Right. We have many, many women now around. So even at Marilisa and, Nadia Zonato. Let's say in every family there is a stronger, stronger presence of, women. Because for, of course, we have a nice, sensitivity for the, the the the the presence of nature for the relations. So, yes, in that one of you, many, many women now. It's not that uncommon. It it is kind of an uncommon thing, I think, in in the rest of the world, becoming less so, but this whole thing about you know, diversity, equity, and inclusion. Have have you faced issues where you being a woman has been a challenge or a problem or or presented something that you had to overcome? Yes. Of course. I but especially the beginning of my experience, not now, not now, not for sure. When I was younger, well, especially because I was, I was younger and was the, the, the, the daughter of my father, you know, so it's more complicated. But, no, let's say generally speaking, not that much, Okay. Let's move on to the US market. Most of the listeners of this show are in the US market and talk about some of the challenges, opportunities, and solutions you've come up with. You started with a a national importer the, you know, the idea of, selling to one entity and let them manage the brand. And you you've come a hundred and eighty degrees. Tell us about why and what benefits that provides to you and the winery. The different importers. I mean, talking about a one year like mine. It is small and family business. What is important for us is the the the personal approach, the human approach, the the human relation, because we have to, not to sell wine, generally speaking, but we have to sell an experience, a lifestyle, an identity. And so we need to have, a very personal, personal contact And so I prefer to work in, in different areas of the, the, your country with person on the market, but sort of a family business, even, in the, in the important. In fact, my, The majority of my importers are, a sort of a family business. And so I can talk directly with the person who better understand our goals, our results, our changement, the news. So you create a sort of friendship more than a commercial relationship. Plus, I think in your case, it's not like, you know, we have, I think you said, twenty five, hectares, under wine, I believe. And total production is only two hundred thousand bottles. It's not like you have an endless supply of wine to sell. So you're you're not as challenged, I think, on pricing, and you can get the pricing for the wine that the wine warrants and represents. And I think that gives you a lot more flexibility than somebody who's trying to sell wine at, you know, nine ninety nine through supermarkets. So it's just not what you're all about. No. No. Definitely. No. Because, once again, I'm selling, I'm selling my experience, my life, my lifestyle. Try to explain with my wine and my mottos, what we have here. So the idea is to reply the experience to be here to smell the, the, the, the, the atmosphere to, to see the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the atmosphere, the, the, the, the atmosphere, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, kind of experience. I would like the people who could have this kind of experience of drinking my wife. It's not a it's not a game of prices. Yeah, it's, that's a special thing. I think, there's an element of doubt. Even if we are not that expensive. So it's affordable. Well, okay. Just to put things in perspective, the average price of a bottle of wine sold in supermarkets is ten dollars. The average price of a bottle of wine sold at wine dot the wine dot com e commerce of fuel is like thirty eight. And that's the world that you guys are inhabiting is customers are looking for better quality wines, wines that are unique, wines that have an authentic story, and more importantly to many, a person behind it who has a philosophy, and that's really what we're talking about here. So taking that philosophy into specifics, I remember once being in your winery, and I have this wonderful picture of you hugging your the egg. You are one of the first people to bring an egg. Talk, tell us about that. And then then we'll get into the stone, for the stone tanks. I love my eggs. Eggs are the first experience. I had sort of self of unification. Again, what I would like to do is to transfer my soil into the glass. And to do that, we need to touch as less as possible, the grapes, the wine, what, whatever. And the eggs are in a shape that is able to mix, to keep in the movement, the, the wine, and, during the humidification. Without touching it. So the wine for physical events of two different volumes is able, and so two different temperatures is able to keep moving the wine, all the time. And this is, good because he's self filtering the wine, and he's transform transforming. He's making a vinification by itself. So the only thing we do when we put the wine, the egg is to taste it. I just had a sample from the egg. And the wine is slowly mixing, and so month of the month is keeping clean and is making, every, everyday cleaner. And so I want, I won't filter it because it's self, it's self filtering. This is kind of the gentle approach that, a lot of things that people have to do to overcome some of the challenges of, growing and benefiting the wine, you're managing more naturally. Okay. So you've got the egg. Great. You also had done a couple of tanks custom made out of the Veranese stone, the typical red. That is, my idea, honestly, because, again, to make the wine, to to put the the grapes in, in the wine, they perfect calm for it. I saw that it was important to put the wine back in the same material where they were born. And so, in my area, my mozilla is located in a place where the soil is under percent calcar and red clay. The armor also de Verona de Verona is, conquer and, radically pressed together, very compressed. And I see it was an experiment, but then when we try with a lot of, happiness, we saw the wine was behaving definitely better. The, the self verification is happening faster than, in, in a, in a hood or in a oka or in a cement, for example. And so we are continuously now in, I just received the sphere, but because I wanted to try with three volume volumes. And, I'm super happy and make me very excited. So it the to talk a little bit more about that. I I haven't seen that, but I I I love the concept. Yep. Big is it? And how did you get it? How did anybody make a sphere out of Verne stone? I know. I know. It's, it's, it's, it's my idea that I am, I'm, I'm following this concept because it's working. First, I try with two volumes, two different volumes in the same tank, let's say. And now with the sphere, I have three volumes. So I wanted to see if it will create confusion or it will have, because I also put a sphero inside that in the concept of the, Golden's? Like, like, like, the the rule of thirds, you mean, the golden. Ari. See. It's purely aoria. Oh, that's something golden spiral. Yeah. Okay. Exactly. Exactly that. I do would the would the conduct the the the movement of the wine in that, kind of circle. So I'm very curious. They just arrived. I need to, to fill it up. And then, I'll be in Italy, I will tell you, let's experience, sir. Okay. Maybe we can taste it. And speaking of which, so reds versus whites, whenever we talk, it seems like I'm always focused on the reds, but you you guys are pretty famous for the whites too. So you talk about the balance of reds versus whites and their different philosophies of making them? Definitely, the red is the the the the the piggers production. So, red for us, but Prischela, for example, is my favorite wine even if it's the simplest, because better represent what we are doing here, the pureness, the fruitiness, again, the the life is inside without touching it because we don't put in the oak. We just put in cement and, just to make it very pure and transparent and, and sincere. So we don't really, we don't work that much in the cellar anymore. We just keep clean. We just keep, we, we, we follow like, parents, the development of these, these guys, helping in case, but, mostly, we are there. And, we put them in condition to have the right place to stay, the right temperature, we protect them more than, we work with them. So the concept, they're all always the same. Making wine that is very easy to be approached, is very digestible, is healthy, and make you have, fun when you drink it and, not a dick when you get up. There you go. Okay. So one of the things I meant to mention about that that red stone, which you see all of all over Verona and the arena of Vorona was made with it. And you can see embedded in it is all of these, ammonites and, prehistoric, you know, fossils and and kind of things. And it's absolutely fascinating to be just walking around Verona and over in the arena and seeing all of this stuff. And, I mean, two thousand years, that's kinda been there. The arena defines Verona as a as a region, and that's how long you guys have been making wine. That's kind of fabulous. So take that back two thousand years. You're also working with in fluoride. Tell us about that. Look, I'm not the super expert because I just started. I prefer to work with marble. I feel it more in my veins. But again, I like to try everything. So I had, I have a tree tree ham for us in three different sizes, and they are working very well. Are you making specific wine? Are you making, for example, orange wine? Or are you doing this with the like they do the Caveri in, in Georgia? I'm doing some experiments, wine without solfitzer. This one won't be sell out of this, winery, just, people who come in here because I don't want to risk who will receive it, could have some, some problem. I don't think it's correct. Yeah. But I I applaud the creativity and the openness to do all that stuff. There's a I think a a burgeoning interest in in the US and call it natural, but, you know, reverting back to the things that historically have always worked, and they've worked for a reason. So we've talked about a lot of things. I I like to end my conversations with the big takeaway. I think a central subject in talking to you and talking about Muscella wines is biodynamics. It's still regarded as a little bit out there or a lot out there or totally unknown to most American wine drinkers, and yet you're fully dedicated to it. Where where does biodynamic fit in the American market in your opinion? As you can, is it emerging more in the West Coast, and in New York? I mean, that's are the two special areas where they are more sensitive to that. It's more difficult to work in the center part of U. S. Talking about biodynamic because the moment people is not that interesting to, not interesting to, but they don't know. They don't know. So when we are in California or in Nevada or in, Washington, or, Oregon. Everybody knows. A lot of people is practicing, and, it's easy. Biodynamics is now thanks God. It's now becoming, more and more and more popular. Because the people see the difference can taste different and can enjoy the difference both buying the products vegetable fruit and wine and also seeing the result of the soil because it's evident is not, something magic or philosophy. Is, this is a big mistake often. People to think about biodynamic like something related to the start, witcher, and strange things, but, honestly speaking, is mostly agriculture method with concrete results. Then you can study during denial stuff, but that is more a personal path. The most important thing is to talk about, what is going on, what is happening to the soil after biodynamic with the culture. And so in the US, ICD is, if you talk about, in, California, and that the West Coast are very sensitive. In New York, especially young people, it's very interesting. He's the, also New York is developing. Honestly speaking, in his two years, I'm not putting, I'm not coming in the US. I don't see the development in this month, in this year, in two years. About the fifth twenty nineteen, I see New York. They were start slowly to, to be more interesting to that. In the rest of the US, my opinion is still a bit. It's also function, I think, of the type of stores that you're in, and and one of the reasons for that, your importer in US's cell city imports and Howard Bernstein, a mutual friend of both of ours, is is getting you in the right places and on display in the right places and the kinds stores where the people who can appreciate the wines that you guys shop at. So that's in New York. It's it's Hill City. What are your other major importers, like in, California. California. And, California, Nevada, Oregon, Oregon, Washington, Washington, Washington, Washington, Washington, Hinton, Texas. And then I have a guy in Florida who's doing, doing a good job. As I said, very small importers, personal relationship, and people is able to, to explain my project. And then I have a guy in Washington, DC, and, Maryland. And, another one in Pennsylvania, small things about working. And then, of course, in Chicago. Okay. So, a big shout out. Thank you to Madalena Pascua De Bachella. I really enjoyed working with you over the years, visiting your winery, and more importantly, drinking your wine and sharing it with other people. Thank you so much for sharing your time and explaining your philosophies of you make one. Thank you, Steve. It's a great pleasure to talk with you, and thank you for the question. Thank you for the possibility to talk about Mozilla, my place, and then looking forward to see you again in Italy, finally. Yeah. We'll be back. I'll be back. Okay. So this is Steve Ray. Thank you all for listening to get US market ready with the Italian wine podcast. Our guest this week was Madelena Pascua de vachella and tune in next Monday. We're gonna have another fascinating conversation on the world of Italian wine. This is Steve Ray. Thanks again for listening. 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