Ep. 2010 Giulia Stocchetti interviews Sara Pesavento | The Next Generation

The Italian wine podcast is the community driven platform for Italian winegeeks around the world. Support the show by donating at italian wine podcast dot com. Donate five or more Euros, and we'll send you a copy of our latest book, my Italian Great Geek journal. Absolutely free. To get your free copy of my Italian GreatGeek journal, click support us at italian wine podcast dot com, or wherever you get your pots. Ben Venuti. Welcome to the next generation with me, your host, Julia Stochettie. Join me as I take you on a journey to discover young stars of the Italian food and wine world for andiamo. Hello. Hi, everyone, and welcome back to the new episode on the next generation of the Italian wine podcast. I'm Julia, your host, And it's a huge pleasure for me today to have here with us Sarah from Casa Chicken winery. So today, we're going to talk about that's a sparkling wine from the near verona, basically, and close to Venice. And it's a region that I really recommend to visit because it's stunning, and they make beautiful wines, like here at Casa Chiquin. Interesting is that Sara and her family are using the indigenous grape variety called Durala to make this sparkling wine. That's mostly a traditional method, but that could also be a Sharma method. So really it's for like every palette. If you like bubbly wines, well, that's it. I think we can start because I'm really curious, you know, everything about her and about Casa chicken winery. Chow. Ciao, Julia. Hi, everyone. Thanks for your introduction. You're most welcome. How are you today? I'm okay. I'm good. Thank you. Nice. Yeah. We are enjoying summer here. The weather is beautiful these days. After all the rain. So we are all so pretty happy, and the vibes are good. So, Sarah, I know you a bit, I could say, but can you please introduce yourself? My name is Sara. And I'm the third generation of the winery Casa chicken, as you said. I'm twenty seven years old. And, I work here. I decided to work here at the winery three years ago. Before this, I've traveled a lot. And I also lived in England when I was twenty. And then, I lived in, Spain in Madrid for a study. I traveled, and I speak English and Spanish. And then after my graduation, I've started to work here. That's beautiful. That means that you speak different languages, and so it's quite helpful, I guess, too. Sell the wines and talk to people about what you do at Casa check-in. So, Sarah, what's your position at the winery? And especially, why have you decided to take on the family business after traveling and leaving abroad? I've joined the family business in a particular moment of my life because actually I was still studying at university, but I was outside the prescribed time. So I've decided to start working here in order to earn some money while studying. And then after the graduation, I said, okay. They need help here because there was only my mother And so she asked me to stay here and help her. Every time, someone asked me what is my role, it's very difficult for me to answer because, you know, when you work in your family business, and you are just, as I said, two people, you need to do basically everything. I do a lot of different things. Also, when there is a need, I go to bunyard. I think that probably shortly, I will concentrate more on the commercial aspect. So I would like to become the sales representative for Vichain Sam. So it's you and your mom Roberta running the winery. Yeah. At the moment, me and my mother, and then, actually, we have a young, one maker, Enrique. And he's with us since two thousand and nineteen. And well, he's now, like, part of the family, and he's in charge to manage the backyard. That's beautiful. And, by the way, for who doesn't know, Roberta is Sarah's mom and she's literally a volcanic woman and she makes outstanding wines. And I hope that Sara will do the same in the future. Yes. I hope. So talking about the family and winery, when was it founded and how did that happen? Like, how your winery was born? Well, the winery was founded in the seventies, and it was my grandfather, Renato, Ranato Chukin, he is actually a civil engineer. And, in the seventies, he wanted to start this business because he is really passionate about his territory. And about wine and also food. He bought this place in Aguliana Montebello, Vicentino, built the house and the cellar by digging into the black basalt rocks because we have volcanic soil here. And then when he decided what to cultivate, he made a decision, and, he decided to plant an active grape this nazi grape is Dorella. So you're located also with the winery in Aguliana in the province of Vicenza or, like, where are you based? Where is the winery? Yes. We are located in Aguliana, and Aguliana is, hamlet of Montebello, Vicentino. We are a few kilometers from Bicenza, and we are on the top of a hill, two hundred and fifty meters above sea level. Oh, that sounds fantastic. Like a paradise immersed in the vineyards. Wow. That's beautiful. Exactly. We are in a natural paradise, and most of the people don't know these places. We are in the southeastern slopes of Lestinia. And people think that we are in Tuscany for the similar landscape because we have lots of olive trees as well, and we have, fruit trees, and, of course, lots of baniards. So it's like a hidden gem on the heels of Vincenzo. Wow. That's beautiful. You were saying that your grandfather planted like an indigenous grape variety, right, to make the wines what kind of grape is this one? And what kind of wine do you make out of this grape variety? Yeah. So when he started, he made this decision, and he started to plant a Durala. Well, Dorella is, kind of grape, very peculiar because it has a very, very high acidity. In the past, this kind of variety was discarded because most of the people thought that it was, too hard to make wines. Most of the people of this area used to make wine with Dorila grape, but they used to make a bad wine, really bad wine. Torella, the name Dorella comes from Duro. That in Italian means heart Dorella has a very hard skin reaching tannins that gives to the wine, tart flavor. And also hard because the wine they make used to be very hard to drink. But my grandfather was really passionate because he thought that with this grape, he could make good wines. He started for the reason to make wines. He started with a steel wine. And then he thought, well, I have high acidity. I can make classic metal wines. I can make sparkling wines with this grape. And so in the nineties, he started to make the classic method with Dorella Grape. And he was one of the first one. Well, in the province of Vincenza, he is the first one. Who started to make sparkling wines with Horella Grator. He also invented the a system for the Remewash, but I'll tell you later. Oh, yeah. I'm so curious about that. But, like, your grandfather is the pioneer of Duralo in the province of Vitrenca. That's amazing. I mean, I can't imagine how much know how he actually is passing to your mom and to you to continue the tradition to make Duralo. That's really interesting. Thanks for sharing. By the way, how many hectares do you have? And how do you manage the vineyard? Because, I mean, you said you have volcanic soil and it's a kind of hard grapes. So I was wondering, like, how do you treat it? Okay. So overall, we have, ten hectares, but share between vineyards, woods, olive trees, as I said before, and fruit trees. But at the moment, we have, only five hectares of vineyard in production, and we have, an annual production of thirty thousand bottles. Oh, so it's a small and high quality production, I guess. Yeah. All bunyas are cultivated on plateaus. The cultivation system is the typical veronese paragola. So the grape can only be harvested by hand. Oh, wow. And, fortunately, as I said, we have Erika that help us. And, well, he's now very busy managing the vineyard. Given the rains, abundant rains. Some people ask me if we have some problems now at the moment with the rains. But actually, we don't have such big problems because We have, well draining soil. That's fantastic. Yeah. This is the volcanic soil. So I I think it's hard to say now how it will be this vintage also because As you know, we harvest the the Dorella grape in the middle of September. So we still have nearly two months. I mean, it is sure that rains are not good, but close to the harvest. Because in that moment, there is a higher risk of, great growth. But now it's good. I think, it could be a good, a good vintage. I'm so happy to hear that because it's been raining so much. And I was a bit worried, you know, about the grapes and how the vintage was going to be, but you're reassuring us. So that's great. And I keep my fingers crossed for you to have a great harvest to make wines. And by the way, you were saying that you also have olive trees. So you're also producing some extra virgin olive oil or you just have the trees as part of the biodiversity and of the landscape? We have nearly two hundred and fifty olive trees, and we started to produce olive oil just, you know, for the family, just for us. But when we had some years with a lot of production, we bottle it and we also sell it to people. We also have olive oil. So if people are lucky enough, they can come to see you and not just go home with some really good wines, but also with some extra virgin olive oil typical from that tiny pearl that is on the heels of Vuchenza. Nice. But talking about your bottles, I often drink your wine, especially the Nordstrom because really I think it's one of the best sparkling wines ever is among my top five. I have to say it. My five favorite sparkling wines. I was wondering why the label has that particular shape. It's quite unique. I mean, I've never seen something like that. Yeah. This is a good question because, you know, the shape, it's, hexagonal shape and it has a deep meaning for us. And in fact, the hexagon symbolizes my grandfather's contribution to the world of classic method sparkling wines because in nineteen ninety two, He studied and he designed a system for optimizing one of the fundamental stages in the production of a classic metal wine. And this is the Remo ash. So this system consists of a hexagonal metal container, and we fill it with two hundred and seventy three bottles. A single person can easily move the container So the yeast gradually moves towards the cork to be then expelled by this gorging. So this system allows the optimization of effort and time. And then we have zero energy consumption. So it's perfect for us. We started to use it in nineteen ninety two and we still use it. This is the only method we use to do the Remoash of the bottles. That's amazing. I mean, instead of having the poopy turn having to turn one by one, all the bottles instead of getting Jira palais, the huge, you know, metal cases to optimize all the system like they're using cover, you just use two arms and you move two hundred and seventy three bottles thanks to this invention of your grandfather. That's amazing. And so you don't have to go to the gym basically because you work out Are you enjoying this podcast? Don't forget to visit our YouTube channel, mama jumbo shrimp for fascinating videos covering Stevie Kim and her travels across Italy and beyond, meeting winemakers, eating local food, and taking in the scenery. Now, back to the show. Usually, how long does your wine spend on the lease? Like at least So for us, the minimum is three years on the lease because we have basically three different kind of sparkling method. So we have three years on the lease that is the nostrum, the one you like. I love it. And then we have the reserva, the black label that stays five or more years on the lease. And then we try to do one hundred months on the lease. That is more than eight years on the lease. It's like a test. Well, you can buy it at the onenery now. It's available, but we only have five hundred and fifty bottles. Oh my god. And you put the number of the bottle on the label? I personally put the number. Oh my god. I wanna get one. I have to come to see you before you run out of this tiny, tiny production of yours, but that means that Dorello can, like, spend a lot of time on the leaves. So it's a wine that can also age. I mean, it's not meant to be drunk young, but you also can age it a little bit. Right? Yeah. That's the point because you have really high acidity. Also, you have to think that we are talking about a native grape. Okay? That's not an international kind of grape. So I think for this reason, you can have a great product and you grate wine because we harvest the grade when we have a complete maturation of the grade. With the complete maturation, we have high acidity. And this high acidity allows us to age for more more years the wines. And, well, the wines can stay a lot on the list, but also after the disgorging, you can leave the wines there because you still have very high acidity because some people ask me when I need to drink this wine and when it's too, you know, too late to drink it. And they say, I don't know when it's too late because I still can drink the vintage of two thousand and nine. Oh, wow. But, you know, I think you have to have a really strong, I mean, super strong will to have a bottle of kazakhine winery at home. And don't drink it. I mean, it's really hard for me. When I get a bottle of yours, I'm like, okay, I shouldn't. I know I should wait a bit. Then I remember the flavor and how pleasant it is. And I'm like, no, I'm sorry. I'm gonna drink it and, you know, it could be quite challenging to wait to enjoy a bottle of your wines, but I think that's definitely worth it. So I'll try to do my best to keep a bottle there and forget about it and try to forget about it. But Anyway, you would say that you make different kind of wines, right, different, I mean, aging period. And what wines represent you the most and why? Well, as a winery, I think that the two most representatives wines are the steel wine because we still produce this kind of wine with Durala always with the this grape, and this wine is called Pietralava. Petralava, the name reminds of the rock, the soil, the volcanic soil. I think that this wine represents the tradition, the verticality of the grape also the saltiness given by the volcanic soil. I find it very representative even though it's not really common because, you know, nowadays, when you talk about, Dorello, when you talk about Montelessini, you always think about classic method wine or sparkling wine. You think about sparkling wine. But we really want that people know that you can make basically everything with this grape, and we want to make and still make this still wine because I think it's very good wine. It's perfect with fish it's perfect with the white meat with traditional food. Yeah. I think this is one of the most representative, but also, who has the black label, reservoir, this is very representative because this is the first classic method that we produced with the five or more years on the list. Yeah. I think these two wines, they have a really great personality. And I think they are, like, the maximum expression of this grape. That's beautiful because you are expressing the Dorella variety potential in both ways. I mean, in the steel version and in the classic method version, and that's really interesting. So people, if you wanna have an idea of how actually Dorella tastes like, go to visit Casa Checkin winery and, of course, ask for Sara. So these are your two most representative wines. What's your key market for these wines? Our key market is very restricted. At the moment, we sell, I can say ninety percent of production between Vicenza and verona or within our region. Actually, in the last two years, I saw that there is, an interest in native grapes by Eastern countries. In fact, we knew William, who is trying to bring our wines in Taiwan. But, well, at the moment, our customers are local. Probably because it's a peculiar wine. It's a wine, well, not for everyone, but also because we have a small product So we couldn't afford the major foreign markets. Where would you like to sell your wines and bro? Like, what countries? As I said, this interest in Eastern countries, I think I would like to go there. Maybe also Japan or China because they are really interested in native grapes. I think that it could be great to sell it there because well, I've never been there. Actually, I've never been, but talking to William, he told me that they are really, really passionate about Italy, about Italian wise, and they also have a lot of Italian runs where you can eat very, very well. They told me. So, yeah, I would like to go there first. Nice. It's really interesting. And I'm sure that William is going to do a good job and you'll have the chance to go and visit and sell some really good Duralo also in Taiwan and in the Asia continent. Talking about the young generations because, you know, this is like the next generation Syria on the Italian Win podcast. So what do you think that young people prefer drinking nowadays? I think actually that in the last years, there are more and more young people approaching the world of wine. And I notice it at one first. I see it here at the winery, and I see also that there are more young people interested in similar courses so in that courses where you can know more about wine. And I think that this means just that people finally want to know what they are drinking, especially young people. I mean, especially here at the winery, I organize wine tastings. And I see that, during these years, I have lots of young people coming here, and they are really interested. I mean, they don't come here just to drink. They drink, yeah, for pleasure, but also for culture because they want to know more. I believe the future of wine will move towards small realities. Small wineries run by a family. I'm really happy to hear that, and I'm glad to hear that because most of the time, small wineries, small producers feel like they're struggling a bit without having the possibilities to promote the wines and sell the wines as much as bigger realities, but I'm happy to hear from your that you're basically a new generation of producers at Casa Chiquin, and you're a young wine producer that young people are more interested and that small wineries will be the future. I really hope so because I think that there's space for everyone, for big realities, but also small family run businesses deserve a spot on the market with their uniqueness. So Thank you, Sarah, for sharing it with us. Let's say, how are you addressing the next generation of consumers? Like, doing these wine tastings at the winery? Or what do you think is something that people can do? To let more young people involved in the wine world. Well, we are addressing, of course, through wine tastings. So a few months ago, we made a new website through which you can book the testing, but you can also find a lot of information about our territory, about the history, about the grade. We make these wine tastings in order to bring people here at the winery because we want that people know what we have here in our region because, well, for me, it's obvious. But, well, we are in Bicenza, and there are people from Padava from Venice that they don't know this grape and they don't know this territory. And I think this is really bad. So we want to do this work. And then, well, We are in two thousand twenty four. I think now it's really important to communicate who you are and what you do. So for this reason, I am trying to do this through social media. You so follow-up as a check-in winery on social media. I have Instagram Facebook. It's a work in all respects. So it's not easy. So it's interesting. Like, education and feeding young consumer's curiosity is like the key to have more quality wine, enjoy it all around. I like it. I like what you think, Sarah. It's been really a pleasure to share all this with you today and thanks for being here. Is there anything else you'd like to add, or you think that's it? I think I've said all. It's fine. And I want to say, yeah, come to visit us. Thank you. Thanks for hosting me. You're most welcome. Thank you for being here with us today and to share your beautiful reality with us. That's a wrap. Thank you so much for being with us today and don't miss the next episode of the next generation on the Italian when podcast next Sunday. Whatever you get your parts. Gracier for being with me today and listening to the next generation on the Italian wine podcast, A la prosima Chinchin.