Ep. 1802 Sofia Ponzini Of Tenute Bosco | wine2wine Business Forum 2023

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 One podcast dot com, or wherever you get your pods. Official media partner, the Italian One podcast is delighted to present a series of interviews and highlights from the twenty twenty three one to one business form, featuring Italian wine producers and bringing together some of the most influential voices in the sector to discuss the hottest topics facing the industry to day. Don't forget to tune in every Thursday at three PM, or visit the Italian wine podcast dot com for more information. This is Cynthia Chaplin, and I'm at wine to wine business conference, interview producers for the Italian wine podcast. And today, I have Sophia Ponzoni with me. She's the owner of Tenout de Bosco in Sicily. Thank you for coming. Thank you for the opportunity. No. It's great to have you here. Because I'm a big fan of Sophia's wines. She's brought with her today. Tenoutte Bonsco Aetna Rosato, which makes me super excited because anybody who knows me or has heard me talk, I am a big fan of Italian Rosay. So this will be a good conversation to have. Before we go too far, I have to comment on the amazing labels. I love the labels. It is the cone shape of Aetna with the flame coming out, but it's actually female lips turned sideways, really, really attractive label. And I've used this wine in many presentations, so I'm so happy to meet you finally and have the chance to talk about it. So let's talk about the Rosato. What great variety are you using? This is a hundred percent Narello Maskaleza in Curones. As you know, Narello Maskaleza is the prince of Aetna Aromas. And, the unification, it's very, very simple. We do amassarization with the skin around three hours just to exalt this, characteristics of Narello, the light color. This, Edna Rosato has a very great potential. Because, from the Norello Maskelese as the great acidity. It's not only a wine for, MPa hour, you know, but it's a real gourmet wine. You can have a complete dinner or lunch with this wine. Last time I tasted with a beef tartar. I always say this type of a rosé is a gastronomic rosé. It can go with food. It can sit on a dinner table in a fine dining restaurant. It has the structure and the care that you need to have a complete meal as you said with it. So Coming back to America, Van Italy International Academy, the ultimate Italian wine qualification will be held in New York City from four to six March twenty twenty four. Have you got what it takes to become the next Italian wine ambassador? Find out at benitely dot com. Of course, our listeners can't see it, so I'm just gonna say it's this beautiful rose gold sort of a very pale salmon color. And I love when producers are confident. It's a clear bottle, so you're confident in your wine. I can see the color of it. It's really attractive. Let's talk about what it's like in the glass. If I poured it in my glass right now, what would I be smelling and tasting? For sure, you can imagine to be on the volcano up on the Aetna because you can smell also the ash of our volcano, but also at first, the flower notes, like rose, and also little red fruits like, strawberry. Yeah. But flower at the first smell, you can have And I always get a note of red currant There's crunchy little sharp berries when I drink Norella Moskaleesi Rosato. There's that lovely sort of sapid, salty, crunchy note to the fruit. That's really seductive. It's a very complex rosette. With a great personality. And the grapes are from center spirit to the main, from the lower and vigorous part of the one yard, that area it's very special to make rosette. And, the vintage, we did around the second half of October. Now this is at two thousand and twenty. It's not the current vintage because I trust on all the vintages, Rosay, because came more complex, more interesting, a little bit less fresh, but very, very interesting. I am so excited by this wine. Let's talk a little bit about the cantina, which is fantastic. How many hectares have you got? Okay. Around ten actors on the northern side of the volcano of Mount Aetna, the town is Castillo de Sichelia, but the contrada, the domain is Pamela Dani that is in Solikata, the little town of Solikata. And also, the other grapes came from Santos Pirito and is in a passo bicharum, around ten minutes by car, but very different, very different tastes. And, Sophia, you founded the winery. What made you decide to? Start a winery. Let's be honest here. There's not a lot of women making wine on Aetna right now. It's kind of a lot of cowboys down there. What made you be brave enough to do this? In twenty twelve, so not that long ago, just over ten years ago. Yeah. My first bottle of red. I started with a red. It's around, yeah, two thousand twelve. But I started just for passion. And, in my family, my uncle produced wine, but just for the family, And then I choose to make wine just to also give back to my territory to communicate the potential and the excellence of Sicily. Well, it worked because you're Aetna Rosa, the Vico two thousand and sixteen from Pre Filoxera Vines won a lot of awards, Italy's finest wines, ninety five points, Robert Parker, top one hundred wine discoveries of twenty twenty. Best organic red wine in twenty twenty three at five star wine and wine without walls. So this is a cantina that's really dedicated to doing things correctly. So organic wine, that is not easy to do. Tell me what sort of prompt to do to have that way. But to be organic is a a philosophy, not just for this moment, for the present, but for the future generation. As a producer, we have our responsibility for the next generation, and we need, and we have to preserve the teruar and the the vineyards and the marmot. I completely agree. One hundred percent, and it's really nice to hear when there's a winery so dedicated to it, and the wine is good. The wine is winning awards. I have drunk the red wine. I've presented it many times. And it's always a crowd pleaser. So are you exporting? I'm exporting in Europe and abroad. And not too much in Asia. I would like to improve the export there. Just in Hong Kong, but I'm a small producer, so it's not so easy to be everywhere. You have to choose. Well, hopefully our listeners will hear this, and we'll get some importers interested in you. How many bottles are you producing a year? Around fifty thousand miles battle. Okay. Depends on the vintages. So definitely small, but not not tiny. You have enough wine to to definitely interest people. Yeah. And to bring Aetna to other places. I think the story of Aetna, the experimentation going on there now. The contrada system that's being developed more and more over time is an important story that we need to get out into the market so that people can understand Aetna is almost its own country within Sicily. It's it's very different from the rest of Sicily. Yeah. Aetna is an island in the island. Someone says. I like that. It's really true. It's really true. Well, people are gonna hear this, and they're gonna want to come and see you and visit you. Can they can they get to you? Are you have you got a website? Have you got social media? Tell them how to find you and how to find your Yeah. About social media, like, Instagram or, Facebook, you know, it's LinkedIn, but at the moment, we are working on the winery and so not to spit out. No visitors right now. But in the future, is that a goal? Yes. I hope. I hope. Yeah. Good. Well, this is, again, Sophia Ponceini, the owner of Tinoutte Bosco, so you can find her on social media. And thank you so so much for coming, and for talking about this very special Rosay from Sicily, the Narello Moschile amazing, and we wish you all the best of luck. Thank you so much. Listen to the Italian wine podcast wherever you get your podcasts. We're on SoundCloud Apple Podcasts spotify, email ifm, and more. Don't forget to subscribe and rate the show. If you enjoy listening, please consider donating through Italian wine podcast dot com. Any amount helps cover equipment, production, and publication costs. Until next time.