Tuesday, July 1, 2014

Report from ... Montefalco: a Journey of Sagrantino, Day 4 - June 25, 2014

Roberto and I took a quick little early morning sojourn to visit BEA Winery (Paolo Bea Winery), met with Giampiero Bea (Paolo's son) to talk natural winemaking in a bunker of a winery that Roberto referred to as "a lair in a 007 film" ... let's take a look:

My usual last day breakfast room pic - where we picked up our morning starters
And could have our coffee or tea overlooking the pool and surrounding gardens
As for Paolo Bea Winery ... we start out in the vineyard
Here Giampiero discusses leaf plucking and shoot thinning in the vineyard
A look through the vineyard

The catwalk over the tank room
Drying grapes for the Passito
"The bunker" - otherwise known as the barrel room

For the first time this trip we actually tasted Sagrantino straight out of a barrel
The BEA tasting room - it's true what your friends tell you, it really is a
rickety old table in a converted kitchen
Three vintage of Pagliaro (Sagrantino) 2005 - 2007
The '05 & '07 were lovely garnering 4-stars each;
while the '06 seemed funky and gamey
Newest Wine: 2007 Cerreto (Reserve) -
1 year in steel, 4 years in oak and released after 8 years
dark fruit and spice with rhubarb, strawberry, blackberry and cassis (****+)

And that's it ... 5 hours later we were all on a plane back to Canada ... Goodbye Montefalco - it was a quick whirlwind trip but one I would return to do again in a heartbeat.


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