Day 9: Chianti Wine Safari

 Day 9

Tina gave us a lot of knowledge about wines and the guidelines for production. Today, we get to go to the vineyards to see where it starts and how it's done. Our first stop was Villa Le Corti, an estate where Principe Corsini wines are made. This is still an estate where the Prince and Princess of Costina live. 

Our guide today is Sara. She really knows everything there is to know about wine! In the vineyard, we learned that most of the vines are sangiovese, at least 80%. The rest are made up of merlot, cabernet sauvignon, and a few others. Sara told us that more sugar in the grapes means less acidity in the wine. We also found out that tannins are in the seeds! Waiting until the grapes are fully mature gives the wine fewer tannins. Did you know there are more tannins in a can of Coke than there are in a whole bottle of wine? Sara said organic is key. To be a DOC or DOCG wine, the grapes must be organic, and they must NOT be watered. Sara said when they are watered, they get a little lazy, but the best, most flavorful grapes are the ones that struggle a little. When the grapes are ready, they are picked by hand. All of them. All those little grapes.

Wine tours are great to see the process, but they are also perfect for standing in the beauty of God's creation. I truly can't think of a place more beautiful than the Tuscan Countryside!

After picking, the grapes go through a visual selection one by one by one by one by one, then they go through a destemming machine. Now they are ready to be squeezed. Sara said even today, the best way to squeeze them is with your feet, and smaller wineries still do that! But wineries that produce thousands of bottles of wine a year don't have the capability. Principe Corsini produces around 90,000 bottles a year.

First stop, the fermentation room. After the grapes are pressed, the juice, skins, and seeds are put into these giant vats to ferment under careful observation.

Next, they are transferred to the barrels below for aging. 3 types of barrels can be used: wood, cement, and terra cotta. Each one can influence the taste of the wine. The smaller barrels below are French oak barrels. It's so funny when Italians talk about the French - they don't like them at all, and it was even hard for Sara to admit that the French oak barrels give the best flavor to the wines. 😂

You can't see them well, but the black containers on the left-hand side are the cement barrels. The ones in the middle are the French oak. Darn those French! To be considered an official Chianti Classico, the guidelines state that the wine has to be aged for at least 1 year. To be a Chianti Classico Reserve, the wine has to be aged for 2 years. To be a Chianti Classico Select, it has to be aged 2 1/2 years. As you can imagine, the longer the wine is aged, the flavor becomes more full-bodied and smooth.

This is the room where labels are added to the bottles.

We got to explore the estate's beautiful garden before heading to the olive oil production rooms.

                                       

Just another day in Tuscany. If you've seen
one garden, you've seen them all. 😂

The olive oil production process was every bit as fascinating as the wine was! The olives are also picked by hand, and then brought in to be pressed. They press the entire olive, seed and all. Well, that just saved a lot of time! The first time the olives are pressed, the oil is extra virgin. The 2nd press gives virgin oil. The last press is called Sanza; it cannot be eaten. Italians don't like to waste anything, so it is used to heat the villa. 

The first picture above is how olives used to be pressed. The second picture is of an old olive press used long ago. 

Now for the tasting! Sara gave us a quick tutorial on tasting wines like an expert. First, you look at the color, tipping the glass sideways to see the depth of color in the deepest part. You're also looking for sediments that may be present. Next, you smell the wine, swirling it in your glass to get the full scent. This is where you detect fruity, nutty, or oaky notes. Finally, you take a sip of the wine paired with the food it pairs best with. For the first time, I was able to see how wine can enhance your meal! 

We were able to try a Chianti Classico, a Chianti Classico Reserve, and a Chianti Classico Select, in that order. You could tell a big difference between them! As expected, the Select was both of our favorites! We also tried their extra virgin olive oil with bread. It had a deep, rich flavor that we fell in love with! 

This next video is a minute of our drive through the Tuscan countryside. You can hear Sara funneling her knowledge to us in the background. You're welcome.

Fattoria Di Rignana was our next stop. We tasted their wines and had lunch on the patio overlooking the countryside. The symbol of the estate is a hedgehog to honor the noble Florentine family, De Ricci, who previously owned the estate and had a hedgehog on their coat of arms. In Italian, the word for hedgehog is il riccio. We were talking to one of the employees who told us that story. He ended by saying there are hedgehogs everywhere! We told him Malachi had a pet hedgehog when he was younger and asked if Italians kept hedgehogs as pets. He said, "Uhh, no" as if to say, why would we do that? We laughed!

The first wine we tasted here is a Rosato. They call them orange wines because of the orangish color. In Italy, it is illegal to mix red and white wine and call it rosé. If you think about it, without the skins, all grapes would actually produce white wine. The skin is where the color comes in, and how long you leave it in affects the depth of color. In a Rosato, the red grape skins are left in for only 24 hours, then removed, which gives the wine a lighter color. 

Sara also had us do a "blind" olive oil tasting. See the two bottles covered in aluminum foil in the background above? One is grocery store olive oil and one is DOP, the government stamp of approval for olive oil. Again, to get a DOP label oil makers need to follow strict guidelines. And you can taste it, too! The DOP oil went right down and had a little burning sensation in the throat. The grocery store version sort of coated the mouth with an oily film. Sara said both oils are necessary. The DOP wine is so expensive that you wouldn't want to use it in cooking - that's what the grocery store olive oil is for. But you do want to use it for bruschetta, dipping bread, salad dressing, etc. Another interesting fact Sara told us is that olive oil does not need to be kept in the fridge. Italians do not keep their olive oil in the fridge, but they don't keep it on the counter, either. It's kept in a dark glass bottle or in a tin and then stored in a very dark place between uses. Well, shoot. I've been doing that wrong!

 

For lunch, we started with an appetizer. All of our meals have started with an appetizer here! We had four different types of bruschetta, some are traditional Tuscan favorites that were different for us: 

1. Tomato, Basil, and Onion
2. Chicken liver pate - a Tuscan favorite, it was everywhere. We gave it a taste, but it wasn't our thing. 
3. Cannolini beans, Sara said, Tuscans are obsessed with them! We saw them on every single menu.
4. Prosciutto

All of them were drizzled liberally with Tuscan olive oil!

We had 2 pastas for lunch. The first is a ricotta ravioli with a white truffle and peccorino cheese sauce. They just slice the truffles on top, because cooking ruins them. When done properly, the truffle pasta is delicious! Next, we had pappardelle with a wild boar ragu sauce. It was also delicious! Boar is delicious; they cook it like a roast and add it to the sauce. Apparently, wild boar are everywhere in Tuscany, and they taste good, so it's an inexpensive, easy dinner. Something I've noticed is that all of the red sauce we've had has some kind of meat in it - either ground beef or boar. At home, we've never made our sauce with meat, so it's really different for me. I was talking to one of our guides, and they said that a meatless sauce comes from the south of Italy, which makes sense because that's where my Dad's family comes from, and that's the sauce we make.

By the way, this is our off-roading vehicle for our wine safari! It's ginormous! Did I mention that I forgot my mecclezine at home? Super fun.

Our final stop was at the estate where Porggio Torselli wines are made. This is a much bigger winery, producing about 150,000 bottles a year. 

The driveway lined with Cyprus trees was stunning!

Viola, one of the wine makers, gave us an in-depth tour of the production. You can see how much bigger the fermentation vats are compared to Principe Corsini, our first stop. 

The cement vats looked impressive! A staircase to the top allows employees to check on the wines throughout the process.

The fermentation cellar was similar to the previous one we saw, with large and small oak barrels. The smaller barrels can only be used 3-4 times, then need to be discarded. The larger one have 2 inch thick oak walls. After the wine is removed, someone goes inside and scrapes the edges to get all the skins, seeds, and sediment out and ready for the next batch. Some of the oak from the barrel wall comes off with the scraping; that's why the 2-inch-walled barrels can last a year longer.

Once the tour was over, we went to enjoy the garden. Oh, the gardens! I felt like I was in a Bridgerton episode. Even more so when we stepped into the ballroom! 

It's finally time to mangiare and bere! (eat and drink)

Viola introduced us to a rosato, Bizzaria, that is served chilled. By this time, we were exhausted! We tried 4 other wines, but I didn't write them down. They were all good and not surprisingly, our favorite was the Grand Selectizone.

Needless to say, we rested well once we got back to the room! Another fabulous day in the books!! 🩷