Thursday, March 14th | 5-8pm
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We feature:
- Bertani Due Uve Pinot Grigio 2021
- Bertani Valpolicella Superiore 2020
- Secco Bertani 2016
Tasting plus food pairing: $18.00
Bertani’s colorful history began in 1857, after the enterprising Gaetano Bertani traveled to Burgundy and learned winemaking from Jules Guyot, the legendary French physician and agronomist who developed the Guyot system of pruning vine canes.
Bertani, who with his brother acted as both a négociant and vineyard owner, brought French techniques and a penchant for dryness to Valpolicella area wines, which were typically sweet—as in Amarone’s cousin Recioto.
Breaking from convention, Bertani began making a dry wine called Secco-Bertani, without drying grapes and blending Corvina with Tuscany's Sangiovese and small amounts of imported varieties. Today, those are Cabernet Sauvignon and Syrah, used in the Verona Secco-Bertani Original Vintage Edition.
Bertani’s modern age began in 1957 when it acquired the historic, 500-plus-acre Tenuta Novare, crisscrossed by a series of small Roman-era canals that channel spring water from its hillsides.
For decades thereafter, Bertani used the Novare vineyards for its new Amarone (at the time called Recioto della Valpolicella Amarone Classico Superiore), but didn’t bottle it because there was no market for a dry version with "Recioto" in the name. As a result, many of the vintages were aged 20 to 30 years in cask until the 1990s, when Amarone earned its own appellation and a boom followed.
In 2012, Italian conglomerate Angelini Group bought Bertani and made it the flagship of its wine division, which also includes Tuscan estates Val Di Suga in Montalcino, TreRose in Montepulciano and San Leonino in Chianti Classico, as well as Fazi Battaglia in Le Marche and Puiatti in Friuli.
Enter Lonardi, from a family of longtime Valpolicella growers. After studying agronomy in France, he worked, among other positions, for pan-Italy wine giant Gruppo Italiano Vini as viticultural director.
“Bertani was a great brand,” says Lonardi, walking up the hillside of Novare. “But there was a lot of dust on it.”
The last 10 years have seen a lot of renovation, from the old, once-abandoned cement fermentation tanks in Bertani’s cellars to the vineyards of Novare. There, Lonardi has focused on a pair of single-vineyard bottlings of Valpolicella, a leaner, everyday wine made primarily with Corvina and without drying the grapes.
Winery: Villa Mosconi Bertani
Importer: Regal Wine Company
Rep.: Maria Campilo
