linea

newsletter

Cantrina at New York

posted on 6 July 2010
Hello there everyone! As in all family-run companies we’ve been very busy, and so some time has passed since our last newsletter… Here, then, is a little news about our activities over the past few months. Having found an importer in the United States, we went to New York for a brief business trip and we are now looking forward to seeing our wines on the lists of some specialist wine stores and/or exclusive restaurants in Manhattan. In our opinion, New York is a city that offers great opportunities and there even particular products like ours can find the right type of market exposure. At a tasting at the Hudson Hotel our products – especially the Nepomuceno and the Rinè - were highly appreciated, and our American friends suggested that we define our wines as “unconventional” because of the character and original style that set them apart. From this trip to New York we also realized how important the use of QR (or Quick Response) codes is: these, “read” by your mobile phone, enable you to decode information or connect to an Internet site, thus forming a link between physical objects and the web. From the next bottling runs of our new vintages, in fact, we shall apply this code to all our bottles, whether they are destined for Italy or for export markets. We are just about to bottle the  Rinè 2009 and Sole di Dario 2007. As is usual for us, they will only be released when they are ready and therefore not for another one and a half to two years from now. However, we can tell you that they both show really great promise. We are also preparing another experiment: a white wine for which we picked the grapes a few years ago – yet another “open-mindedexercice de style” which we will tell you more about in the near future… A final note about what’s going on in the vineyard. This is a strange and complicated year: the cold winter weather, which dragged on throughout most of the spring as well, did not prevent the vines from undergoing a good, regular bud-break, followed though by a long period of very heavy rains that are now causing us a number of problems as regards vineyard management, both from the point of view of the vines’ health and the work we have to do on the growing plants (trimming the tops of the shoots, eliminating excess leaves and thinning out the bunches). Now we are hoping for a long spell of dry and sunny weather that will help us finish in the best possible way a growing season that started off with a certain amount of difficulty… Cristina and Diego

Crazy weather!

posted on 6 June 2012
Greetings to all of you, just a few months after our last newsletter, here we are again, right in the middle of a new growing season. “We just don’t have real seasons anymore,” has become a set-phrase overused by almost everyone, but it certainly is right on the mark for this crazy start to 2012! December and January were cold and dry, then February was freezing, followed by a March that was almost summer-like. Heavy rains and snow arrived only in late spring, with temperature swings of as much as 10-15oC between one day and the next. All of this crazy weather nevertheless brought the vineyards into very fine growing conditions, with growth that is quite vigorous, maybe even too much, since the vines are keeping us running to keep everything balanced and to monitor the crop.

Epiphany 2012

posted on 6 January 2012
As usual, the Befana [the old crone who personifies Epiphany] is bringing with her the latest news from Cantrina (or, if you prefer, the first of the new year…) and this is also an excellent opportunity to wish all our friends and clients a splendid 2012!!! So, here we are: The 2011 ROSATO (Rosé) made from Pinot Nero has been bottled in the last few days (its release is planned for mid-February) and we have great faith in the quality of this product, in which we have sought to bring out – even more than in the previous vintages – freshness, finesse and elegance. This wine now becomes an integral part of the estate’s range and acquires its own individual name, ”ROSANOIRE”, which recalls the refined notes that derive from the Pinot Nero grape.

Speaking of the harvest…

posted on 12 July 2011
The curtain has gone up on the 2011 harvest… rather earlier than usual: we in fact started picking in mid-August. Spring this year, which was particularly hot and precocious, already made us think that there would be an early harvest, even if June and July – unusually cool but with just the right amount of regular rainfall – slightly slowed down ripening. But then along came the crazy, Sahara-like temperatures of the second half of August to speed things up again. In view of the sudden drop in acidity that accompanied the final stages of ripening, we were particularly concerned with preserving the freshness and healthiness of the fruit, so as to obtain wines that were still naturally fresh and well-balanced.
1 Unfortunately, 10 11 12 13 14 15