Malvazija 2021

Carso is a small Italian wine sub-region – part of Friuli Venezia Giulia – located in a narrow geographical strip between the border with Slovenia and the Adriatic Sea. Its sunny, Mediterranean climate is sometimes calmed by cool northeastern winds. The soils are extremely poor, with a thin top layer of red earth, where iron and calcium are abundant, followed by another layer, which is quite thick and dominated by white limestone, so that the roots of the vines have to go to great lengths to find water in the depths.
Benjamin Zidarich was born in the small town of Prepotto, where the tradition of each small estate producing wine for its own consumption dates back to ancient times. In 1998, with just 1 hectare of vines, he decided to found Azienda Zidarich. His deep connection with the Carso terroir led him to embrace traditional farming practices, working according to the lunar calendar, implementing a kind of viticulture as traditionally as possible and without the use of chemicals, exchanging low yields of grape production for maximizing and enhancing the unique characteristics of this singular territory. Nowadays he works around 8 hectares of vineyards, most of which are native varieties.
Vinification takes place in the underground cellar, which opened in 2009 and is located 20 meters under the vines. Native wild yeast fermentations take place in uncovered karst rock vats and without temperature control. Following the Carso tradition, the white wines are made with skin contact for a few weeks. However, it is at this point that Benjamin’s wines differ from the norm, because instead of having the expected deep, coppery color, where the emphasis is on the tannins, his wines reveal a subtle, shimmering and vibrant color, and at the same time the tannins are elegant, smooth, firm and perfect, allowing the minerality to stand out in each wine. Filtration and fining are practices that are never used and the wines are aged in Slovenian barrels of different volumes, being usually bottled two years after the harvest. So here we have wines whose pungent minerality shows us that this winemaker is truly an integral part of the Caroso terroir from where the wines come from.