The Great Italian Decanter Fine Wine Encounter 2003
by Adam Lechmere
High spirits and great wine flowed in equal abundance at the Great Italian Decanter Fine Wine Encounter on May 17. Here, partcipating producers tell Adam Lechmere their thoughts on the day
Italian winemakers are a fiercely independent bunch. They're not a fraternity like Californians, and they don't regard their neighbours with amused suspicion, as they do in France. They just don't take much notice of each other.
Francesca Planeta put it quite neatly. 'We're not very good at marketing,' she said. 'Single producers do very well but we're not so good at banding together. Usually when you put a lot of Italians together it doesn't attract people.'
Planeta was delighted at the turnout at the Great Italian Decanter Fine Wine Encounter, as was everyone. 'At a Decanter tasting the public is well informed - that's what makes it special,' Alessandro Candido said. 'You don't have to keep explaining what Sangiovese is,' said another producer.
Most of all they were delighted to be able to show their wares in difficult times.
'Five years ago you wouldn't have needed a show like this,' Luciano Sandrone said. 'Now, since 9/11, the war with Iraq, the state of the euro against the dollar and competition from other countries – this is a very important tasting for Italian wines.'
Asked how they feel about the future, Italians are optimistic – in a relieved kind of way. They give the impression they see the end of the road after a long journey.
'We have taken the road to quality,' Gian Annibale de Rossi of Castello del Terriccio said. 'How long is that road? Consider - 15 years ago Chianti was in fiasci (flasks) with no producer name on it. Now producers are pround to be on the label.'
Roberto Bava is also optimistic. 'We're on the same trend we were five years ago – people are really interested in quality, in native grapes.'
But he was also keen to stress they were still going forward. He said, 'Italy is a work in progress.'
In which case, over 1000 keen Decanter readers spent an afternoon watching the artists unveiling their latest works with a flourish. Or perhaps 'conjuror' would be a more appropriate word. As Bava said, 'Italy is never boring. We will always pull something out of the hat.'
