The Winw World of Alessandro Cellai

Alessandro, welcome to the Kosher Terroir. That's the, that's the podcast we're on. Um, I wanted to, I just wanted to mention to you, in, you know, researching your background, uh, it was amazing. It's an amazing background. There's so many things that you've done, uh, not only wineries but wines that you've made, and You know, there's a theme that goes through it. You're an extremely creative person, but you're also an extremely visual person. So a lot of the things that you've noted are all, you know, have these strong visual cues. And it's very cool, very, very interesting, very exciting.

Thank you so much for your introduction and presentation of myself. And, uh, so I spent, uh, all of my career until now for, for the quality. I had a great privilege to have one of the, probably the best teacher, the best mentor, uh, in the world is Giacomo Tacchis.

Yeah.

That he was the inventor of, uh, the most important, uh, Italian white wines. And through him, I became strictly connected with his philosophy. And his philosophy is, of course, starting from the vineyard and bringing the passion from the vineyard into the glass of wine. And the philosophy of winemaking is, uh, of, of Giacomo Tachis was, uh, founded on three different, uh, columns, extremely important. The first column was, uh, that, uh, in all great wines we must recognize terroir. The second column was in top wines we must recognize grapes. And the third one That is, we must recognize the DNA of the winemaker. So that was the vision I took from my maestro, from my teacher, from my mentor, Giacomo Tacchis.

He was the one who basically created Super Tuscan, wasn't he?

Correct, correct. He was the inventor of Sassicaia, the inventor of Tinello. He was the key of success of Forte fortune of Antinori family. But not only, he was the creator of the new Italian wine renaissance at the end of '70s when in many regions of Italy the wines was considered just in bulk. And now, and now that regions are making a big fortune like Sicily, like Sardinia, like Trentino Alto Adige, thanks to him because he, with his genius, with his mind, he create the best wines in that region. Just to consider what was Sicily and what was Sardinia before Giacomo Tacchis. Now, two regions to make wine and 95% in bulk. And to export or to bring in other regions to make more alcohol content and different things. Now Sicily and Sardinia are two of the most important wine regions in Italy.

Very interesting.

Alessandro, you know, it's funny, I know you for like 10 years already. I never heard you speak about your mentor like that. How did you— I don't even know the story. How did you even get to— to hook up with him.

The, the relation with Giacomo Takis was, uh, uh, by a fortunate moment in my, in my life during the university. Uh, one day Giacomo Takis came to the university to make a seminar, and, uh, and I immediately included myself in the participants of this seminar. And at the end of the seminar, Giacomo Takis was very kind to all of the participants and say, I'm here for half an hour extra time. So if you have some questions or arguments that you want to make more deeper, so I'm here to help you. And nobody asking something, and I had a list of huge number of questions. And then I started to make question to him. After a few minutes, he say, okay, so listen, you have so many questions, come to my house, come to my house next Wednesday, and I explain you tasting the wines, you can understand much better. And I felt at that time like a passionate man of Formula 1, for example, that I was meeting with Enzo Ferrari. Enzo Ferrari inviting that person to make a tour in Fiorano. And maybe to have a trip with a Ferrari racing car. So I felt the same level of happiness, the same level of enthusiasm. And since that moment, the relation with Giacomo Tacchis was a very friendly relationship. So we became true friends. He considered me as his son, and he spent many of his times to teach me, to bring me in this beautiful world, and to help me to understand his vision. I spent many, many days with him, many time, many visit in the vineyards, visit in the cellar, tasting a lot, a lot, a lot, a lot of wines with him. And that was for me one of the most important part of my career.

My career— He talks about him like we talk about our rabbis.

Yeah, no, but he was. He was so instrumental in Italian wine. It's just crazy. It's unbelievable.

Was he a businessman too, or he was just— it was just like a president of vineyard enology and things of that way?

All of them. He was a great winemaker, a great vineyard manager, a great philosophy. He was a great of everything. So one hour with him was much more than— with a much— I have a deep respect for all of my professors during my student career. But one hour with him, the value of one hour with him was much more than 5 years with anybody else.

He passed away in 2016.

So yes, correct.

Wasn't so long ago. But correct.

Correct.

And but he was an older gentleman, right? He was an older gentleman.

I think 70, 77. Not, not really old.

Yeah, he was born in '33.

I was more than 33. So yeah, now that is, uh, that, that was one of the two big fortunes of, of my career. The first fortune was, uh, to have my, my uncle as a Catholic priest. You, you know, Ralph, that my uncle was a Catholic priest.

Yeah, yeah.

And, uh, I spent all of my younger, younger age with him, and he had a little vineyard around, around the church. To make the wine for the community. And since I had 4, 5 years old, he bring me into the vineyard teaching me how to make the wine. So I probably, it took from myself, from inside of myself, the germ of wine that I was born with that because no other person in my, in my family was involved in the wine industry.

But you know, that, that wine industry connection is— wait for a second— no, the wine industry connection is really, really good. But Giacomo instilled in you a creative bent that most people don't have. Most people aren't that creative. And between— even in business, all the different businesses that you've created, I mean, I— this is like the resume of a guy who's 100 years old, and, and you're still strong and, you know, and, uh, healthy and well, thank God, and, uh, amazing. So I want to start at the beginning though. We jumped a whole whole level. You started in Siena and you— your early years were in Rocca del Machia.

Yeah, allora, I did two levels of graduation. The first level of graduation was to become a winemaker, and in, in Siena, in the agricultural school. And the second level of graduation, when I met Giacomo Tacchis, was the chemistry university in Pisa.

Okay. Wow.

And, uh, and, and, and then my first, uh, experience before to be graduated in chemistry was in Rocca delle Macie, that, uh, that is a big company, big winery in Castellina in Chianti. Okay. Uh, where I had, uh, the first 3 years of my career. And after that experience, I moved to Castellare.

Okay, so Castellaria— Castellari is, um, or DCC, yes, people call it, um, really is an incredible, uh, that was in 1996. Yes, you, you started there. So what did you start as, as a winemaker?

Yeah, yeah, the, the Uh, I met at that time in 1995, Mr. Panerai.

Okay.

And Mr. Panerai is the owner of Castellare. And, uh, in that year, uh, he owned only Castellare and he was looking for a person to follow not only the winemaker section, but, uh, also the management section. And I was extremely clear with him and I say, I'm very excited to think about this venture with you, but I'm very honest. I can feel very confident about technical aspects because also I have the best guide in the world. But in terms of management, in terms, especially in terms of sales, commercial things, I have no experience of that. And Mr. Panerai answered to me with an answer that I still have in my mind. And he said, one great winemaker and became for sure a great salesman, a great salesman and never became a great winemaker.

Perfect.

And that's great. With this sentence, I started with a lot of energy, with a lot of emotion, and we grow immediately a lot with Castellari. A few years after, we started the project of Rocca di Frassinello, the joint venture between Castellari and Château Lafitte Rothschild. And then we started also in Sicily, the Feudo del Pisciotta. And I took the position of general manager, winemaker, salesperson, and so on, and the CEO of the company. After almost 30 years, I decided to take another challenge. I spoke very clear with Mr. Panerai and said, this is the right moment to to take another challenge, and I took the project of Valle Piccola in 2019.

And that's a different family, right?

Yeah, this is a different family. They was asking for me for many, many, many years. So at the end, they, they asked me to became a general manager, to became like a guide of this new, very, very important project. You visited, Ralph, you know how important is this project with 100 hectares of vineyard, the second largest investment in the wine industry with 7,000 square meters cellar, 2 hotels, 4 restaurants, and so on. And I took this challenge without to lose Castellari because I'm still making the wine for Castellari. And I preserved my position of Vice President of Castellari. And but at the same time, I took the position of General Manager for Valle Piccio.

And so you're still the winemaker on both ends?

Absolutely.

Absolutely. Absolutely.

That's what's amazing.

That's— Honestly, Ralph, that's like crazy.

Simon, he's very, he's very humble, you know. I know. When I walk around, when I walk around Chianti, I feel like the Pope is walking through Chianti. Everybody stops me. And, uh, and, uh, he, he's the king, uh, king, king, king winemaker of Tuscany. There's no doubt about it. Wow.

So now, just, just, uh, 3 days ago, I got an interview from, uh, The most important Italian newspaper is Corriere della Sera. Maybe you are familiar with this.

Yeah, yeah.

And this journalist called me to, to make me an interview, to dedicate for me a full page. Should be next week about my career.

It's really incredible. It's really incredible. Is, you know, I I have some questions with regard to the specific wines that you produced. You've been jumping faster, but in Castellari, is there a specific wine that you feel that you touched and made, made, you know, an amazing wine? Is there a particular one that Is it "I saw the De San Nicolò"?

Yes.

It's incredible. Yeah.

Simon, you know, it's funny you ask that question. I met Alessandro through our good friend who you've interviewed in your podcast, Nunzio Castaldo. You know Nunzio?

Yes.

We ate dinner with him and he introduced me to Alessandro. And, you know, we, we, um, I'll tell you two funny stories. So when Nunzio introduced me, I was coming off my French kick. Alessandra, I know you know when I started this business, you know, we don't make money in this business. We're doing it for pleasure, making wine. Hopefully maybe in 10 years it'll become something big. But we were coming off the French, and the French, it's almost impossible to deal with them, Simon. You know, it's like, you know, everything is like, you know, you have to have this special you know, demeanor and decorum and this and that. You sit with Alessandro Cilay, the whole town thinks he's the Pope and he's hugging us and kissing us and talking to us like a regular guy. But I'll tell you one of the most impressive stories. We made this wine because of Yisrodi. We made kosher wine because all I hear from my Italian sommeliers, oh, you wanna taste a good Chianti? I love Chianti myself. And he says, "This Isodi is something else. This is something nobody knows of." So I called Nunzio, I said, "What the hell is Isodi everybody's talking about?" Because Isodi is my best friend. My best friend Alessandro Cilai. When he came in, that was the wine that actually put me in the heart of Italy. That's the first wine we made that was— it took many years to produce, right? Because it's not— it's an IGT, believe it or not, because it's It doesn't use the classic designations, but it is probably the pinnacle of why we make kosher wines. And I want to tell you a story. I want to tell you the story because it is going to attest to who Alessandro Cellai is, Simon. Whenever I leave a French winemaker or French thing, I have to kiss their feet for giving me the honor or the pleasure to make kosher wine. I can't tell you what I do. When we had our first drop of kosher wine, first drop that was pressed, put in, I wasn't even there. I was here in America. Alessandro, I'll never forget this till the day I die. It's ingrained. It's like, like when you do a surgery and you see the tumor, you know, you have razor-sharp eyes on how you're going to get around it. This comment penetrated right through my heart, and it was, "Ralph," he called me doctor at the time, says, "Doctor," I want to thank you for giving me the privilege of making kosher wine.

Yes.

When I say it, I want to cry. You understand? It was a bond that formed that only people who appreciate wine and appreciate winemaking can understand one another. That's who Alessandro Cella is. Not kicking you out and saying, okay, just pay me the check, I'll see you later. It was a vision. And that attests who Alessandro Celai is. The second story that we'll tell you is when we were in the middle of COVID Alessandro Celai in Florence was, got sick. He got very sick. And I was so scared for him now because at that point he became like a brother. I had all my medicines here, the monoclonal ready. I was ready to get it shipped. And I told him, do me a favor. Don't listen to anybody. Go there and get the monoclonal antibody, please. If not, I'm shipping it FedEx. I had it ready to go, package ready to go. He went, he got better. 2 years later I come, I brought him 10 doses of monoclonal. So we're sitting in one of the big conferences. When he saw me, he gives me a hug and everything. So the people around him ask him, "Why are you so worried about him?" I told him, "This guy houses more kosher wine than the entire France. I got to make sure he stays alive." No, this is—

you anticipate me, dear friend Lars, because that for me was one of the most dark moment in my life.

Because he was sick, he was very sick, he was in the hospital for 2 months.

I was very, very, very sick and doctors, when I entered in the hospital, I asked, so doctor, what do you think, I can think to come outside and to survive? 'And they said, we don't know, because at that moment many people was dying. And so just 2 days before to be recovered in the hospital, Ralph recommended me to do monoclonal. I did. And when I was outside of the hospital, just the day before to have the admission to the hospital, the major doctor of the hospital say, you can be 100 thanks to monoclonal because if you survived, 99.9% is thanks to the monoclonal. Because your COVID level was, your pneumonia was very serious. Your COVID level was very, very, very high. And so that's the reason why I can never forget what Ralph did for me. I always say to everybody, nobody can touch my best doctor Ralph. Nobody can touch because we became, as he said, very, very big friends. And I think we remain friends for the entire lives.

But he saw the, by the way, but to get to the original point. The Yisrodi was what actually pushed me into this market.

So the Yisrodi, so that's another situation. The name Yisrodi is like—

here's the wine, by the way. This is the wine, you see? Can you see that?

Yeah, the one with the beautiful— with a beautiful bird.

Yeah, and this is the vintage. This is the vintage. The '19 was our inaugurated vintage.

Very cool. So I— yeah. I've shared that with you, Ralph.

Yes.

I've loved it.

So I, I love that wine. It's, it's interesting to me because that was the first thing that like woke me up. I said, this name is so complicated. What is Isodi, uh, mean?

It means— I know what it means in Tuscany. In Tuscany dialect means a strong soil.

It's the soil is very strong.

Yeah, and rich in rocks, right?

The skin is also very dark. Yes, which is the, um, local clone. And it's around the parish of, uh, Saint Nicolò.

Yes.

So which is the church. Yeah. And I said, who names a name like that?

The Mr. Panerai with Luigi Veronelli Just in the middle of '70s when Panerai bought the first land in Castellare.

Yep.

Luigi Veronelli was at that time was the major wine journalist, we can say like that. And he recommended to call this wine through the soil and through the location of the vineyard. And that's the reason why I say Saudi di San Nicolò.

It's, yeah, it's a beautiful name. It's a beautiful name. It says it all. Says it all.

And the Sangiovese of Isodi is in a special area, in that area, compared to the Castellare Chianti in the reserve?

Yes, this is the, it's a specific clone, a specific owned clone of Castellare.

It's, it's, it's a blend of Sangiovese and Malvasia Nera.

Sangiovetto.

Sangiovetto, right. It's not a Sangiovese exactly.

It's, it's the name of the clone, right? Sangiovetto is the name of the clone of Sangiovese that we are using for the sobbi, right?

And the Malvasia is the other 15%, right? It's usually 85-15.

Yes. Yeah, Malvasia Nera.

Okay, um, all right, the next question I had was, and again going along with this whole, um, visual thing, is you— the Renzo Piano winery. Yeah, which is just like— yeah, Rocca di Fasanella. It's, it's crazy because the partnership was one one of the most famous renowned architects.

Yes.

And, and that's— and, and because of that, it had all sorts of special things like gravity flow, natural light, you know. It's, it's an incredible winery, um, and it's an incredible, again, recognition of something very creative but also very visual. So I thought it was very interesting.

How did that, how did that form? How did that relationship form?

This is, uh, the Renzo Piano was since, uh, beginning of his career a big friend of Mr. Panerai, the owner of Stellare. And when, of course, when we started to think about Rocca di Frassinello Renzo Piano was already very, very famous, and Mr. Panerai invited him to, to create the project of the Cellar. Renzo Piano never did before Rocca di Frassinello a cellar, and also never after. Remained— Rocca di Frassinello remained the only one cellar designed by Renzo Piano, and it was very, very excited to do that. And he was very humble because I still remember when he decided to, well, accept the commitment of Mr. Panerai. He said, okay, but Alessandro has to be at least for one week in Paris to spend time with all of my architects. Because I really want to understand which is the needs of the production side versus the architectural side. Because it's much more important to produce a beautiful cellar, but that must be at the disposal of the the technicians, the people that has to work inside, then it's a beautiful cellar but not useful for the people that has to work inside. So that was very, very humble. I spent a week in Paris giving all the information to the architects. So we need this, we need that, this level, this, this must be the bottling line, and this must be— and then they put the dress around the my request. That was very, very important because at the beginning when Mr. Panerai informed me that Renzo Piano accepted the project, I was a little bit scared because I was thinking that maybe this archi style, when they think just to the architectural side, the beauty, you know. But not by the real use.

Functionality.

We have to do the opposite. Renzo Piano was an amazing architect. And he was thinking about the idea of production, the idea of family reunion. And the Sagrato was made just this because it was considered the cellar, a point of reunion of people that working, that are enjoying the production production of wine, that they're drinking the wine. So that is the beautiful— is a beautiful thing.

Very cool, very interesting.

Was he tied to the project, do you think? I mean, he made crazy things, Simon. He did the New York Times building, he did the Museum of Art. I mean, he did the airport in Japan.

He did one of the two top architects in the world.

When he did the winery, what was his emotions? Was he emotional?

Yeah, he was very, very excited. And because he had, uh, he's a young age with his uncle, that his uncle was a wine, a little, little wine producer in Liguria. And he spent time with his uncle like me. But I spent much more time with my uncle. And so, and he was very, very interested since he was a child to about the wine world. And so that for him to design one of the most important cellar in Italy, for him it was a big, a big enthusiasm.

Simon, whatever he's describing is nothing.

No, it's—

To when you get there. And I tell you all the time, we have to make a trip. When you walk into that barrel room, you've been to many wineries, you see they're all stacked on top of each other. When you walk into that barrel room, it's like you almost feel like you stepped into heaven. It's, it's so beautiful, and it's not made like a barrel room. It's like, like they had made concerts in there. They, they, they have, you know, it's just open space. It's just so beautiful. I'll send you some images from when I was there. It's something unbelievable.

Okay, so I want to, I want to go to the next subject, okay? Because it's like never-ending, and I don't want to take the whole, the whole evening from you here. I really promise to, um, cut this back a little bit. Um, Buffanero has become like an iconic 100% Merlot. Why did you decide to plant Merlot And Marima.

By the way, here's the image of the bottle I pulled out from my cellars.

Yeah, that was one idea of Mr. Panerai when one day in, uh, when we just planted the vineyard, he said, because at that time Masseto, the best Italian Merlot, was already created and was already famous. And Mr. Panerai asked me his desire. He said, "I really want to make a Merlot with the attitude to become a great Merlot like Masseto." And I say, "Okay, we try to do. We have a great soil, we have great vineyards." And I started to study how to work to make this beautiful combination. And in 20— in 2007, I decided, so we have the right, we are at the right moment to produce this Prokman Law. And I started to produce this wine 2007, immediately since the beginning, the recognition of the the best wine writers around the world, it was impressive. And now it is one of the 2 or 3 top Merlot of Italy and one of the 5, 6 top Merlot in the world. We have little production, we pick the grapes individually, berry by berry. We do the fermentation in concrete and we age for 2 years in French oak. And then totally manually moved, not the machine or touching the swine. And we destem the grapes by hand. That's the reason why we pick and we select individually berry by berry. And then this is an extremely great concentration, but at the same time, there is a beautiful finesse, a beautiful elegance. And a great taste.

Who came up with the name?

Baffonero is the name of the piece of soil where the vineyard is located. Baffonero means black mustard.

Yeah. A black mustard.

Yeah, that was the name of this soil and we took that name to bring it to the wine.

I love it. Okay. How does Bafanero differ from Bordeaux or a Right Bank Merlot?

Of course, the terroir is completely different. We are near the sea, but at the same time, we are in the middle of the hill. So we have a beautiful influence of the sea, but at the same time we have limestone. So that it's a very particular micro terroir that we have in Rocca di Frassinello. And especially the main difference is that in Bordeaux, the top Merlots always you can feel when you taste a little green, green character.

Yeah.

In Rocca di Foscinello, you can never taste like that. So that is much more, for my personal palate, much more elegant, much more enjoyable since the beginning. Of course, Bordeaux, maybe we are talking about 100 years life. Uh, Baffonero, we don't have yet 100 years of experience, but I am almost sure that we also can taste and appreciate this wine for many, many years.

So, Sharon, just to touch on it so people understand. I've been there. I've been there. You're standing on the top of Rocca di Francianello winery. They have a big outdoor patio. If you look into the distance, you could see the sea. Maremma is on the coast. And then on the right you'll see 3 huge mountains, big mountain hills. So you get this, you go there, if you go there early in the morning you get this very cold, it has crazy diurnal variation and you can get, you can actually see the sea from the background while you see the mountainside. It's an incredible sort of microclimate that he's describing. So you're getting a lot of influence off the ocean and it's being protected by these big mountains on the route, on the outside. It's a very fascinating place. Besides the fact that Renzo made it and it's beautiful, just the actual vineyard in the area is something that you don't see in many places.

Yes, correct.

Okay, next question. The balance of Sangiovese and Bordeaux grapes, that's become kind of the— this is the Super Tuscan world. And has the climate change shifted the blending decisions with that?

Honestly, in all the wineries where I'm working right now, I never, never had the feeling that the climate change is modifying my touch into the grapes and into the wine. Because the vines are trees that are extremely able to adapt themselves to the change of the microclimate. And never had bad experience. Of course, we had some, for example, this year we had 1 or 2 weeks extremely hot, it was 40, 42 degrees. But during the night, we have a big excursion of temperature. So temperature during the night is going down rapidly and then fast. And then in that conditions, the ripening is going beautifully without any effect, any damage or any needs to to modify the management of the vineyard. But the trees, the vines are beautiful trees, very smart trees, and they adapt themselves very quickly.

And you know, in the testament to that, the percentage of Merlot and Cabernet that you put into the Super Tuscans, it's been relatively the same from what we described. Yeah. Even since I've been working with you.

Awesome.

I was going to ask that. How do you decide on the proportions? How did you decide on the proportions?

The proportion, of course, so we have a kind of idea that we decide years ago, but normally, normally every vintage is a different story. So in every vintage, I can decide to use a little bit less on this, a little bit more on that. But because depend the feeling, the taste, the balance, this is extremely, extremely important to verify every single vintage what we have in front of us.

All right. I want to change the subject again. What attracted you to Sicily, to the Sicilian vineyards? With your project in Sicily?

Uh, the project in Sicily, it's another very exciting project because Sicily, uh, following also the idea of Giacomo Tachis, uh, the, the Sicilian terroir is the best to produce anything you want, uh, because the sun is beautiful, the microclimate is amazing, the terroir is fantastic. And Sicily for me was an amazing experience and it still is an amazing experience. And especially where we are located, we are in a beautiful hill between 200 and 300 meters elevation and in front of us we have the sea. So we have all the benefits from the sea, so bringing a lot of breeze, especially during the evening, cooling down the temperature. And we have all the beautiful benefits from the sun, giving texture, giving power, energy, without to lose the freshness, the elegance, and the beautiful drinkability.

So is that the difference between the Sicilian terroir and Tuscany?

Yeah, a lot of difference. A lot of difference because mainly the soil in Sicily is, especially in our side, is based by sandy. And in Tuscany, we have more limestone. So that is, it's a huge difference.

And the temperature, right? It's much hotter more in Sicily.

Yeah.

Temperature is also, but for example, that is the crazy thing. But this year, this year, the maximum temperature of Sicily was 41. The maximum temperature in Tuscany was 43.

Wow.

You can't believe it, huh? Yeah. That's the true thing because Especially in our, in our site, we have the beautiful breeze coming from the ocean and making the temperature a little controlled, especially during the last part of the day.

Just a few more questions. I love your designer labels project. What a great idea to to come out with, uh, with all the series of the different designers and how to unify art in Italy and the design, especially with the grapes and the wines. It's beautiful idea, incredible idea.

Thank you. This is an idea from Mr. Panerai that, uh, he, he is in touch with all of the major fashion designer through his main business, that is a publisher. And when we started the Sicilian project, he was thinking about this idea to make a sort of combination of the most important and famous fashion designers to produce the label for the project. And without any fee, for them, but the opposite, we spend the same amount of money to help the renovation of museums and artworks of Sicilian culture. So that was a beautiful idea. The fashion designers was extremely happy because they advertised them, that project. Yes, they are They are bringing some of their profits to the renovation of museums and artworks of the Sicilian culture.

Very cool.

Okay, so let's discuss a white for a second. Tursat is also a very interesting project with Chardonnay and Viognier. I know it's unusual for Sicily, but it's also, I think, unusual in the rest of the world.

Yeah.

So tell me a little bit about that. What influenced that? What—

First of all, this is the second winery that we have in Sicily. It's a little winery. It's only 5 hectares and is at the opposite side of Sicily. So the Pisciotta is the southeast, uh, Pilsat, so the Cura di Mare is the northwest. We are near Menfi and we are just, uh, in, in a beautiful hill for 80, from 80 meters above the sea level and going down into the sea. So that is That is a beautiful hill, starting with limestone in the top and arriving at the beach with the last vines. So we have a variation of terroir, variation of everything, and that is the beautiful combination between the power and the elegance of Chardonnay and the finesse, the beauty of the nose and the flavor taste of Vionnier. Oh, Vionnier. That is, uh, that is the beautiful, beautiful combination. And you feel the saltiness because we are really close. We are 50 meters from— the last vine is 50 meters from the water.

So it goes like a slope all the way down.

Yes, yes.

Have you tasted that, Ralph?

Yeah, we made it. It was our first wine. It was our first wine, one of the first runs when we made Paddy di Pisciotta. We made a Cabernet which has the Missoni label. We made the Nero d'Avola which is indigenous grape to Sicily, so we have to make that one. That was made by Versace. And then we made the Merlot again because it was Valentino and because Alessandro makes Merlot. And then I told him, if we're already doing that, let's make the white wine. And we made white wine. It ages on the lees, correct?

Also, 100% no French oak.

Yeah, it's, it's just, it's a very old-fashioned type of white wine that ages over time. It was our first, one of our first higher-end ageable white wines.

Yes, I don't know if I ever tasted that. I must have, but I don't.

You, you, I, I, you must have because it was one of our really first, and obviously We got it before we got the reds. So we were selling it out. It's a beautiful wine. In fact, one of the, you know David Sutton, Jack and Albert, you know the Sutton brothers? Their Uncle David, it was one of his alfè wines. He was walking up, parading down the street talking about how great that wine is. That was our first. And it's so unique. He mentioned a very subtle comment, but it's really one of the wines where you're not getting a fatty, buttery California Chardonnay. It has the Chardonnay qualities of Burgundy, and what you find on it is that at the back palate, you get this minerality, this saltiness that is, is indescribable. And even if a guy says, I don't know how to taste wine, it's so evident to him, and it's such a beautiful, different wine. Oh, we sold out of it a while ago. We only made one vintage of it.

Well, okay.

Yes.

And I want to say special thanks to Rav because the past year he allowed me to make for the first time in my experience the Mevushal wine. That was an amazing experience for me because we always made non-Mevushal. But this year, Ralph convinced me and allowed me to produce in Valle Piccola Chianti Classico Mevushal and in Rocca di Frassinello, the Sugare Mevushal.

That means these are the pains of the Messiah when an Italian winemaker is reminding us that he made Mevushal wine.

That's unbelievable. Yeah, that was very— because honestly, and I'm very excited for two things. The first thing, because when Ralph proposed me, I was a little bit scared. I'm very honest, because as a winemaker, considering a pasteurization, even for a few seconds, is still a pasteurization. So it's a very high temperature for the wine and it's not always a good effect. But I can say tasting the wine with and without the pasteurization doesn't make any, at the moment, after 8 months, 7 months, never we are finding a difference.

Wow. That's, that was the question I was going to ask you. Did you, do you find a difference? So, wow.

No, not yet. Not yet. I'm curious to Um, to taste, uh, time by time, maybe next year or 2 years, just to understand. But for the moment, no difference.

My experience has been that the Mevushal wines actually stand up better over time.

But non-Mevushal or Mevushal?

Mevushal.

Ah, Mevushal.

And I don't know why, because it might be that it's frozen in a period of time. So there's a question as to whether it ages well or whether it just stays where it is and it doesn't really age over time, or whether, you know, the new processes are so different than what was used 20 years ago that it— we'll see. We'll see what happens. But that's amazing.

Yeah. By the way, we've been through a couple of renditions. We started with Pescaia, and I have Alessandro speak to Beppe Pescaia all the time. You know, he adopted it very early. I think what happened with— in the way it happened was that the wines are just so good and the restaurants want them. So when I first talked to Alessandro, he's like, no, no way, no way. I'm not that crazy. There's no way I'm going to take my wine, especially Sangiovese. You know, it's a very lighter grape and it's not— it has light, big tannins, The skin is not as big as the Cab, the Merlot, the Nebbiolo. So we actually made one in Italy with an Italian pasteurization machine. It was horrible. De Montepulciano did well with it because I think it was also in that same ruggedness, but in the other ones— and we just threw it out. Then we went to France and we literally— the machine that we bought, Vale Picciola, which is his second winery, that's the machine we used. But we did 3 runs before we introduce it. And I remember Alessandro, I even sent you a couple of samples of non-Mevushal and Mevushal.

Yeah, yeah.

From the—

No, but I say I want to thank you because I'm learning and I'm understanding that this is a very, very interesting process. And at the moment I don't feel any difference in the— into the wine.

And it came out, we made the Valle Piccola Chianti Nebbiolo. We also, we made the Super Tuscan, Le Sughere. We made it Nebbiolo, Salmon. And you know why? Because the demand for the high is so high. So we made Pescaia Arnes, we made Pescaia Nebbiolo Barbera. And I said, okay, fine, northern, we have a little bit of northern Nebbiolo. Now I want Tuscan, the heart of Tuscany. And I think this attests to who Alessandro Cellai is. He's not square in his mind. He thinks outside of the box. He plays with it, he investigates it. And you know what? The reason I picked him, I could have picked other people, is because I know he's gonna exhaust the options to make sure that his label is on it, that the wine is just as good. And I think that's what we did.

What in 2021, what, Alessandro, what convinced you to join this relatively young project with Val Pacheco?

Val Pacheco, yeah.

Yeah.

Yes.

Why?

Yeah, why did you join such a young project at this time?

Yeah, because as I said before, it was for me a kind of challenge for my career to bring a new project rapidly from zero to a very high level. And in fact, with the vintage 2021, so I started to work with the 2019 vintage. So after 3 vintages, the 2021 was included in the top 100 wines of the world by Wine Spectator. Well, so from, from zero to the top 100 wines of the world in 3 years. And we are growing, we are having a big success. And the wine is very well appreciated all over around the world. We are selling the wine in over 40 countries around the world. And it's still a young project, but with a great material. who became rapidly one of the point of reference in Tuscan wine production.

I mean, if you— if we— hopefully, I keep saying we're gonna go, but if you just to put it in your mind into that and your podcast members, Castellare is, as you would imagine, you're in 1950, old school, old brick Tuscan cellar. It's just old vines, it's an older, very mature winery. You know, how you expect wineries in your mind or envision it in the movies. Valle Piccola is brand spanking new, top of the line optical sorters from France that are brand new. It's a brand new, highly adaptive, highly, you know, sophisticated nouveau riche, so to speak. Sort of like the Rockefellers And Jamie Dimon, you know, new money, old money. And it's old winemaking, brand new winemaking. And you know the only common denominator is Alessandro Cilay, is Alessandro. So you have the same winemaker making these paradoxical one zelu madze, as the good book says. And that's the wineries.

So Alessandro.

Yes.

Dr. Ralph has been talking to me about you for a long time. I've wanted to do this for a while, and we've talked about it for a little bit, and I hadn't really grasped who we were talking about until I started doing a little bit of research. And then all of a sudden I went, wow, what am I— you know, like, I'm, I'm humbled by even you giving me the time to ask you questions because it's so This is just really so special. It's amazing. It's absolutely—

Grazie.

Grazie.

Okay, so now it's nearly 30 years of winemaking. I don't want to go into the details too much, but, um, what do you want your legacy to be? What do you want to be remembered by?

That's a great question. Uh, That is a question. So after, I think, a good career, my idea, and I really hope because I have two kids, a boy and girl, both are graduated in winemaker. One is just finished a month ago, and my daughter will finish in 2 months. And my idea is to bring to them all of my attitude, all of my feeling, all of my ideas. But of course, they have to bring also their idea by themselves. But I hope that they can bring and to can continue to bring my philosophy for the future. That is my dream. So I want to leave my legacy to them.

I love it. Please God, they will be as creative as you. Yeah, I hope it will be.

It's very hard. Yeah, I consider myself a very fortunate man because I had a lot of great, beautiful moments in my career. I had fantastic moments in my life. I had the opportunity to meet wonderful persons like Dr. Ralph. And I had great experiences. And, but always what I was thinking since my beginning, that always we can learn, always we can be better, always we can do better. And that was my idea, was my target. Vintage by vintage to try to grow, to make a little step on. And that was my— never to consider myself arrived, never to consider, you know, the level I reached as the maximum. Always we can do better. Time by time is the idea, the motivation The attitude must be to create something better year by year.

Amazing. I thank you. I feel incredibly privileged to have had you on this podcast, and I always feel privileged with Dr. Ralph, but it's— you're really— it's awesome to go through this. And I really look forward to meeting you in the future.

I hope to meet you in person soon.