The Hindu Business Line : Sparkling lineage

"Earlier you could not find good wine in India; even when you did, it was only French wine… but in the last few years Italian wines have become known along with Italian food and fashion!"

S. Thanthoni

Alessia Antinori: Toast to good wines.

Rasheeda Bhagat

It is with both affection and passion that Alessia Antinori, reputed to be “a world renowned diva of the wine industry”, talks about wines in general and those produced by her family in particular. “A good wine has much to tell you about the region it comes from, it has not only an identity but also a personality and can stand distinct from other wines,” she says.

The title of a wine diva sits lightly on her, as a heritage in winemaking that dates back to 26 generations spanning 600 years of traditional and innovative wine production in Tuscan and Umbria regions of Italy. The family not only traces its tradition of winemaking back to 1180, it is also renowned for some of the most legendary wines in the world; Alessia’s father is a pioneer in the world of Italian wine and has won a plethora of awards and her uncle too has several laurels under his sleeve.

Dressed in a simple black dress, the inheritor of such lineage brushes away the introduction where her 14th-century 18-room stone mansion, which she calls home, is mentioned. “Oh, my room is quite small and the house also has my office,” she says softly, adding that soon it will be “celebrating its 500th birthday”. It is located a stone’s throw from the most important monument of Florence — the cathedral Duomo.

But when it comes to wine and wine appreciation, she doesn’t hold back. These days she has a hectic travel schedule, being the export manager of her family’s wine business in new emerging markets in regions such as Asia and Australia. But India is a place she loves to travel to, and she has gone beyond the exotic Rajasthan and places like Mumbai or Delhi to regions like Varanasi.

As she joins a small group of journalists for lunch at the newly launched Italian restaurant Prego at the Taj Coromandel in Chennai, she is waiting to finish the assignment and take off on a temple tour that she has been planning for a long time. “It’s a pity that I don’t have the time to go to Madurai,” she sighs.

It is soon evident that wine is integral to this wine diva’s existence and she is greatly relieved that during the last few years it has been possible to buy “good quality wine in India.”

She has fond memories of the Taj group and relates how during a visit to Udaipur 12 years ago, when she had “gone without wine for 10 days”, she finally managed to get wine at the Taj hotel in the city. “It was French, but it was good,” she smiles.

Her first visit to India, “which I simply love” was for a holiday, but over the last six years, it is business that has been bringing her regularly to Mumbai and Delhi.

Taste for Italian wine

“I find the awareness and knowledge and even availability of wine has improved tremendously in India over the years. Earlier you could not find good wine in India; even when you did, it was only French wine… but in the last few years Italian wines have become known along with Italian food and fashion! I find a dramatic transformation particularly in the last three years.

Her family produces 18 million bottles of wine which is exported to 130 countries, but the majority of their produce is consumed in Italy, with the US being their second largest market. “You have to be first well known and establish a presence in your own country before going abroad,” she says. After the US, Germany, Canada and Switzerland are the most important markets for the Antinoris, though emerging markets are fast increasing their share.

Alessia defines their wine-making business as “medium in size, and we’re keeping it that way because we are totally obsessed by high quality; all our wines aim for quality.”

Innovation is another buzzword that obsesses her; she is currently engaged in an exercise to make an interesting sparkling wine.

The family owns about 1,800 hectares of vineyards in Italy, grows its own grapes and “and we are the biggest in Italy when it comes to family-owned vineyards. This is very important because you can ensure the quality of the grape if it is grown on land that you own. The grape is a delicate as well as difficult fruit to grow as it depends heavily on natural climatic conditions. We’ve had two bad years — 1992 and 2002 — when due to too much rain we couldn’t produce about 70 per cent of our top wines.”

In 2002, she recalls there was excess rain during the harvest and this is particularly bad and affects the quality of wine made with such grapes.

One of three sisters and a qualified oenologist, Alessia talks about the finer aspects of winemaking, particularly the mixing of two different varieties of grapes to produce “interesting wines”. She is an innovative and adventurous winemaker and has followed many interesting winemaking projects — the latest being the sparkling wine project in northeast Italy.

An Indophile, Alessia looks for any excuse to return, so when Taj Group’s Executive Chef Hemant Oberoi visited Tuscany and invited her to visit their newly launched Italian restaurant, she was more than willing.

At the Prego, Chef Giovanna had put together an interesting lunch to accompany Antinori wines. The starter was a simple salad made with chunks of orange, fennel and white endives (called chicory in the UK, it has white leaves with pale-yellow tips and is good for salads), and was followed by a broccoli cream soup “without cream” and homemade spaghetti with carbonara sauce. Chef Giovanna explained, “In Italy we don’t use cream in the carbonara”, and later Alessia said: “French food is excellent and I love it, but after a while it gets too creamy, too saucy. But Italian food is simple and it goes well with Italian wine. In Asia many Italian restaurants are now opening.”

For this part of the meal we had one of her white wines, a Cervaro 2004; slightly sweet, light with a fruity aroma. Delicious… is my verdict. The expert tells us more; “it’s a unique wine which blends Chardonnay with Grecetto grapes. It’s exotic and aromatic.” She adds how in wine circles the ABC — anything but Chardonnay — mantra is getting popular. “You get interesting wines when you mix grapes, and we do it all the time with French and local Italian varieties. Tradition is good, but innovation in necessary to improve your quality and I am obsessed with quality.”

Before we move to the next course — a juicy lamb stew with polenta (made from cornmeal) — we have already tasted a red wine, the Chianti Classico, and are onto the third and the best wine of the afternoon. The Tignanello is a super Tuscan made with a blend of 80 per cent Carbernet Sauvignon and a local variety of grapes; a bottle of this red would cost you a whopping Rs 32,000 in a five-star hotel in India, inclusive of the stiff taxes and hotel mark-up.

Tuna with red wine

As in winemaking, Alessia likes to experiment and innovate when it comes to matching food with wine. She doesn’t go by the general rule of thumb of white wine with white food — chicken, fish — and red with red meat or spicy food. “This is not true all the time, you also diversify. You can have a tuna with a light-red wine… nothing is compartmentalised like that. With food and wine you always have to experiment.”

She thinks as people become more discerning and knowledgeable about wines, tastes and preferences will change. “I think red wines will become more popular. We are more known for red wine production in Tuscany, but we also make white wines as we find a lot of interest in white wines. Last year we ran out of white wine after two months. But I’d say that red or white, quality makes all the difference and going forward high quality wines are going to do better.”

Do women tend to prefer white wines because they are lighter?

“Possibly, but white wines are not always light, sometimes they have a little higher acidity — not ours though — and are more difficult to digest. But good white wines don’t have acidity, and we are very, very conscious of quality.”

And this obsession for quality translates to her personal preference too. “In summer I love white and in the winter I prefer red; I really like whites but they have to be of really high level. I’m more a red person, but it all depends on the weather and mood.”

And the price, one would like to add!

Response may be sent to rasheeda@thehindu.co.in