TENUTA MIGLIAVACCA
Barbera del Monferrato 2025
Piedmont, Italy
Barbera from vines up to sixty years old planted over clay and sandy marl. The grapes were destemmed, and the wine fermented on the skins for a fortnight before being pressed to large oak casks until spring. Offering lashings of berries and turns of spice, it is awash with the kidn of cleansing acidity that makes it the perfect foil to the kind of rich, robust dishes you find in this part of the world.
Barbera
ABOUT THE PRODUCER
Tenuta Migliavacca was founded by Francesco Brezza’s grandfather in 1921, though grapes have been grown here since the early 1700s. The farm has always been known for the high quality of its sfuso, which was sold in demijohns to clients all over Italy and often exchanged for chestnut wood, which they would use to make the large wooden casks used for storing the wines.
By the 1960s Francesco’s father Luigi was at the helm. Like many farmers he was encouraged to introduce systemic products to make work in the fields more efficient, but he quickly noticed a decline in the health of the soil, vines and those who worked amongst them, returned to organic farming and began the search for something more.
A true pioneer, Luigi and a small group of like-minded friends were the first in Italy to apply biodynamic principles in a time when it was almost unheard of in these parts. By the mid-sixties he began turning the farm into a place of entirely self-sufficient, closed-loop agriculture, introducing a few dozen cows for grazing, and sowing a wide variety of grains. In 1972 he obtained Demeter certification, becoming the first winery in Italy to do so, and in leading the way he became a mentor for many others, including a young Stefano Bellotti of Cascina degli Ulivi.
Today Francesco continues his father’s legacy, working in the same spirit whilst listening to the changing needs of the plants in an era of dramatic climate change. Biodiversity is key, and of the farm’s fifty hectares, only ten are planted to vine, with the remainder kept as forest, open fields for cows and crops, keeping bees, or their vegetable gardens.
Barbera, Freisa and Grignolino are grown on vines up to sixty years old over gentle slopes of clay and marl. In the vineyards, they work almost entirely by hand, with a natural focus on soil health in order to produce the kind of grapes needed to make wines which seek to nourish as much as they do please.
In the cantina they work just as they always have, simply, fermenting and ageing the wines in large old wooden casks and bottling them unfiltered in the spring. The resulting wines capture the essence of Italian vino da tavola. Offering tremendous value, they are decidedly old-fashioned – pure, nourishing and full of charm.