For many years, Valpolicella was more of a “brand” in the US, but today’s beautiful wine from Musella deserves to be justly celebrated as a serious wine of place. Indeed, we’re guilty of often focusing on the process of winemaking here–fresh grapes for Valpolicella, dried grapes for Amarone, and something in between for Ripasso–but, as their importer aptly describes, Musella is a “modern-day Garden of Paradise” just outside the beautiful city of Verona, and therefore the vineyard, land, and farming are just as important here as the winemaking process. Without any new oak or raisinated grapes, this old-school bottling of Valpolicella is a transparent, and exuberant window into the terroir of this sub-Alpine region of northern Italy. It’s time to (re)discover why classic Valpolicella took the world by storm!
The Valpolicella growing zone lies just north of Verona, in Italy’s Veneto region, about an hour drive west of Venice. The vineyards are planted on the steep, Alpine foothills that rise slowly towards the Dolomites. The soils here are mostly iron-rich red clay, with pockets of tufo (porous limestone). In the past several decades the process of making wine from dried grapes has been the focus, but historically wines like this “Superiore” were the driving economic force of the region. That history was front of mind when the Pasqua Di Bisceglie family took the reins of the Musella estate. It’s a vast property, covering roughly 1,000 acres in and around the town of San Martino Buon Albergo, in the Valpolicella DOC zone. Most of the property is wild forest, with about 60 vineyard acres farmed according to biodynamic principles. Since 1995, the family has replanted historic hillside vineyards to native grape varieties such as Corvina, Corvinone and Rondinella, and they’ve firmly established Musella as a new-generation benchmark for Valpolicella production.
All the fruit for their Valpolicella–mostly Corvina and Corvinone–is biodynamically farmed, hand-harvested, and then fermented with native yeasts in steel tanks. The finished wine is then racked into cement tanks for six months, and following that is moved to large, neutral oak casks for another six months of aging before bottling. It’s a fairly traditional process, and it elevates this wine from the super light, steel tank only Valpolicellas that dominate the market, without venturing into the modern, powerhouse styles either.
Bright, energetic, full of red and black cherries, spice, and wild herbs, this medium-bodied wine is drinking beautifully now, and is basically a pop-and-pour style: Decanting it 15 minutes or so before service certainly wouldn’t hurt, but really, just keep it cool (55-60 degrees), pour it in some Burgundy stems, and you’ll be very happy with the results. It’s a perfect red for pairing with baked pastas (a meaty lasagna would be great) or something out of the home pizza oven. And given the excellent pricing, I would definitely recommend stocking up because textbook, old-school Valpolicella like this is perfect for outdoor events when the weather starts to warm!
