VINEGROWING AND WINEMAKING

NATURAL WINEMAKING, AGEING AND BOTTLING AT CASE BASSE

Farming operations on all vineyard terrains

  • Winter ripping followed by the application of natural fertilizer (manure)
  • Manual hoeing of all the vineyards each year, to remove harmful weeds
  • Levelling off and refining soil, also beneath the vine rows
  • Cutting grass under vine rows when necessary

Farming operations on vines in production

  • Pruning begins around 10th February; two buds are left on the cane, one of them a base bud; all operations are done by hand, including disinfecting the cuts with natural products
  • The last thinning out is done at veraison
  • Natural treatments to protect against disease; copper, sulphur, Bordeaux mixture and propolis. Treatments are never systematic and the last one is done no later than 25th July
  • At the end of August, the leaves covering the grapes are removed

Harvest operations

The harvest is done exclusively by hand, selecting the grapes both in the vineyard and in the cellar, so that destemming is only carried out on healthy, ripe grapes, keeping the individually-selected berries intact.

Winemaking, ageing and bottling operations

  • only bunches that are selected in the vineyard and then manually selected again on arrival at the cellar are destemmed. Destemming is done in special machines in order to keep the berries intact and to enable them to be selected according to size.
  • The berries are checked one by one before being transported via a belt straight into oak vats of over 100 quintals for fermentation
  • Subsequent pumping over until devatting; no clarification or filtration
  • devatting is only done into large Slavonian oak barrels (not barriques), no filters, no clarification, only racking when necessary
  • the only additive used is sulphur dioxide, though in very limited amounts
  • the wine is bottled directly from the barrels without filtering, even after the wine has been ageing for over 4 years
  • only Sangiovese grapes are used, no other grapes and/or wines are ever added
  • only grapes from Soldera’s vineyards
  • bottles are kept in cages in the cellar for some months before the new vintage is released onto the market