Podere Il Carnasciale

Until 2005, one Tuscan wine tionary 10,000 vines per hectare, and to prune to a mere five clusters per plant. As if to presage Il Caberlot’s future, the Rogoskys buried a bottle of Sassicaia under the first vine.

From the first vintage, 1988, Il Caberlot has been a huge cult wine in Europe, its scarcity driven by nature and the vineyard’s size of less than an acre. Wolf Rogosky passed away in 1996, but Bettina has carried on the work with her son Mortiz and her winemaker, Peter Schilling. With time, more vines have been planted, but production remains miniscule. The wine is still bottled by hand, and is held for two years before release. Bettina Rogosky hand- numbers each label. A second wine, made from younger vines and named “Carnasciale,” was introduced in 2000.

Il Caberlot

Il Caberlot boasts an extraordinary perfume, sleek texture and great elegance. Boasting nuances of Graves, Pomerol, and Il Carnasciale’s unique terroir, it ranks among the planet’s most singular wines.

Carnasciale

Carnasicale is a perfect example of a second wine. It mirrors its sibling perfectly, on a slightly smaller scale. And, as vine age has increased, the stature of this wine has grown with it.

Bottled exclusively in magnum, only two enotecas (out of a thousand or more) in Tuscany get any, and restaurant allocations are limited to a handful of top European restaurants. Members of Florence’s elite Teatro del Sale were allocated one magnum per year, a privilege handed down from generation to generation. And, in 2005, we were fortunate to be named the first US agent for the estate.

A UNIQUE CLONE

The wine is Il Caberlot, and its fascinating story mdoesn’t end with its scarcity and desirability. It, and its second label Carnasciale, are the only wines in the world made from a mysterious clone discovered four decades ago near Verona. Named “Caberlot,” the grape has characteristics of both Cabernet and Merlot—hence its name.

Caberlot’s discoverer—agronomist Remigio Bordini—has allowed the vine to be planted just one place outside his nursery: at Wolf and Bettina Rogosky’s Tuscan estate, Il Carnasciale. The vineyard lies atop a rocky, south-facing bluff that tow- ers above Tuscany’s
Arno river. Famed enologist Vittorio Fiore discovered this providential site in 1986.

Four parcels of vines totaling 3 hA. The original site (0.3 hA) is located at 430m elevation, while three younger vineyards (0.7, 1.0 and 0,9 hA) are planted between 200m and 250m. Vine spacing is a revolutionary (for Tuscany) 10,000 vines per hectare. A new plot was planted in 2013.

Soils: The original site is iron-rich clay, while the three newer sites lie on a combination of chalky clay, sand and rock.

Zone: The estate is located at the divide between the Arno and Ambra river valleys. This crest protects Il Carnasciale from rains, making it one of the driest and best ventilated sites in Tuscany.

All treatments in the vineyard are natural and follow the principles of organic farming. All work in the cellar is manual and minimally- invasive. Grapes are hand-picked and destemmed before undergoing a fermentation and maceration of 8-10 days. The wines are aged in barriques and fûts from Burgundy, 60% new, over a period of 22months prior to bottling by hand. No filtration is employed. Il Caberlotmatures 16 additional months in bottle before release, while Carnasciale is released after 6 months in bottle.

Over the years Il Carnasciale has acquired cult status among readers who crave the finest Tuscany has to offer, and rightly so. These are some of the most unique wines from Italy.

Antonio Galloni in The Wine Advocate