Sweet wines – looking beyond the prejudice
So many times when I tell someone that I write about wine (someone outside the industry), they will say to me that they only like sweet wines. Often, they are sheepish about this, expecting condemnation. I sincerely believe everyone needs to find a wine that brings them joy. Otherwise, there is no point in drinking it!
Sweet wines can often get a bad rap. Unclad feet on a bottle of Moscato on the bottom shelf at the grocery store might not be a wine I would recommend, but sweet wines don’t deserve the negative vibes they often get.
We eat foods that are both savory and sweet, right? When dieting and avoiding desserts, we might vilify those sugary, delectable treats, but we still appreciate them.
So it should be with wine. The variety of wines is one of the things that drew me to it!
So today, we are diving into Moscato, a grape often not taken seriously. Specifically, we are speaking of Moscato d’Asti, from the Piemonte region of Italy.
Let’s get in the mood with a bit on this region.
Piemonte and Asti
Piemonte is in Northern Italy, west of Lombardia. It is separated from the Mediterranean Sea by the thin strip of Liguria. To its west is France, to its North Switzerland, with the small Italian Province of Valle d’Aosta between the two.
This is the foot of the Alps, and as it is partially cut off from the sea by the mountains of Liguria, the climate is continental, with cold, snowy winters and warm, dry summers. In the fall, you often see fog here, in Italian “Nebbio,” which may be the origin of the name “Nebbiolo,” the grape that makes the famous wines of Barolo and Barbaresco in this region.
Piemonte has more DOCGs (Denominazione di Origine Controllata e Garantita) than any other Italian region at 19. It also ties with Toscana for DOCs (Denominazione di Origine Controllata) with 41.
For our exploration today, we head to the Asti Province in the southeast part of Piemonte around the City of Asti. Here, you find the grapes Barbera, Nebbiolo, Dolcetto, Grignolino, Brachetto, and the grape we are focusing on, Moscato.
Moscato
Let’s speak first of the grape. Moscato Bianco is also known as Muscat Blanc à Petits Grains, which means white muscat with small berries. Unlike many other wine grapes, this grape is delicious enough to often be used as a table grape. While its exact origins have not been determined, it is thought to have Greek origins.
The first mention of this grape was in Italy in the 14th Century, when it was referred to as a table grape that was grown around Bologne. (Wine Grapes 2012 Jancis Robinson, Julia Harding & José Vouillamoz)
Canelli
The heart of the Asti region is Canelli. Italy’s first traditional method of sparkling wine was made from Moscato grapes in this region in 1865 when Carlo Gancia returned from learning about sparkling wine in Champagne.
Moscato became well-known and beloved in this region in the Renaissance.
The city sits about 25 km south of Asti, and the nearby town of Santo Stefano Belbo is still famous for its Moscato d’Asti.
Canelli is home to a UNESCO World Heritage Site, the “Underground Cathedrals.” Here in the calcareous tuff soils, these began as small caves, originally created to preserve goods. Over the centuries, they have expanded. Today they extend 15 kilometers under the city, reaching a depth of up to 40 meters. With all the wine in the region and the perfect temperature and humidity of these caves, they came to be used for making and aging wine. Today, they no longer make wine in the caves, but if you visit and tour them, you will see pupitres of sparkling wine tended by the cellar hand.
The Canelli DOCG
The region of Canelli was previously a subzone of the Asti DOCG but, in 2023, became its own DOCG. It straddles the border between the Cuneo and Asti Provinces and comprises 18 parishes. The DOCG contains about 100 hectares of vineyards, which, according to DOCG rules, must be between 165 and 500 meters above sea level.
This DOCG is for wines in the Moscato d’Asti style which are sweet, frizzante and 100% Moscato Bianco. A couple of other DOCG rules: they must hand harvest the grapes, and the wines cannot have over 2.5 atmospheres of pressure (for comparison, Champagne is between 4 and 5 atmospheres of pressure). Lastly, the alcohol level must be between 4.5-6.5% (for comparison, a dry white wine is between 11% and 13% typically).
There is also a Riserva level in this new DOCG, which requires 30 months of aging, of which 20 months must be in bottle. Yes, aged Moscato d’Asti is a thing and a delicious thing at that, as you will soon see!
Ca’D’Gal – The home of the rooster
Ca’D’Gal was a property initially owned by the Boido family, who were the 4th generation to run the estate. Alessandro Boido, the owner and winemaker, worked to produce ageable Moscato near Santo Stefano Belbo in the Valdivilla hills. The amphitheater that held his vines was a prized location in the region with seams of limestone-rich blue tufa soil. He began the winery in 1989.
He had no children to pass the winery to as he grew older. Luckily, he met Allesandro Varagnola.
Allesandro was from Turin, near Langhe Monferrato, where his parents worked in event organization and wine events. The family dream had always been to move to this area of the Piemonte.
He studied economics and worked in Milan, Dubai, New York, and Boston before investing in the family dream. In 2023, they acquired Tenuta Valdivilla Vineyards and Tenuta La Cova in Calamandrana.
Allesandro looks to honor the tradition of this winery and guide it forward. Allesandro speaks of it as a sense of “continuity and a boost of energy.” They spent a year with Alessandro Boido, learning about the vineyards and his philosophy as much as possible.
Tenuta Valdivilla is dedicated to Moscato, with 6 hectares of vineyards. Tenuta La Cova is a 25-hectare property with vineyards, hazelnut groves, and forest. Maresa Novara is their agricultural consultant and directs them on what they call “restitution” agriculture (which seems very much “regenerative”). They promote biodiversity and integrated pest control and look to encourage a healthy microbiome in the soil.
They are SQNPI-certified and are working toward organic certification.
Luca Caramellino is their consulting winemaker.
The Wines
Thanks to Studio Cru, we met with Allesandro and Luca via Zoom to learn about their wines. We discussed 6 of their wines. Chardonnay and Sauvignon Blanc from their Tenuta La Cova property that have just been released, their Asti Spumante, and their 3 Moscato d’Asti wines. We will get to the Chardonnay, Sauvignon Blanc, and Asti Spumante on another day.
Today, we speak of Moscato d’Asti, the Ca’D’Gal Lumine, Sant Ilario, and the Vite Vecchia. This is a range of Moscato d’Asti wines, each unique in flavor, color, and in their evocative and beautiful labels.
Ca’D’Gal Lumine 2023 Moscato d’Asti DOCG
This wine comes from vines between 20-45 years old with Northern exposure. This wine is meant to be fresh, evoking the sun in the area, mirrored in the label, created by a local artist.
The grapes are then pressed softly and fermented in stainless steel to reach 5% abv.
This wine had notes of sweet fruit, honeysuckle, white flowers, and sweet ripe white peach.
This wine retails for around $25 and is (as they all are) 5% abv.
Ca’D’Gal Sant Ilario 2022 Moscato d’Asti Canelli DOCG
The vines for this wine are older, averaging 70 years, and this part of the vineyard has North-east exposure.
The grapes get a soft press with “carbon snow” (dry ice) and then stay on the yeast in an autoclave at 0° Celsius until the following spring. Then fermentation continues at 16 to 18° Celsius until the wine reaches 5% alcohol. The wine is bottled and matures in bottle until September before release.
This wine was the palest in color of the three, with a faint green tint. I found notes of lemon, lime, wet green leaves, melon, and kiwi in this wine.
This wine retails for around $28.
Ca’D’Gal Vite Vecchia 2016 Moscato d’Asti DOCG
Yes, stop and look at that vintage. This is 2016. The Vite Vecchia is a single vineyard wine from the Valdivilla Vineyard, where the vines average 70 years. These are the last vines to be harvested each year.
As with the Sant Ilario, this wine has a soft press and sits on the lees until the spring following harvest. Then, they age the bottles in sand-filled wooden boxes for 60 months. This creates a dark, humid environment that mimics the “grottos” where their grandparents stored wines in the region.
This style of aging is a continuation of the previous owner’s experiments with Moscato. From my sips of this bottle…it is a worthy experiment. The wine is delicious, lush, and rich. It was my favorite of the 3 wines., with rich notes of lemon sauce, peaches, dried flowers, orange zest, and a hint of lanoline. There are subtle caramel notes and bits of white balsamic.
Allesandro considers this an after-dinner meditation wine and suggests oysters or aged parmesan as a pairing.
They produce just 5000 bottles of this wine from their 1-hectare vineyard.
This wine retails at around $80 per bottle.
The grottos or “infernòt”
This wine was meant to mimic the way that generations of small vignerons kept their wine. Allesandro spoke to us of the grottos in the region. Families would have a grotto that was cool and humid, where they would store food and wine. They currently use wooden boxes filled with sand to mimic these grottos, but their other estate has a grotto.
As I tried to envision this, I began looking up “grottos” in Piemonte and, coming up empty, reached out to Studio Cru, who had set up this tasting. Elena was kind enough to reply and give me more information.
“Between Langhe and Monferrato, you can find these grottos dug in tuff, known as “Crütin” or “Infernòt” according to the dialect and the area. In the past, they were used as a place to store food and also wine due to its constant temperature and humidity.
The storage under the sand derives from a local tradition passed down to Alessandro. As the soils are sandy and grottos were dug in the hills, the best way to store wine was to create some recesses where to place the bottles or bury them.”
I found the term “infernòt” used most often. They are prevalent in this area due to the Pietra da Cantone sandstone. This region was once a sea bed, and this tuff stone in this particular area allowed people to dig and create these caves and cellars by hand without engineering knowledge. The Infernots are part of the UNESCO World Heritage sites in the region. Built only during the 19th Century, this type of cellar is found nowhere else in the world.
The Pairing Panzanella
A few years ago, during the pandemic, while doing a pairing of sparkling wines with an online seminar (thank goodness for those; they kept me sane!), I made a stone fruit, Panzanella. It was delicious and gorgeous! I wanted to recreate that, but we are not in stone fruit season!
I went with what was available at the store, and we ended up with a Panzanella with heirloom grape tomatoes, cantaloupe, kiwi, grapes, orange, basil, mint, lime, and pistachios! The dressing was a blend of honey, lemon juice, olive oil, basil, mint and prosecco vinegar. We finished it with crusted sourdough baguette chopped into squares and toasted with olive oil and salt, topping it with burrata.
We also had a bit of aged parmesan and blue cheese to pair. Blue cheese is often delicious with sweet wines, so I thought we should give it a try.
All 3 wines were fantastic with the blue cheese. I found the bright fruit and floral notes from the wines to explode in my mouth with the blue cheese.
The wines went well with the Panzanella, but the contrast with the salty cheeses was much more satisfying. It made me ponder on crumbled blue cheese to top a Panzanella.
More Information
On the infernòt
- http://www.turinitalyguide.com/insiders-guide-to-monferrato-piedmont/
- https://fermoenosteria.net/infernot/
For more information on Cadgal, you can visit their website (although it is currently under construction): https://cadgal.it/. There, you will find links to their wines and social media, where you can find more information.
Robin Renken is a wine writer and Certified Specialist of Wine and WSET 3 Certified. She and her husband Michael travel to wine regions interviewing vineyard owners and winemakers and learning the stories behind the glass.
When not traveling they indulge in cooking and pairing wines with food at home in Las Vegas.
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