Agriculture Reference
In-Depth Information
better ones will remind you of apricot kernels
and white peach. I'm not sure I have ever tasted
an Ortrugo wine that qualifi ed as complex, but
for early appeal and simple, easygoing sipping
on hot summer days, the wine is hard to beat.
has surged back in the last twenty years, mainly
thanks to the Boscaini family at the Masi estate.
At Masi, they replanted Oseleta in 1985, includ-
ing it in their wine blend called Toar beginning
in 1990 and then creating Osar, which Oseleta
gets to play solo. The use of Oseleta on a larger
or routine scale, such as in small percentages in
Valpolicella and Amarone blends is only very
recent, dating back to the late nineties (Tosi and
Bletzo 2000). The rebirth of Oseleta happened
by chance. Sandro Boscaini, the owner of Masi,
was visiting his brother one day and tasted a
remarkably tannic and dark Valpolicella. The
wine didn't remind Boscaini of any Valpolicella
he knew, so he asked to see the vines that had
been used, and those didn't remind him of Cor-
vina or any other cultivar commonly used to
make Valpolicella. So he had the grapevine ana-
lyzed and learned it was Oseleta. Impressed,
Boscaini never looked back, and he set up par-
cels of Oseleta vines on his own estate. Riccar-
do Tedeschi points out that Oseleta is a highly
adaptable grape: it grows well more or less any-
where. “It's also extremely resistant,” Tedeschi
says, “allowing you to make wine in those
weather-challenged vintages such as 2011 in
which all the other varieties have to be literally
thrown out. It also builds up sugars much
faster than other varieties, so the air-drying
process doesn't need to last as long, which saves
us both time and money.” Given Oseleta's very
small berries and lack of juice even when not
air-dried, this is probably just as well. These last
two characteristics explain why, in the begin-
ning, Oseleta's arrival on Veneto's winemaking
scene didn't excite or interest the majority of
growers: many simply didn't think the grape
was suitable for air-drying (D'Agata 2003a).
In fact, Oseleta is characterized by very
small bunches (average weight 130 grams) that
are cylindrical-pyramidal in shape and
extremely compact. Berries are small, round
but not uniformly so, and blue-black with thick
skins. They contain at least three pips to the
two of most other varieties, and the grape is a
very resistant, almost rustic variety. For exam-
ple, even though its bunch is very tightly
wines to try:
Barattieri San Pietro**, La
Torretta**, Marco Cordani** (Frizzante),
Mossi** (both the still Ortrugo and the Ortrugo
Brut, a sparkling wine), Tenuta Pernice**,
Cantina Valtidone* (Frizzante). Pusteria's
offering also contains 15 percent Trebbiano
Romagnolo.
Oseleta
where it's found:
Veneto.
national regis-
try code number:
358.
color:
red.
One of the many
uve uccelline
(bird grapes)
of Italy, varieties so called because birds loved
to eat the sweet berries, Oseleta is a true native
grape success story. A miserly producer, it had
been abandoned by growers in Valpolicella
(where it wasn't documented much before the
twentieth century anyway). It's not a grape with
a long and distinguished history. In part that's
because there was more than one
Oseleta
described in the past, when the grape was more
commonly referred to as Uva Oselina or Ose-
lina. The fi rst important description was by
sixteenth-century humanist scholar Onofrio
Panvinio. The ampelographic commissions of
1880 and 1883 listed four red-berried
uve oseline
in the Monti Lessini area of Veneto, and one
with white berries: Oselina Rossa, Oselina di
Montagna, Oselina Mora, Oselina Nera, and
Oselina Biancara. All were characterized by
very jagged, intensely green leaves and small
bunches and very small and tart berries (Ose-
lina Mora's were the smallest berries of all).
Acerbi mentions an Uva Ozilina, but it is
unclear if this is today's Oseleta; I have read his
description carefully, but I don't fi nd there is
enough information to conclusively say the two
are the same, despite what you may read else-
where. Zava (1901) noted the presence of the
Oselina
s around Verona and Treviso. Oseleta
