La Bertuzza Estate covers 13 hectares of vineyards, partly surrounding the company on the hills of Castell’Arquato, in one of the best positions of the area, about 120 meters above sea level, and partly in Diolo in Val Chiavenna (municipality of Lugagnano). All the plots of land have a soil mixture ideal for the production of our Colli Piacentini DOC wines and a constant exposure to the sun. This allows to obtain grapes with perfect ripening, healthy and with characteristics that make wines soft, full–bodied and of intense aromas. All natural! The planted vines are the traditional ones, which are needed to produce the wines of the Piacenza hills: Barbera and Bonarda for the red ones, Ortrugo, Malvasia di Candia Aromatica, Moscato, Sauvignon, Trebbiano and Chardonnay for the white ones. More or less 3 hectares of vines are old, with an age of about 40 years. Unfortunately, the more and more scarce yields and, consequently, the unbearable costs, will lead soon to the restoration of the plants, but probably the special clone of Barbera present in the oldest vineyards will be recovered in small clusters, because of its excellent quality.
Vines have natural grass and are grown with the Guyot method with a branch on the new vines and two on the old ones, which have reduced yields not to exceed with alcohol content after vinification. The harvest is made by hand to obtain a grape selection, clean but mostly intact.
In the wine cellar they follow a traditional vinification with steel and cement tanks with the exception of Gutturnio “Superbo”, for which they use barrels with 2 or 3 transitions for an aging of 12 months that do not cover the typicality of wine but makes it more harmonious, complete and structured.
For sparkling wines, autoclaves are used to obtain clear bottled wines, ready for consumption after a natural second fermentation.
For the raisin Malvasia wine, grapes are harvested after a slight withering on the vine and
are placed in small boxes where they complete the drying. End of November, they proceed with crushing. In the early years, as grapes were scarce and there was not any equipment, grapes were crushed with feet, while nowadays an old handling wine press is used. The natural fermentation takes place without yeasts. After a light filtration, it is bottled to be sold the following Easter.
The selected yeasts are used only in cases where it is necessary to start the second fermentation (so all the wine sold in the demijohn is made without added yeast) and not as a standard practice. Sulfur dioxide is used very scarcely, well below the legal limits.
