Rare wines: beyond the limit, resistance

Raffaele Troisi and Nicola Biasi have different points in common. Both are not very used to compromise and both love a challenge: their wines are a direct expression of their respective terroirs, often difficult and angular in their youth, but of great charm if you have the patience to wait for them a while. For some time, both have focussed on extreme vineyards, going beyond the altitude limits deemed suitable. Raffaele with his Traerte brand produces, only in the best vintages, an indomitable Greco, the Fuori Limite, powerful and vibrant, from a vineyard at 600 metres in Montefredane; a few bottles for a white that will go through time with unprecedented ease. Vin de la Neu, the white wine produced by the young Trentino winemaker Nicola Biasi, runs on an innovative and experimental track.

He was among the first in Italy to bet on the qualitative peculiarities of PIWI grapes, an acronym that in German (Pilzwiderstandsfähige) means "resistant to fungal diseases." These are hybrid grape vines capable of spontaneously opposing powdery mildew and peronospora for crops that respect natural farming, surely eco-sustainable. And as if that were not enough, the wine is produced close to home, at an altitude of 1,000 metres, in his native Val di Non. Some time ago he planted the Johanniter grape, born from a crossing of riesling, to press white grapes destined for the rare, exclusive Vin de la Neu. A wine that takes us to a hypothetical future – without treatments – which doesn't even seem that far away.

Rare Wines. Two white wines from extreme altitudes