Vino Da Tavola
How To Read A Vineyard

You read grapevines just like you do Renaissance paintings or Greek pottery: Really look closely and you'll begin to see something of a world view, hidden in the tiniest of details.

How are these vines trained? That is, how has man forced his will on them, remembering that vines are actually that- vines - and that they want to grow as the please, up trees and rocky hills. (Perhaps even more than the actual harvest it's the pruning that is the most humbling part of my time making wine, when you come face to face with the unstoppable yet silent life-force of the plant world. Cut it. It grows back. Cut it. It grows back. If you spend more time in the city than the countryside, it's the same quiet beauty, as the tiniest plants silently crack cement that would require jackhammers as loud as airplanes for the rest of us).

Here, Nino is using the double Guyot method preferred by a lot of the world, although, not that typical of here in Puglia , where the alberello method is used (more on that in part three). Double Guyot is the preferred method in Bordeaux , telling again, as finding them in Puglia implies travel and study, as do the rose bushes (read on).

The Doppio Guyot or double Guyot trains the vine into a fork that runs left and right on a metal wire. The effect is bondage and discipline, but for plants. It's time-consuming for the pruner, the extra labour performed among the winter elements. But it also dictates how the leaves will grow, directly over top of the fruit, shielding it from the Half-Day sun. Come harvest, the grapes will contain less over-all sugar, which is what will eventually turn into alcohol.

And Nino's vines stand out from the others. Lately I've noticed that whenever I notice a grower doing something atypical from the others in the community, the effect is almost always fascinating.

This is Nino, a total sweetheart of a man.