(Note to readers this blog article and each of the subsequent ones were written upon our return to the USA.)

We planned an entire day in the Irpinia wine region, which includes Gaetano’s home town of Montemiletto. We had six places to visit, our busiest day of the trip. Irpinia wine region is located in the Province of Avellino.

Panificio La Rosa

This bakery is located in Gaetano’s home town of Montemiletto. Achille and Nunzia Brogna started the bakery in 1972. It is a family run business. Their son, Antonio, is the head baker and works the midnight to 6 AM shift.  Veronica, a daughter -in-law works as a baker. Achille provides day time supervision. Nunzia works at the counter ( photo at below right).  La Rosa’s products include pizza, taralli, biscotti and pie in addition to bread. I had to have a slice of pizza even though it was only 10:30 in the morning because it reminded me how my Grandmother and Mother used to make pizza.

Ciarcia

Ciarcia, a meat market and processing plant established in 1930, is located in the nearby town of Venticano. This is not a place for vegetarians. Ciarcia is considered by many as having the top cured meats in the Irpinia region.  Behind the retail shop is a processing plant.  Meat arrives at the basement level to be prepared for the curing process.  We did not observe this area and we were not disappointed as it was described as being messy.  In a second area, the meat is cured for up to eighteen months. The curing area looks like the scene in the movie “Rocky” when Sylvester Stallone practices his boxing in a meat locker (photo above).  In a third area the aged meat is prepared and packaged for distribution. After the tour, we had a tasting of eighteen month cured prosciutto and sopprasetta with cheese and bread (the bread from la Rosa).

Azienda Agricola Antonio Caggiano

Antonio Caggiano’s winery, located in the town of Taurasi, produces highly acclaimed Taurasi, Fiano di Avellino and Greco di Tufo wines. This was our fourth visit to his winery, but this time we focused on his agriturismo and vineyards.  Antonio, an architect before becoming a wine-maker over twenty years ago, has built an agriturismo which is stunning, with a two bedroom guest suite that has sweeping views of his vineyard and the nearby mountains; comfortable, with outdoor dining areas surrounded by grape vines; and exotic, with an outdoor Jacuzzi built into a stone wall and featuring a waterfall ( photo at right).  Antonio gave us a brief tour of his Macchia dei Goti vineyard, where he grows the aglianico grapes for his award-winning Taurasi.   We tasted a 2000 Macchia dei Goti Taurasi, and true to form, it was excellent. As he often does, Antonio shared some of his views on life.  This year Antonio said making wine is similar to love. There are tears of joy when all goes well, but tears of pain when all goes poorly.

Azienda Agricola Perillo Di Romano Anna Maria

This was our third visit to Michele Perillo’s winery located in Castelfranci.  Michele and his wife, Anna Maria Romano, gave us a tour of their largest vineyard located about two kilometers from the cantina. Michele’s grandfather planted the vineyard, which includes Michele’s plot and his uncle’s plot. Unlike Michele, his uncle sells his grapes to local producers.  As we were touring the vineyard Michele pointed out the tracks from wild boar. Fortunately wild boar do not eat aglianico grapes.  However, they do like fiano and merlot grapes.  Michele has five hectares of grapes, 4.8 of aglianico and .2 of coda di volpe.  At the top is a photo of Michele’s coda di volpe grapes (white) and aglianico grapes (purple).  A small producer of 15,000 bottles to 18,000 bottles, Michele was once again awarded the Tre Bicchieri award from the Italian wine guide, Gambero Rosso, for his Taurasi Riserva.  Only about 300 wines win this award annually.

When we returned, we walked up a hill behind Michele’s and Anna Marie’s home/cantina to see more vines growing at the top.   Along the way we stopped to gaze at panoramic views.  Michele and I aren his vineyard on the top of the  hill (photo at right).  Back at their home, we enjoyed conversation and coffee with Michele, Anna Maria, their two sons, Felice and Nicola, and Michele’s mother.

Azienda Vitivinicola Salvatore Molettieri

For the first time in four visits to Salvatore Molettieri’s winery located in Montemarano, we arrived during daylight. When we got there the Italian television station RAI was in the final stages of filming Salvatore with his grandchildren, Salvatore and Angela, for a story on grandparents and grandchildren.

Salvatore and his four sons work together in the wine-making. His son, Giovanni, has taken over as the lead wine-maker as Salvatore has “retired”; he was recently selected to be President of the Retired Farmer’s Association.  Despite his retirement, Salvatore still seems much engaged with the family business. His son, Guiseppe, gave us a tour of the historic Cinque Querce vineyard.  Over the past four years the family has added nearly 16,000 new plants to this vineyard  ( photo at left.) The family would like to expand its annual production of 70,000 bottles to 100,000 bottles.

We had not planned on a tasting, but in connection with the filming there was a long table with a spread of cured meats, cheeses and bread along with wine.  Salvatore convinced us to join them.

Azienda Agricola Ciro Picariello

Our last stop of the day was a first time meeting with Ciro Picariello and his family — wife Rita, daughter Emma, and son Bruno, all of whom are involved with wine-making.  Ciro is a civil engineer who bought his vineyard in 1990, built the winery in 2002, and had his first production of 10,000 bottles of Fiano di Avellino in 2004.  He owns seven hectares of vineyard and rents four hectares to support his annual production of about 50,000 bottles.  Seven hectares are dedicated to fiano grapes and two hectares each are dedicated to the Greco di tufo and aglianico grapes.

We tasted Ciro’s five wines: Irpinia Fiano, Fiano di Avellino, Greco di Tufo, Zi Filicella (aglianico based wine), and Brut Contadino. We learned that Emma is studying bio-technology at a university in Avellino and Bruno is studying to be an oenologist.  Ciro is a self-taught wine-maker having only made wine for home consumption before starting his business.  He made a memorable comment when asked if he agreed with many of the wine-makers in Campania and Basilicata that this year is a great year for grapes.  He replied that we will have to wait and see if it is a good year, but noted that those who are already promoting the vintage have an interest in selling wines.

Note: In the September 19, 2015 blog there is additional information on Caggiano, Molettieri, and Perillo.