The sparkling adventure of Claudia and Giulia Benazzoli

Claudia and Giulia Benazzoli Physically, big shoulders do not have them; they are both well-proportioned. Figuratively speaking, however, over the years they have not spared themselves in anything. After all, who is immune? The challenges that life subjects them to daily have forged their character, enriching them in awareness and strength.

When you work in viticulture there is certainly no shortage of challenges, and not putting off until tomorrow what you can do today often makes a huge difference. This was one of the favorite phrases of Father Fulvio Benazzoli, who died prematurely in 2021 leaving his two daughters lacking perhaps a lighthouse, but full of teachings and above all (proudly) fearless. Fear is your enemy; not having any allowed them to move forward and discover what the future had in store for them. Work ethics, responsibility and a dash of boldness are what, in my eyes, identifies them.

After establishing themselves as women producers (this may sound all said and done… but it is a man’s world and until that changes you will continue to hear it) in the production of the Lake Garda wines. They become big by expanding the boundaries and also producing wines from the Valpolicella.

The Trentino adventure

Trentine by birth and to the core, they were not content and went in search of a new challenge, that of produce a classic method in their home region. Challenge also immediately accepted by Father Fulvio, who actually seems to have preceded them. At the mere mention by the “little women” of wanting to produce a classic method, he immediately routed them to the right vineyard. Already he had identified it and already knew what to do with it.

Thus began the adventure with the bubbles, type of wine this one that more than many others teaches you the value of time. You become patient, in the course of the nerve-wracking wait for those bottles lying inside which things happen that you cannot know. They should simply be left alone. And then you forget about them for a while, aided and abetted by fate that gives you much more to think about and almost makes you forget to devote yourself to that new project, which was born in three and whose flavor you still don’t know.

That flavor, however, Giulia and Claudia finally discovered; one day by chance or perhaps out of boredom or perhaps out of a sense of duty, when they decided to finally uncork the first bottle. In an instant that sip, so naked still, stripped of everything but time and never ever of memories, revealed itself to the sisters all too familiar by taking them back to where it all began. They had produced a Trentodoc Riserva that tasted like the mountains., indeed, in their words, tasted like Trentino.

A descriptive and evocative wine

After my tasting, I confirm it: it tastes like the kind of fatigue one experiences on Sunday morning walks, with small, steady strides with a backpack on. Father Fulvio used to make them for him all his life. He knows of the satisfaction of having reached the summit not without overcoming obstacles, even those whose slope made them seem insurmountable. The Trentodoc Riserva Fulvio 2019 dosage zero smacks of victory, of two sisters, young women who believe in their values and, I’m not sure how they do it, know how to transmit them to wine as well.

I tasted their new wine, in a very limited run of 2500 bottles. I enjoyed the taste, of course, but what I took home was so much more.

Best of luck to Claudia and Julia on this new bubbly adventure. With the wish that they can return home as often as they like, provided that they always return afterwards because the Veronese wine world needs them.

TO READ THE WINE DESCRIPTIONS, WITH SCORE AND AVERAGE SHELF PRICE, CLICK ON THE TABS BELOW.