Young Istrian Winery Valenta appeared in Zagreb. Journalist Tomislav Stiplošek in the multifunctional space History of the Club in Tkalčićeva Street in a fun-educational interactive workshop on wine with literary and musical contents was presented the Valenta family winery from Kaldir, near Motovun. On six hectares of vineyards, most of which are in a location called Raj (Paradise), on the Šubijent Hill, the first commercial vintage had 2017, and it have already begun to receive medals and awards for this first wine.
There were more comments on this Wine Conversation than usual. We were surprised by the quality of the Valenta wine, considering that it was a small and new winery. Still, one should note that wine in this family has been produced for generations, but it has always been there for its own sake. Their wines are made from old vineyards, so although they are new to the market, it is by no means accidental to have awards from this vineyard and cellar. "We went on a wine adventure because we wanted to express desires of our sons of Stiven and Ivica," explained Valter Valenta. Asked about the financial viability and operations of the winery, he said: "Six hectares of vineyards is not enough yet; to make it really financially viable for a family, it needs to have about 10 hectares. The winery business model is simple - we are not interested in either quantity or bulk, but exclusively premium bottled wine. "
The Wine Conversation audience had the opportunity to taste comparatively Malvazija 2018 and young Malvazija 2019, which is not yet on the market, followed by Sauvignon 2018. For another comparison Teran 2017 and Teran 2018 still aged in a wooden barrel were given. The best impression on all present was left by the Malvazijas. One is particularly refined in its quality and aromas, and the reason for sure is that the family will not put grapes of the other varieties in these wines (it was even allowed up to 15%), but they also work with their own selected yeasts. It should be noted that the doyen of Croatian wine journalism Vitomir Andrić ranked Malvazija Valenta at the very top of Istrian Malvazija currently on the market. Sauvignon is very good, which is the most time consuming thing, and was very difficult to produce in Istria because of the large amounts of sunshine. For the wines with potential to succeed in the future, when it comes to Teran, great results of Valenta are expected.
They couldn’t offer Muscat this time, because this past vintage is completely sold out, which shows quality, and for November Muscat from 2019 will have a little more to say and the wine will be ready for market. Pleasant conversations and wines were followed by snacks that showed how the flavours of food and wine blend into different differences - a plate of dried meat products and pate by Buretić Bregi and Latus dairy cheeses.
In the literary section of the workshop, Dragana Radusinović Tafra, a journalist and commentator who has followed the business scene for many years, presented her first novel, "The Tycoon's Daughter," by Beletra, which was presented as a love novel about economic crime. While researching and writing for important publications, he was introduced to partner capitalism up close, and the novel showed him so faithfully that it often raises the question of whether it is an element of one's biography, but Dragan must have made the novel fully fictional. At the end of the Wine Talks, musicians performed. This time it was Helena Novosel and Svibor Perković.