Wine requires special care (“ad personam”) of the grapevine, starting from the grape: each bunch, (the most of them), is handled individually, one by one, and valued during the short time needed to place it in the box, or plateau. And its grade of maturation and its potentiality in the wine making process is determined just by touching it. Once the grapes are resting, their drying process is checked every day, adjusting ventilation if the weather is not favourable. But it is already known if a certain vineyard is more suitable to produce Valpolicella classic, Recioto or Amarone; therefore special attention can be easily planned to obtain the best results.

This attention, that comes from tradition, the same required by the most updated enological science, is justified by the special place taken by wine in the people’s culture, and perhaps in our civilisation. Wine was always surrounded by a sacral halo, the signs of which are not limited to the Christian cult, but are related to the popular customs and tradition up to few decades ago: grape harvest began after the feast of Our Lady of the Rosary, Recioto was decanted on Good Friday, the wine for the Holy Mass was made from grapes offered by the entire community.

Each family kept some grape bunches, hanging from the wooden beams the kitchen (el rosso, the red ones) to be eaten on Christmas, and some bottle of good wine were kept for the children’s baptisms.

The same good wine was used to confirm an agreement, a new friendship, a marriage contract: when a father was going together with his son to ask officially for the hand of the girl he loved (morosa), the assent of the girl’s father was endorsed by the invitation to sit at the table and drink a bottle di quello buono (“of the good one”).