To say that Odilio Antoniotti is “old school” is both a great understatement and it also misses the point entirely. Odilio and his son Mattia do everything in their vineyards and cellar in what we... Read More

To say that Odilio Antoniotti is “old school” is both a great understatement and it also misses the point entirely. Odilio and his son Mattia do everything in their vineyards and cellar in what we think of as an old fashioned way because it works and because they don’t really have any means to do otherwise.

The Antoniotti’s grow grapes and make wine in the steep Alpine foothills of Alto Piedmont, in the DOCs of Bramaterra and Costa della Sesia. Despite some recent outside interest and investment (looking at you Roberto Conterno) this region is still the “backwoods” of Piedmont, and this is especially true of Bramaterra where there are only 8 producers for the whole appellation. Gattinara and Carema are certainly gaining steam quickly, but Bramaterra well, not as much.

So Odilio and Mattia do everything by necessity. They farm without chemicals and entirely by hand, which is the only possibility in their steep, remote vineyards. In the cellar they use the same giant, cement tanks for fermentation that have been there since 1911. They look like a combination of huge brick ovens and giant chimneys.

After fermentation (with wild yeasts of course, they likely wouldn’t know where to get commercial ones) the wine is racked into steel tanks to decant, then it goes to old barrels for aging. Most of the barrels are made from oak that grew on the family property. And that’s it, other than a bit of S02 nothing is added or taken away and after bottling the labels are applied by hand, with a small paint brush and some glue.