Kmetija Hedele

We’ve skipped over the Italian border into (west) Slovenia, on the 45 parallel, to bring you the crystal clear wines of Kmetija Hedele (‘Kmetija’ means ‘Cantina’). More precisely we’ve followed the ponca trail from the Colli Orientali del Friuli, through Collio & Cormons, & into Slovenia’s stunningly green, serene & luminoso Valle di Vipacco (Vipava), that boasts even more of the amazingly deep, 65 million year sedimentary ponca/flysch/clay & silt, & arenaria (sandstone) soils/beds, that give the white wines a glistening brightness, fruit intensity, & sea-salty mineral quality.

And since 2011, around the village of Goce, local agronomist & ponca expert Andrea Pittana has been planting & vinifying Malvasia Istriana, Sauvignon Blanc, & Chardonnay here, high up on the ponca terraces of the valley. Vines have been planted there since 1892, dating back to Napoleon & the Austro-Hungarian empire. The vineyards are all dry-farmed, with no irrigation.

All wines are tonneaux fermented using indigenous yeast (pied de cuve), having been whole bunch pressed, & aged in tonneaux for a further 12 mths, without battonage or racking. The wines are then racked – along with their lees – into stainless-steel tanks for another 12 mths, before being bottled. Andrea firmly believes in the added quality imparted to the wines by leaving them on their lees for two summers. The Chardonnays also undergo malolactic fermentation in wood, & sometimes the Sauvignon too, depending on the vintage.

Since vintage 2018, Andrea has made a couple of thousand bottles of a single vineyard expression of Chardonnay, from his steepest, ponca rich Obelunec site at between 350-400m asl. Incidentally, the Sauvignon Blanc includes 50% of fruit from the Obelunec vyd.