The Wine Growers Association of Slovenian Istria was founded in 1996, to interconnect all wine growers of Slovenian Istria and represent their interests. To fulfil this goal they organise a line of lectures, trips, meetings and wine fairs, one of the more important being the Malvasia Festival, one of the largest international events in promoting wine culture in Slovenia, Glas Istre reported on March 18, 2017.
“I am glad that a noble drink such as Malvasia connect our lovely Istria, with a record number of participants proof wine growers trust us and that our recognitions are of large importance to them,” said sommelier and President of the Association Ingrid Mahnič, among the festival organisers from the very beginnings.
In the two festival days over 2.000 wine lovers had a chance to taste 120 samples of Malvasia form 54 winemakers from Istria, Kras, Vipava Valley, Croatian Istria, Italy…
The programme included, besides tastings and wine ratings, many gastronomy workshops, blind tastings and lectures.
The star of the festival – Malvasia, was rated in five categories: fresh, ripe, macerated, sparkling and Malvasia with sugar residue. Rating was performed by the Wine Culture Development Society – Slovenia Sommelier 2016, with six members in the rating commission, Slovenian experts and sommeliers headed by Tilena Praprotnik.
The best rated wines were from Croatian Istria. The points won represent another in a line of recognitions profiling Croatian Malvasia into a traditional and most important Istrian variety.
In the fresh Malvasia category, the Prelac winery from Momjan won the most points and took first place among twenty samples form Slovenia, Italy and Croatia. In second place, fresh Malvasia by Slovenian winery Marković and third place for winemaker Tomaz with his fresh Malvasia. In the category of ripe Malvasias the largest number of points went to La Prima 2015 Malvasia by the Fakin winery from Motovun, second place to a Malvasia by the Franković winery in Buje, while in the macerated Malvasia category the best was the one from Cigoj Farm in Slovenia.
In the sparkling Malvasia category, the first place was again awarded to the Istrian sparkling Malvasia Z.P.O. Zigante Wines for the Vero Blanc sparkling. Z.P.O. Zigante Wines have gained many valuable recognitions at international and domestic shows. Their sparkling is made with the traditional method of fermentation in the bottle from the Istrian Malvasia variety. Vero Blanc was aged on yeasts for two years, has an exceptionally lovely straw yellow colour with excellent pearling, with notes of white flowers.
Such high scores of Istrian Malvasias represent a very good sign for the upcoming Malvasia World show organised by the Vinistra association, gathering Malvasia from around the world in the second weekend in May.
