 Welcome back to exotic wine travel. I am your host Matthew Horkie We're here on the island of whar in southern Dalmatia in Croatia And I'm here with somebody we've followed for actually quite a few years now I have a little guest on the show today. This is a Joey her master of wine one of only how many master of wine They're actually making wine in the world. Oh making wine. That's probably only about 15 20 this 15 or so there you go We're making wine here on whar from indigenous varieties. Welcome to the show. Thank you very much Thanks for being you know, I followed we've been sure and I've followed your wines pretty much from the start from just Rosina to now Everything see can you tell us a little bit about why you maybe your background? Why you wanted to start making wine here in Croatia? Well, I've been making wine around the world for 20 years. That's how I studied in Australia and then I worked for various different companies sort of like small company like Charles Melton, which was sort of like 100 tons up to working for Jacob's Creek when I was doing 20,000 tons So it's sort of like you know, either and then and now I do even even even less. I don't make 7,000 bottles And I was always looking for somewhere to make my own wine. Okay, so I've blended wines I've worked with wines all around the world and and to me Croatia is like It's really exciting. It has all these indigenous great varieties. So there's about a hundred of them And I just think the indigenous great varieties are really interesting because it they reflect the soil They reflect the personality of the region for much more possibly than Yeah And I think people are really interested in Something that they can't get from anywhere else. Yeah And so I thought well, I'm looking for somewhere to make my wine. Have I was one of the most beautiful livens in the world So you're working with you're working like poshia bogdanusha kuch plavats Mali dharnakusha What do you find exciting about working with these grapes here? Oh, I mean for me Pavats Mali I thought was really that when I first tasted that it's a great variety that you can make something that sort of Approximates like an Adriatic Barbarisco, which is is sort of When you did a tasting of my wine and you said that you reminded you of Barbarisco I was like, yes, exactly But then it always all the way up to an almost like a deep Amaroni style wine all with the same great variety from the same region And it's all about your your choices and on your vision and what what what's why styles you personally like and I think that's a really interesting as a great variety and and dharnakusha, which is Make the Rosina from is is a is nearly extinct There's only one hectare left in the whole world and it's all on have our and that has such fantastic acidity And the vineyard I get this from is really up high up five hundred meters So that is even even better acidity and you need acidity to rose. So and it has all of these countries sort of Sour cherries and and rhubarb and and raspberry rather than the sweeter sort of strawberry So yeah, this is much more of a gastronomic line and I make gastronomic lines with tension and and texture Freshness as a shireen likes and shireen loves the rosin. She's behind the camera. She loves the Rosina actually from dharnakusha We're also big fans of you're starting to make macerated wines welled skins We just tasted through a couple potential blends. Why did you want to start making some macerated wines? I mean, I love macerated wines and you know, and I got inspired by the the wines that were made in Slovenia and in Friuli and in lots of other places as well But but I wanted to try to extract some more complexity out for local grape varieties Which which some of which can be a little bit simplistic and lovely lemony characters But but not something that that has ability to age and has structure and Again this tension I think is really important So a lot of the flavor is in the juice obviously But then there's extra flavors that are in the skin and it takes time to extract that flavor And then it also takes time for those flavors to develop So earlier we tried we went through the Wine that had just 10 or 15 days on skins and then we looked at the stuff that's still on skins now So it's about 340 odd days at the moment And they've all got different flavors and that more extended skin contact brings the whole the real complexity of the Massivation and the aren't the tangerine peel and the the bergamot And this this lifted aromatics that you there's not from the It is from the grapes, but it's from the skin you what you just don't get that without the skin content But you also don't get that tension of the extra phenolics and like white tannins Yeah, which which adds an extra freshness and in a very warm climate like Dalmatia I'm always searching for acidity and freshness Because that helps with longevity It's something I want you know I want to be able to have a glass of wine and feel refreshed rather than feel heavy Yes, how many master wines are there in the world 300 in No, 390 What are all your mastermind friends think about you actually making wine in the middle of in the middle of the Adriatic sea and kind of in the middle of nowhere And I show them the photographs of the of the sea and and how beautiful it is they go Oh We a lot of people not just masterwines, but a lot of people just assume that the grapes are really cheap because it's eastern europe Yes, right this craziness that you know, why would that be? And and the dates aren't aren't cheap at all. Um, and so then people with it wasn't Cheap grapes. Why you know why why why there because you have no connection with there But but part of it is is the fact that there are so many Interesting indigenous great guys here, but I'm not unexplored locally, but but maybe internationally are unexplored and they were definitely unexplored to me And so I just thought it was very interesting to just to start tasting the the grapes and trying to work out What what could be could could be done with them and it is ridiculously beautiful When you think about uh, you know, I mean not just for your wines, but Croatian wine in general the country needs to do to improve quality improve visibility and the world market I think well visibility is quite hard on because the in case of the the um The vineyard plots are really quite small and so there are only probably five large wine companies that can produce high volume and and and a sort of more of an entry point level and and usually that is What starts at all rolling in terms of the the the international scene But we can flip that and actually we're in a in a In a time where people are actually going a little bit wanting to have provenance and and and seeking out things that they You know, it's not just you know foods and experiences and wines that they can't see anywhere else actually, we could actually concentrate on our individuality and and and therefore you can actually look at Exporting small quantities of stuff that is high quality that is unique and You know when I'm like I started exporting to australian to and to japan that's my first export markets um, you know when I went to To australia I studied wine making in australia and I lived there for 10 years and I have an australian passport But you know the reason that the sommeliers let me into the to the restaurant to do a tasting was not because I used to Work for child's milk and I used to make japan's creak. It was like denakusha. I've never heard of that Yes, yes, and and so they there was this like first for something that's different and and and so that that that opens doors that that that you I don't think we could compete with the quality and the and the price and the quantity of wine that's made in spain and italy and So let's not try to let's concentrate on the high quality niche Amazing things that nobody can get anywhere else And not try and compete with making chardonnay at 80 euro cents a bottle. Yeah, I agree 100 percent. What do you see? what do you so What do you see for the future for a her and bino? um, I'm hoping one day and a car that doesn't break down every five minutes I Reverse head forklift would be fantastic. That's really I wish for more than the car. Oh fairness. I do But no, I mean, I don't want to get and I want to be able to make wines that I really like and I make wines that I like to drink And so, you know, I make seven thousand bottles now this this coming vintage probably be ten thousand bottles um, so it's it's you know a good lunch. We could drink it all together, but um So, yeah, I mean, you know, maybe 20,000 30,000 bottles. Um, that's about it I'm looking at my my my new release of the next year will be a Red Dalmatian wine that's that will be an approximation stylistically of what peanut or are because lots of people drink wine here in In the summer and they don't want to drink big heavy clavets And so I'm working on a blend of Of denakisha and and clavets marley to produce something that is has that lightness of touch But it's still complex and concentrated and it has that silky texture that that peanut has and we taste it on the barrel I think shirina proves, right? So, uh, uh, check out. Check out just you are in I think usa australia japan. Where else UK Denmark, um, singapore That's it so far. Huh? So come on come on come out. Check out her wines Come on down to the island of war. Check out her very modest and uh, very charming winery You can also check out her interview actually we interviewed in her on our book cracking Croatian wine So I'll put that up on the screen too. So check it out guys. If you like this video Please subscribe to our youtube channel exotic wine travel. I will see you at the next episode