It’s been a while after the festival and here I am, with a brief report and the first part of mine impressions…

As you noticed in my previous post, the festival was divided into 2 venues. The venue at hotel Union was mainly reserved for the promotion of winemakers that are part of the Family estate association, there was also some room for wines of foreign countries and other major resellers presenting their catalog range. Unfortunately I couldn’t make it to the venue at hotel Slon, so I can’t say much about that.

On the 2^nd day I took an hour of time to visit the stands. Matjaž, winemaker MonteMoro replaced me for that time, but unfortunately it happened to be when it was most crowded. None the less I still managed to do a quick sip & spit tour. Even though, due to the lack of time I didn’t manage to stop at every stand so, here is just a few of the impressions… I must also apologize to readers and winemakers for the lack of descriptions but I’m sure I”ll be writing in details about some of these wines shortly.

I started tasting wine from wine region Podravje. The region is known for its white varieties, although red varieties are also becoming notable. None the less the world’s oldest vine comes from this district. You’ll find dry as well as medium dry wines, that have a distinct freshness ideal for ageing. Non the less the region is known for its Predicats.

Miro wines

Miro was presenting his Furmint 2008, Blue frankinja 2008, XL 2007 and Fuga mundi 2006. Miro wines are divided into two segments; if you’re prefer fresh wines, with distinct varietal notes then look for his orange marked screwcapped bottles. For lovers of oak barrells grown wine the color to watch is black. Of course a special packaging is reserved for his Botrytis marked Fuga mundi.

Verus vineyards

You probably read Jancis Robinsons impressions about their Furmint 2007. This time visitors had the chance to try Chardonnay 2008, Welsch Riesling 2008, Sauvignon 2008 and Pinot Gris 2008. Verus wines have distinct varietal aromas, are well structured and quite ballanced. I got impressed by their Chardonnay, wich was partialy aged in oak barells.

Kupljen wine

The atmosphere at Kupljen wines was really happy, unfortunatelly due to lack of time I stoped only to do a quick sip & spit and to take some pictures. The wines dislayed were Welsch Riesling 2008, Furmint 2008, Sirius 2008 and Pinot noir Selection 2007.

Gaube wine

I already mentioned Gaube wines on my blog. This time I could try his Pinot gris 2008, Kerner 2008, Chardonnay 2008 and Welschriesling 2008.

Steyer wines

Quick stop to try their 8 cuvee 2008, Steyer Mark cuvee 2007, Gewurtztraminer 2008 and Gewurtztraminer extreme 2007.

Joannes wines

I interrupted the chat between winemaker mr. Protner and Slovenian Collio’s winemaker mr. Sirk to try his Sauvignon 2008, Welschriesling 2007, Welschriesling 2006 and Pinot gris – rose 2008. I must say I got impressed by his Welschriesling 2006 and Pinot gris – rose.

Graben wines

Unfortunately I didn’t take any pictures at Graben wines, the only representatives of the wine region Posavje. They were presenting Pinot gris 2008, Traminer 1998, Gamay 2003 and Blue frankinja 2004. I found the last two wines quite interesting.

This is it for now, stay tuned for more and cheers!

Yes, I’m back, finally! Sorry for this long hiatus but I’m sure you’ll understand. There are some new things coming up, to mention one is a fresh design, thanks to my colleagues.

OK, since this is a blog about Slovene wine I have to start with, … for some of you maybe boring stuff…, but to understand Slovenia as a wine making country you have to know some of the following data.

Slovenia has approximately 22.000 hectares of vineyards, about 17.000 are registered. Wine is produced in 14 wine districts which are united in 3 wine regions:

- wine region Primorska,
- wine region Podravje,
- wine region Posavje.

(This is a wonderful map, but the name of the wine district Koper is wrong, it was changed to Slovenska Istra)

There are more than 27.800 registered winemakers, amongst them 1.700 bottling their own wine. Slovenian winemakers produce about 50.000.000 to 65.000.000 liters of wine yearly.

More than 50 different varieties of vine is being grown herem with white varieties prevailing. Vineyards are growing on steep slopes which on one hand results in high production costs, but on the other it brings high quality crop. In fact more than 60% of produced wine is of a higher quality.

The vineyards surface hasn’t changed a lot in the last few years, the vineyards were expanding until 1996, but then started to decline slowly. The prevailing white varietal vine declined in this period from 76% to 72%. Since the surface remained almost the same, the crop of grapes and wine was almost solely dependent of the weather.

This is it for now. That’s just some pure huge information, which will be explained throughout the blog. Next time I’ll present you our wine regions and their prevailing vine varieties so stay tuned…

Cheers!