In the North Eastern corner of the Conegliano Valdobbiadene Wine Region in the region of Veneto in Northern Italy, you will find vibrantly green, sharply terraced hills laying at the feet of the Alpine-Dolomites. The terrain is rugged with myriad patchwork of vines blanketing this steep elevation of slopes. It is known to the locals as ‘Prosecco Storico’, since this is where the most famous sparkling wine from Italy, Prosecco, was ‘born.’ It is also here that you will find artisan wine maker: Eros Zanon.

Prosecco country is commanded by the glera grape, which is ‘the’ Prosecco grape that dominates Italian sparkling wine production. Glera is a delicate grape which is ideal for making sparkling wine and Valdobbiadene is known making the best Proseccos, like the ones made by the Sanzovo brothers of Col del Balt with their DOCG Prosecco garnering “Best Of” attention by wine critics.

Then, there’s Eros Zanon who’s doing something different, making only sparkling wines from native grapes from the area made in a natural Pet Nat style. Being in ‘Prosecco Storico,’ he, naturally, makes a Pet Nat ‘prosecco’ made from 100% glera, but it was a serendipitous discovery close to his own land that led him to an unprecedented access to one of the most rare Italian white wine varieties: Boschera.

Zanon’s Gem: Boschera

Boschera is an ancient and nearly forgotten, rare, Italian white wine grape variety whose vines make up only a tiny amount of hectares in the whole region. Several years prior to the bottling of Zanon’s Boschera, a few of his peers brought him the grape and asked him to vinify it.

He was intrigued by the challenge and took time in his winery to understand the story Boschera wanted to tell. In Eros’s hands Boschera became something special, thanks to his familiarity with this rare grape, of which there is only 20 acres in the world. It’s so rare, we were the first to ever import the grape into the USA just last year!

Compared to glera, the boschera grape needs more love, attention and aging when making it into wine. Not to mention that Eros’ Boschera wines are made in the col fondo style, or bottled on the lees, with native yeast fermentation, making a more complex, age worthy and unique type of sparkling wine.

Not surprisingly, the Pet Nat Master Eros Zanon, as his Pet Nat prosecco, makes his Boschera grapes into a natural sparkling wine using the ancestral method, a method older than the traditional method used by producers in the Champagne region of France, and certain other types of sparkling wines. Aside from the selection of grapes used to make a sparkling wine that is aged in the bottle on its lees , the main difference between the two methods is that Eros’s wines are not disgorged and therefore the lees stay bottled inside the wine under a crown cap rather than a cork and cage. A still base wine is created and aged in an inert vessel to preserve the pronounced aromas, then the wine is bottled with a very small amount of sugar called dosage to reignite the yeast and spark the second fermentation in the bottle. The wine stays with its native yeast even after bottling which helps the wine continue to develop character and complexity. This natural sparkling wine is known as ‘Pétillant-Natural’, or a petnat wine.

Sustainable Wines and Vines

Eros’s natural wines are produced farming sustainably just as his family has been doing for generations. Indeed, he lets his old vines grow in a kind of free-form, wild style allowing them to take shape in whatever way is healthiest for each vine. What is most important to Eros is listening to the needs of his vines and adjusting their form individually. 

Eros is a winegrower that spends a lot of time thinking about the needs of his vines and observing their health. He understands the soil, the effect of each day’s warming sunlight, as well as the cool morning mist, and chilly mountain evenings. It is this strong diurnal shift, at 1000 feet of elevation, that gives boschera its structure and helps the grape to hold its high acidity during the growing seasons. This high acidity gives the natural wine the ability to age with grace and complexity so that the wild nature of the Boschera grape is captured and enhanced in the bottle.

Of course the limestone and silty soils in Valdobbiadene are a strength for building character, too; root structures benefit from the superior drainage and alkalinity of limestone. And for grape vines it is essential to have to burrow down, deep into the earth through the craggy limestone deposits to seek nutrients and water; this is what has helped to give these old vines longevity. In fact, his Pet Nat Style prosecco expresses the full on minerality that comes from this soil.

His vines are grown on the classic, steeply terraced hillsides of Valdobbiadene, where tall grass grows at the foot of the vines to provide a structural support against erosion. During the days of the growing season Eros can be found alongside his vines and maturating grapes, observing, thinking, listening, in a way, to the nature around him and to his vines. He knows the land intimately, as he has lived here all of his life. Indeed the man that puts so much thought into this provincial bit of agriculture is a part of the landscape himself, and his wine is a reflection of his passion for nature and honesty. Experiencing nature in this way allows him to choose the right moment for harvest in order to capture the full expression of the grape and allow it to blossom in the bottle.

He expressed this belief to Vero founder, Sheila Donohue, several years ago: “I believe in making my wine in a way that my vines and fruit can give all their flavors, aromas, and potential. This also translates into the vineyard, harvesting at the right moment according to what the season brings, in order to allow each bottling and vintage to tell the story of that year in complete honesty.”

In the Bottle…

Zanon’s Boschera is pale apricot in color from skin contact, moderately fizzy from wild yeast fermentation, rich with brioche notes from three years lees contact, unfiltered, and therefore slightly cloudy, like the mornings during the growing season when all the beautiful potential for the coming harvest is building within the grapes. For the drinker, the flavors are intriguing and deep: orange essence, honey, risen dough, wild petals, the savoriness of wild thyme with a long, saline finish. It’s almost like drinking a champagne, but without so much sweetness. Eros thinks that thanks to the acidity and inherent properties of Boschera, it is a wine that ages nicely, in fact, might just need some age to really come into its own. Of course, being bottled on the lees just helps this; it will keep evolving until the moment you sip.

After speaking with Eros, and hearing about his philosophy regarding the growing environment of his vines, his skillful and intuitive winemaking practices, and especially after tasting his natural Pet Nat wines, Sheila dubbed him ‘The Pet Nat Master’ in a previous article. Eros’s reply to this moniker was to give a chuckle and a shrug and humbly give the credit to the grape and to nature herself. He knows that quality comes at the price of quantity and profits, but he’s not fussed about that. Eros told Sheila regarding the center dot design of his logo, ”It helps remind me to keep my bearings, and for my wines to remain always like that little dot in a sea of proseccos.” We would add that Eros Zanon’s Boschera is a little, precious dot of old wisdom, gentle winemaking and indeed, a story of complete honesty. What better way to tell the story of your year: in complete honesty, value and enjoyment. 

For those of us seeking a wine that is artistically produced, yet, less expensive, more wild, and more authentically ‘of the year’ compared to moderately priced champagne or indeed many other sparkling wines in an over-flowing market of options, we would say Zanon’s Boschera is truly an authentic expression of the unique grape, the UNESCO World Heritage Site that is Valdobbiadene, the influence of the growing season, and the brilliance of the wild-man, the Pet Nat Master himself. 

So, if you want to celebrate the ringing in of a new year, and commemorate the year’s past, with a sparkling wine that tells the story, and the history of its growing environment in complete honesty then pick up a few bottles of Zanon’s Boschera today.  

Find Boschera in a Natural Wine Shop

Zanon’s Boschera is a special wine, and its status as an unfamiliar grape and wine in the US market motivates us to spread the word. Which is why we just had to bring it over, and not only that, but be the first to do so! That’s right… we at Vero have the distinct honor of being the first to import Zanon’s Boschera to the US. Renowned even among wine writers, this skin-contact, aged Pet Nat style vintage sparkling wine is gaining acclaim for its distinctive herbal and citrus taste profile, perfectly complementing a myriad of dishes. With less than 15 acres of this rarity worldwide, the question beckons: Do you want to be the trendsetter among your friends and savor this unique experience?

For those of you that know our curation style, you know that we love to support small producers and bring you rare and unique fun wines, like Zanon’s Boschera or Zanon’s Glera-based Col Fondo. And you can enjoy Zanon’s Boschera and other of our curations by trying a selection of different wines and different winegrowers from our portfolio. We sell to both businesses and consumers across the US:

• We are enlarging our network of distributors around the country. Reach out to us if you are interested in distributing our wines.

• We sell to wine stores and restaurants in certain states - contact us if you would like more info.

• We do corporate gifts and sommelier guided wine tastings. Email us and we’ll tailor unique and sustainable corporate gift ideas.

• If our farm crafted wines and olive oils are not in your local shop or restaurant buy wine online here and we’ll ship it to you, including wine gift for Christmas, and we ship to most states.

• We also have an award winning wine club for true wine explorers seeking to continually discover unique, sustainable and authentic small production wines they never had.

Written by Cassandra Fisher.

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