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The wines made by Elena Walch are strikingly similar to the woman herself – elegant, open and emotional. Drinking such wine is a huge pleasure, and interviewing such a person is a journalist's dream. I'm a very lucky journalist.
— Your name is on every single one of your wines, every bottle....
— I'm very proud of that. Since my name is on every single bottle, that means I have to ensure the quality of it at every minute. That's a big responsibility, and the whole team shares it with me, every single person who works on our wine.
— Do you come from a wine-making family?
— No, my family was never connected with wine, and up until I got married, I'd never had any experience with winemaking or even growing grapes. For me, wine was always just perceived as a part of culinary arts, what we drink with dinner. But then I got married and wound up in a family with long-standing traditions of wine-making. I settled down among vineyards and at some point, I started to notice that I had a completely different attitude toward my surroundings. In the morning, gazing out the window, I wasn't just checking to see if the sun was shining or not, I was trying to determine if the weather was good for the grapes. If there were strong winds or if it was raining, I didn't think, like I used to, “Oh, I better take my umbrella and put on my raincoat!” Instead, my first thought was, “There could be problems with the grapes!” I didn't expect it myself, becoming so fascinated with wine; you could almost say nature pushed me towards it. It was a very lucky turn of events. I've been making wine for over twenty years now, and not once have I regretted abandoning my career as an architect.
— Whose name was on the bottles before?
— The name of a winemaker that was established a long time ago – all the way back in 1879. My husband makes wine now, but in a different style than me. From the very beginning, I've wanted to stray from the old traditions of Alto Adige and do something new, something of my own. I had everything I needed to do that – an interesting terroir, wonderful grapevines....I dreamed about my name becoming famous, a name associated with high-quality. Maybe my dream was too ambitious, especially considering my lack of experience at that time, but I gave it a try anyway. As it turned out, of course, dreaming about it and talking about it were much easier than actually doing it. I pushed forward slowly. At first, I had to change my style of work on the vines, and then in the cellar. But it all worked out in the end!
— How does your husband feel about your success?
— When I just started out, everyone said, "That's Mr. Walch's wife." But now they say "That's Elena Walch's husband" about him. He's very proud of me though!
— What's the most difficult thing in your work?
— Keeping the grapevine in the right condition so that it gives us good grapes and, correspondingly, good wine. People never really think about how much winemakers have to depend on nature. You work and wait all year, but you only have one chance to actually make the wine. You only get one chance! There's no rehearsal, no extra attempts. Whatever happens, happens, and it's impossible to change that or fix it. Of course, work is easy during the good years, but there are also very bad harvests sometimes. Then you have to think about what you can do in the cellar.
— If I'm not mistaken, you're a member of the Le Donne del Vino women's association. What is it that prompted you all to unite? Do women winemakers in Italy suffer certain difficulties?
— Our group brings together women who've started to independently make, sell and develop wine, meaning not only winemakers, but also sommeliers, chefs, heads of companies and even those who write about wine. These days, of course, no one places much emphasis on who the winemaker is – a man or a woman. But there is still this tradition: men make wine, and wineries are inherited by sons, not daughters. I remember starting out. At that time, people said, "A woman is really making wine?" I had to prove it to them with action. A lot of the time, I just offered them some wine, "There, try it, it's my wine!" If a man is working in a wine cellar, no one asks him what he's doing there. A woman, on the other hand, often ends up in exactly that situation. It seems to me that it's been understood for a long time now that a woman can achieve a great deal in this field, but she'll constantly have to prove herself and strive for excellence, because we're still seen as a new phenomenon in this business. In the end, the winemaker's work is judged by the contents of the bottle. There's no need to ask who made the wine; the question is – how good is it? In Alto Adige, I'm the only woman engaged in manufacturing wine. Incidentally, similar associations exist in France, Germany, and the U.S.
— How many women are engaged in the production of wine in Italy?
— I'm not sure. I think around 150. Our association has about 800 people.
— The wines from your area aren't very well-known in Russia yet. I'm quite certain that many people don't even know where Alto Adige is.
Alto Adige is the northernmost part of Italy. It's a small and very interesting area. Up until 1919, the land belonged to Austria. We actually have two languages here – German and Italian. At home, we speak German. — But can you call yourself Italian?
— Of course I'm Italian! But we do have many German traditions. We celebrate Christmas on December 24th, for instance, while the rest of Italy does so on the 25th. And we have Santa Klaus, while Italy has Saint Lucia. We have very interesting cuisine, because it's influenced by both Austria and the Italian Mediterranean. We took a bit from both and created our own. That's in our nature. It's probably fair to say that we're not Germans and we're not Austrians and we're not Italians. You get a sense of that as soon as you come to Alto Adige. But at the same time, you'll understand that this is Italy, because you'll immediately notice great Italian taste in both clothes and the design of shop windows. The Italian way of life is peculiar for us. Germans represent strictness, and Italians – romance.
Alto Adige is famous for its apple orchards. Every tenth apple eaten in Europe was grown here. Wine has always been made here, even before the Romans! The wonderful climate and terroir creates the perfect conditions for producing luxurious wines. The Dolomite Mountains give the vineyards a moderate cool at night. That's very important, because if it gets too warm at night, the grapes get a low level of acidity, and cold weather takes away the aroma. Our grapes come out fresh, with a rich concentration of flavor and good acidity. In the total volume of Italian wine, we own only 1%. But what wine it is! No decent restaurant in Italy could make do without it.
Elena Walch
"I am proud to say that this year's wine got the highest score in the prestigious wine guide Gambero Rosso - plus three glasses. Everyone knows Alsatian Gewurztraminer, but few know that its homeland is Alto Adige, the land surrounding the village of Tramin. Alsatians often use grapes from a late harvest; their wines are sumptious, rich and very outstanding. Sometimes our winemakers make geverts wine in the Alsatian style. But my wine is different. In Alto Adige there is a special terroir: we're located at the foot of the Dolomites, so there's chalky, mineral-filled soil. You can feel the minerals in the wine. Gewurztraminer Kastelaz is wine with an excellent balance and a multi-layered bouquet in which there are pronounced spicy tones. It's subtle and elegant, full-bodied but not fat. There's no pomposity or flamboyance in it, like in Alsatian geverts, which reminds me of the baroque. My geverts is more like classicism.
Elena Walch Kermesse
Cigar Clan Russian Edition 5'2010. Marina Razorenova
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