In 1928 Dario Raccaro’s grandfather, bought the farm at the foothills of Monte Quarin, just outside of Cormons, near the small church of S.Maria. During the sixties Dario’s father decides to concentrate on the production of wine and in the eighties Dario decides to abandon his career in professional basketball and to take the reins of the winery.
Dario’s charismatic and gregarious personality eschews trends and avoids the compromises dictated by the market. He is adamant about vinification in steel for his whites in order to retain the purest expression of the fruit and the terroir.
Dario is the president of the Enoteca di Cormons right in the center of town, created by a group of local wine producers to showcase and promote the wines of the Collio; it serves as a meeting point for wine lovers and wine makers alike where to exchange ideas, compare wines and stories. The spirit of comraderie amongst the Collio wine producers is unusual and refreshing, there is a sense of “all for one, one for all” which aim is to jointly improve the lot of such a small region whose white wines are amongst Italy’s best.
Dario produces 27.000 bottles from 5 hectares, planted at a density of 4000 vines per hectar. His Vigna del Rolat vineyard, planted in the early 900’s is unanimously considered the source of Friulano’s best rootstock, producing 10.000 bottles of one of the absolute best white wines of Italy. The soil is the classic “ponka,” known as flish in English, a friable stony, marny, and sandy mix which endows the grapes with the distinctive Collio minerality.
The average age of the vines is 30 years.