Southern French winemaker, Skalli, is targeting the UK off-trade with a new Corsican wine brand.  Domaine Terra Vecchia includes a white, red and rose wine from grapes grown on Skalli’s estate on Corsica’s eastern coast where the intense daytime heat is tempered by cool sea mists during the day and cool mountain air at night.

Having discovered an area of outstanding natural beauty along Corsica’s eastern coast in the early 1960s, the Skalli family was one of the first to make wines on the island.  As president Robert Skalli explains: “When we moved to Corsica from Algeria I quickly identified that the microclimate was ideal for wine production and began experimenting with the local indigenous grapes.  It was a defining moment for me to recognise the potential of these new varieties, in particular Vermentino and Niellucciu.  We now produce some extremely fine wines from these varieties under the Clos Poggiale label that are gaining a growing international reputation. However, we recognise that for less confident consumers, the best way to encourage experimentation is to blend in grapes that they know and understand so that these can be signposted on the label.  This was one of the main rationales for Domaine Terra Vecchia.”

The Skalli family own vineyards and produce wines in Corsica, the Languedoc, the Rhône Valley and Provence, together with a Napa Valley estate in California called St Supéry.

The wines will be available from Thierry’s with an RSP of £9.95. 

January 2011