The video clip is from our standard 3 hour interview with each farmer. Renato and his wife Milva spend a ridiculous amount of time in their vineyards. In fact, their grapes are so good that they often sell excess to Bruno Giacosa. In their vineyards, they perform over half a million (528,000) tasks by hand from January to October. That is amazingly hard work for two people. But you can taste the results in the quality of their wines.

No subtitles edited yet, but here’s the translation and then watch the video. 

Renato says, "You calculate…more or less from pruning to harvest, in a normal year, we have 11 to 13 manual operations per plant." I ask, "You have 11 hectares- how many plants is that?" After a brief consultation with Milva, Renato explains that they have approximately forty-four thousand (44,000) plants.

Join us at Vinocamp this Saturday at the UBC Botanical Gardens. Should be a fun day of sharing wine, stories and technology. I am on the schedule in the late afternoon, aroudn 4pm and am going to talk about the intersection of wine, farming and technology. I will, of course, have plenty to say about sustainability and what that means in the world of wine and food. That will be interesting and all but there are three reasons why you really want to be there:

1.Taste "Super Elena" 2004. We will pour at least two or three- and they only made 113 Magnums. 

2. Taste Martin Arndorfer’s Gruner Veltliner and feel the soil it grows in at the same time. Yep, contraband Austrian soil!

 3. I am making Barolo-Chocolate truffles.

See you there. If you are coming, let me know in the comments below and I will bring you a gift. 

Several times a month we are out and about pouring wine for top sommeliers to taste. At the end of the day we often have several more bottles of great wine open than we can drink ourselves. When we do, we will send a message on twitter telling you what city we have wine open in and you could find yourself with most of the fixings for  spontaneous in home wine tasting. Just tweet back saying you want the wines and we will coordinate pick-up or delivery with you. The last friend who took up the offer exclaimed, "This is better than Christmas!"

 So, start following our updates on twitter and you could be rewarded with a wine tasting normally reserved for top sommeliers and wine pros.

Some of our favorite farm blogs: 

Tiny Farm

Sugar Mountain Farm 

Down on the Farm 

Nature’s Harmony