Some labels are born from marketing. Others are born from a pencil mark on a bottle, drawn by hand by someone who simply wanted to set the best wine of the year apart from the rest. Bandarossa belongs to the second category, and that origin still shapes what’s in the glass.
The gesture goes back to Giuliano Bortolomiol himself: the man who spent a lifetime chasing the idea that Prosecco could be more than a modest local wine. Long before Bandarossa had a label of its own, the “red stripe” was simply the mark he traced by hand on the bottles of his finest Extra Dry selection each year, the ones set aside for the friends who shared his passion for the land, for tradition, for good wine, including the fellow founders of the Confraternita del Prosecco who helped carry the wine of these hills to national and international recognition. More than forty years later, Bandarossa has grown into a brand with its own identity and a considerable shelf of international awards. And yet it still functions, at heart, the way it always did: as a promise of quality renewed harvest after harvest.
That promise starts in the vineyard. The Glera grapes come from the hills of Valdobbiadene, trained using the autochthonous “cappuccina modificata” system and harvested between mid and late September, with yields kept to 13,500 kg per hectare. Vinification stays entirely off the skins, through gentle pressing, and fermentation runs at controlled temperature with selected yeasts. The second fermentation, the Martinotti-Charmat method that Giuliano himself helped pioneer in this territory, takes 25 to 30 days, followed by one to two months on the lees and a further two months of bottle aging before release. The result is an Extra Dry that translate, glass in hand, into roundness rather than sweetness.
In the glass, Bandarossa is pale straw yellow, with a fine, persistent perlage that sets the tone early. The nose leads with ripe, layered fruit: mealy yellow apple and pear first, then a gentler citrus sweetness underneath, finished off with delicate floral notes. On the palate, the carbonation is creamy and well-integrated with the residual sugar, giving a slightly off-dry, velvety, harmonious sip rather than an assertively sweet one.
We tasted it, appropriately, as an aperitif first, and then alongside trout marinated in lemon balm, paired with cooked must and sour cream: a combination that let the wine’s fruit and its faint sweetness play off the dish’s acidity rather than compete with it. It’s exactly the kind of pairing Bandarossa seems built for, food with a delicate savory-sweet balance of its own.
Company Profile
Having always been a point of reference on the Prosecco panorama, the Bortolomiol winery is based in Valdobbiadene, in the heart of the Conegliano Valdobbiadene Prosecco Superiore DOCG appellation area. The sparkling winemaking company was founded by Giuliano Bortolomiol in the 1940s, although the family tradition dates back to 1760. Giuliano, who graduated from the Conegliano School of Oenology, was the first to create a Prosecco brut. Today the winery is run by sisters Elvira, Maria Elena, Giuliana and Luisa Bortolomiol, who are committed and passionate about carrying on the family tradition, making continuous investments into technology and overseeing the entire production process. Aided by a team of oenologists, the Bortolomiol sisters focus their attention on sustainable projects that safeguard mankind and the land.
BORTOLOMIOL
Via Garibaldi 142, 31049 Valdobbiadene (TV) Italy
parcodellafilandetta@bortolomiol.com – + 39 0423 804258
https://www.bortolomiol.com
