Croci

Croci is a small estate in the westernmost winegrowing sub-zone of Emilia-Romagna, the Colli Piacentini, just south of the city for which those hills are named (Piacenza) and on the eastern border of the Lombardy region. Massimiliano Croci is the current generation of vignaiolo running what started as his grandfather’s property in 1935. His focus is the traditional wine of the area: white and red sparkling wines re-fermented in the bottle. Currently 8.5 of the total of 16 hectares are planted to vines—Barbera and Croatina for reds, Malvasia, Ortrugo and few others in small amounts for whites. The rest of the acreage support Croci’s dairy cows and the feed grain, hay and pasture for the animals.

Milk was the farm’s main production until 1970. At that time, competing with bigger, more modern institutions became too difficult for Massi’s father. So he pivoted exclusively to wine, starting with bulk sales in demijohns before eventually bottling and selling locally. While initially successful, in the 1980’s his rustic wines were scoffed at as a wave of “clean” industrial wines swept Emilia. Charmat and heavy filtration became the norm, with cloudiness/sediment in the bottle to be avoided at all costs. 

Massimiliano took over the vineyards and winemaking in 1999, where he quickly dropped the charmat method eventually adopted by his father. He took inspiration from his grandfather’s wines from the 1930’s, which would always be bottled with sugars so they could referment in bottle. Filtration was dropped as well: “Without filtration and charmat, you taste the land. With it the wines could be from anywhere.”