Building Community with Barbera at DANCIN Vineyards – by Chris Cook

Barbera is a unique red grape variety that is full of contradiction. With deeply-pigmented skins, it makes dark red wine that drinks more like a white. It is high in acidity, crisp and refreshing with none of the mouth-drying tannins you would expect. Even so, it typically has qualities you would enjoy in a big red—dark cherry, ripe plum, blackberry and a baker’s choice of spices.

With these unique characteristics, Barbera is a great food wine, which many enjoy with tomato-based dishes, rich-dark meats, mushrooms, herbs, root vegetables and blue cheese—although the possibilities are innumerable.

We don’t see much Barbera in the United States and hardly any in Southern Oregon. Here, DANCIN Vineyards is leading the way in Barbera production, with its first Southern Oregon vintage in 2014. According to DANCIN owner Dan Marca, his “Tribute” Barbera is in celebration of his southern Italian heritage. A first-generation American, Dan also makes an “Onore” Barbera (to honor).

“Barbera evokes in me the feeling of friendship, generations of family coming together—not distracted, but instead being in the moment—and taking time to do what’s important in life,” Dan smiles. “That’s the kind of experience we want to create when you enjoy our wine—whether in our tasting room or in your own home.”

Dan and his wife, Cindy, (DAN-CIN, get it?) built their tasting room, just outside of Jacksonville, to facilitate great conversation and comradery. With tableside service, Dan says, “We literally built DANCIN to facilitate conversation. It’s almost like being in an Italian piazza where you’re out conversing with people. The ambiance beckons people to come, relax and be served.”

The winery and tasting room are magnificently set on the forested foothills of Southern Oregon overlooking the Rogue Valley—one of the most unique terriors in the winemaking world. Here, you can imagine you’ve been transported to Piedmont, Italy! And aptly so, as critics say the best Italian Barbera comes from southeast Piedmont around the towns of Alba, Asti and Alessandria.

Coincidentally, Alba has been the city of Medford’s Sister City for nearly 60 years! At the writing of this article, a contingent from Medford was in Alba for the annual White Truffle Festival and they brought along DANCIN’s 2015 Barbera to share.

“Considering the fact that world-class Barbera originated in the hills surrounding Alba and has been produced there for centuries, you might say it was intimidating to take a local Barbera as gifts,” said Medford/Jackson County Chamber of Commerce President Brad Hicks. “That is until you taste Dan and Cindy’s award-winning Barbera. What has been a fun collaboration between the Chamber, our Alba Sister City Association and DANCIN culminated with the presentation of our special “Alba” Barbera to the Mayor, City Council and the Sister City Committee. Our friends in Alba were so excited to receive “our” Barbera that they invited representatives from the local paper to attend our meeting and photograph the wine bottles.”

You may wonder how all these disparate connections came together. Look no further than a 2016 encounter when Dan was sharing the newly-released “Tribute” Barbera with Brad Hicks. After some thoughtful conversation, the idea of bottling a Barbera in honor of the sister city relationship between Alba, Italy, and Medford, Oregon, was born. Several meetings ensued between the Alba Sister City Association, Brad and Dan, and they collectively decided to call the wine, “Sorella,” meaning sister in Italian. The back label included the Alba crest and the story of the relationship between the two communities.

DANCIN produced 10 cases of the 2015 “Sorella,” and because there was a chance that this wine could make it into the hands of the traditional Barbera wine producers in Italy, Dan was a little apprehensive. “We knew the wine was delicious, so we entered it into the largest competition of American wines in the world—the San Francisco Chronicle Wine Competition—and patiently awaited the results.” Dan recalled, “To our delight, we earned a Double Gold, which confirmed our thoughts about the quality of this wine.”

In 2018, Dan had a chance to share his 2016 “Tribute” Barbera first-hand as the Chamber hosted the Mayor of Alba and his council members in Medford. Dan graciously hosted the group in the winery’s piazza for a meal including DANCIN’s famous stuffed mushrooms, Caesar salad, homemade thin crust pizza and dessert paired with their Chardonnay, Pinot Noir and—of course—Barbera.

With a knowing smile, Dan recounted, “It was a great time of food, friends, family, wine and wonderful conversations and friendly debates about farming practices in Medford compared to the way they farm in Alba. It was a spirited discussion and it’s just what friends, “sisters” and families do!”

Are you ready to try some Barbera? You can still get the DANCIN 2017 “Tribute,” which won best of class at the 2019 Sunset Magazine International Wine Competition and the 2017 “Onore” Barbera, which won the best overall Barbera at the 2019 San Francisco International Wine Competition. And there’s more to look forward to as the 2018 vintage will likely have a third, and possibly a fourth in the lineup. Dan will be unveiling the details soon at oregonbarbera.com and dancin.com.

JULY 2020 UPDATE: Are you ready to try some Barbera? Four expressions of DANCIN Barbera were bottled for the 2018 vintage. The “Sorella 60th,” made in honor of the 60th anniversary of the sister city relationship was released in June and sold out in just 4 weeks! The “Tribute” is the latest release and is available now. The 2018 vintage also includes the “Onore” and the “Synergy,” a proprietary blend of two very food-friendly wines, Barbera and Pinot noir!

Featured image is of presentation of the 2015 DANCIN ‘Sorella’ Barbera in Alba, Italy. l-r: Brad Hicks, Carlotta Boffa-City Councilor, Domenico Boeri-President of the Council.

©Southern Oregon Wine Scene – from the Spring 2020 issue

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