Milan Nestarec Senza

Winemaker: Milan Nestarec

Appellation: Morava, Czech Republic

Varieties: Riesling, Blaufrankisch, Sauvignon Blanc and Zweigelt

Milan on this wine: “Our 2020 vintage spontaneous idea. I was tasting the grapes freshly harvested from our Sahary plot, then my imagination struck, and voilá, an impromptu red sparkler was born.

To be honest, it was probably secretly hatching somewhere in my mind for some time, fuelled by my penchant, or rather obsession to buy Lambrusco each and every time I spot it in Italy. Not that I’ve always loved their taste – I had some incredible ones and a fair bit of bad bottles too – but I really enjoy the idea of a wine that’s at the same time sparkling, aromatic, and red.

The name Senza is a nod to the Italian inspiration and the joyful Italodisco vibe I get when I drink the wine. It’s also a multi-lingual pun: it means “lit” in colloquial Czech, and “without” in Italian, referring to both this wine’s no-additives pedigree and its no-worries merry character. To capture all these references, our graphic designer came up with an amazing flashy-trashy label that’s part Malibu (when I first saw it, it immediately threw me back to my 90s childhood, afternoons spent watching Lorenzo Lamas in Renegade – very fond memories!), part Bibione (we lovingly call it “the beach towel a weird guy next to you would have in a cheap holiday resort “).

To enjoy this whole so-bad-it’s-good Italo vibe even more, we made a special 6-hour Senza playlist, an eclectic selection of vintage bangers and modern disco versions alike. Senza worries, senza make-up, senza solfiti agguinti.”

Grapes: Cabernet Sauvignon, Cabernet Franc, Pálava, Moravian Muscat

Vineyard: Sahary – sandy plot with mixed plantation from 2003. Estate-owned, organic.

Making of: The grapes were hand-harvested, sorted on sorting table and gently destemmed. The Cabernets underwent short carbonic maceration; while still fermenting, the direct-press Pálava and Muscat must was added. The wine was then bottled under crown cap to finish the fermentation as sparkling wine over winter. Unfined, unfiltered, undisgorged, unsulfured. 

Personality: oh this is really, really fun. Lush and intense dark cherry & raspberry flavors with distinct tannins and very zingy acidity. The kind of wine that will wake you up from basically any state.

Milan Nestarec has quickly become the star winemaker of the Czech republic during the time we’ve been working with him. His wines display so much life, vitality, and originality, that they have become very sought after all over the world in a very short time. We are honored to have been working with his wines since 2014. The wines we are selling now represent the full evolution of his original vision: a full range of wines, from quaffable yet energetic and inexpensive wines like the forks and knives and liter bottlings of Nach and Bel, to the amazingly expressive skin fermented wines, made entirely without additions of sulfur. 

Milan’s father planted  8 hectares of vines in 2001 across two wine growing municipalities: Moravský Žižkov and Velké Bílovice. Milan studied winemaking with Aleš Kristančič of Movia, where he learned a great deal about the delicate art of making skin fermented white wines. No herbicides are used and the vines are worked organically. He believes that gentle methods of growing grapevines and grape processing gives the best result. All wines in the cellar are fermented spontaneously and they are usually vinified in oak and acacia barrels.

-Jenny & François Selections