Belonging to Giuseppe Leali’s family and son Antonio, these vineyards are an amazing and magical place in the small town of Raffa, on Lake Garda, Italy. Giuseppe is a very charismatic person, whose ancestors originally came to the village of Raffa in 1100, and founded a big house here (the casa grande), before creating the vineyards and farm in 1398.

It is an old, solid family home with a multi-generational tradition of viticulture and wine production. Tradition is the word that comes to mind when I recall this great mansion full of beautiful old antique furniture and memories of the last centuries, but above all when I think of its owners, people who have let us enter a piece of their own world, showing us their private kingdom. They told us with passion about individual pieces of furniture, as well as about their ancestors. The son Antonio, who is a master of the piano, will soon take over the running of the vineyard: the fascination of wine is in their family.

Giuseppe is the biggest fan of wine I ever met. He gladly and enthusiastically tells people about his wines and their production. The important aspect for him is that the wine stays as natural as possible: he cares about using only the appropriate and highest quality grapes, and the whole production process is done very carefully. Before the wine is bottled and capped, it is filtered three times.

The winery Ca ‘Granda creates eight different wines, and their specialties are red wine such as Gropello, and the so-called Chiaretto (it has a pink color, but this is not the rosè). These are wines typical of this region in Italy. In 2013, Garda Classico Chiaretto took first place at the competition in China as the best wine for fish, displacing more than 550 other wineries from around the world who had put up a minimum of 2-3 of their wines. We tasted it and it is simply delicious. I’m a big fan of red wines, so I love the Garda Classico Rosso Ca ‘Granda D.O.C. (Riserva). Wonderfully crisp, a magnificent bouquet of aromas: splendid.