FUSO 'Calx' Primitivo Puglia 2021

Producer: Filippo Cassano
Where: Puglia, Italy
Grapes: 100% Primitivo
Body: Medium
Category: Red Wine / Chillable Red

Primitivo, the Italian cousin to Zinfandel, often becomes flabby and hot in the sweltering Puglian sun.  But thanks to the Filippo's early picks and conscious efforts to maintain acidity (as well as those limestone soils, which imprint their chalky minerality into the grape), this wine is light and refreshing, retaining all of the ripe berry flavors of Primitivo.

Crunchy red fruit, peppery spice and joyful juiciness, which shines even brighter with a slight chill.  The perfect summer red that works with everything from park day drinking to BBQs to twilight sipping.

organic // native yeasts

2021 // 750ml

FUSO is a collaboration project between natural wine importer Portofino with organic grower/vignerons in different Italian regions to produce "Italy’s natural and characterful daily drinkers from farmers and producers who are our long time friends and colleagues".  Here they partner with Filippo Cassano, of the certified organic winery called Polvanera in Puglia, the ‘heel’ of Italy’s boot, to make the Calx bottling.  'Calx' is the ancient Latin word for limestone, the unique soil found here and the building blocks for the ancient Smurf-like farming houses called trulli.  Filippo's cellar itself is a limestone wonder: excavated into 8 meters of limestone rock, it's a cold cave in a very hot region that allows the aging of wines at a constant temperature.