Erbaluce di Caluso or Caluso

The gentle hills of the Canavese district extend southward from Ivrea as far as Caluso and around the lake of Viverone they are prickly with the towers of numerous castles. The area, which abounds in ancient viticultural traditions, is the realm of the goddess Albaluce and also the home of the variety that has taken her name: Erbaluce.

Erbaluce di Caluso is called the wine of the Albaluce Nymph, the daughter of the Sun and the Dawn. It is said that she was moved by the affection shown to her by the hard working inhabitants of the Caluso area. Being compassionate towards their toil, she could not hold back her tears, which falling on the soil impregnated with limestone, gave birth to the vine. It was named ERBALUCE in her honor. During the magnificent Renaissance period, bards singing the praises of the wines of the Canavese area, mentioned the wines springing from Erbaluce, whose grapes, as Tedeschini said, “shone in the sun with the warm highlights of the verdigris.”

Erbaluce di Caluso was first mentioned as a typical product of the Canavese area in 1606 in a book by Giovan Battista Croce, jeweller to His Highness Duke Carlo Emanuele I. It was next cited in the Calendario Georgico published in 1798.

The wine owes its extremely appealing name to the grape from which it is made. In the fall, the grape takes on a bright copper hue with slight pinkish highlights. The color of that part of the cluster that is exposed to the sun's rays is an amber so pronounced that the grapes seem almost to have been "roasted". The poetic name Erbaluce is, therefore, sometimes replaced with the term "Uva Rustia" (uva arrostita or "roasted" grape).

Erbaluce is drunk with hors d'oeuvres and fish. It combines particularly well with tench and marinated trout and with the dried meat of chamois, the famous mocetta. The modern liquoroso and passito Caluso made from dried grapes is the direct continuation of the medieval tradition of a sweet and strong Vin Greco. That wine was extolled as "quite perfect'' by Sante Lancerio, an expert on wine of the 16th century.

The Caluso Passito is still widely appreciated. The grapes are allowed to ripen fully in the warm days of autumn and are then dried before being pressed. The process of vinification requires considerable time and constant attention, for the wine can only be bottled five years after the harvest and it is not perfectly mature until six years have passed, when it is golden and exquisitely scented.

Caluso Passito is not, therefore, a wine that can be obtained from one day to the next. But it is certainly well worth waiting for, since the first sip of this superb nectar is ample compensation for all the patience and effort demanded.

Production of Caluso wines is neither substantial nor constant, which is unfortunate since they are wines with a fine personality that sets them apart from other s. They should be able to acquire a much wider market without much difficulty. Although the Centro per la Tutela e la Valorizzazione dei Vini DOC di Caluso has been set up to provide information about the wine and promote it, because of its limited production and because of the esteem in which it is held by local consumers, it is difficult to find Erbaluce outside Piedmont. It is often available only in Biella and Turin.