Back in the 90s, my dad used to work in a German vine nursery. One of the consequences of this experience was his decision to plant a whole lot of Dornfelder, a bold, dark-pulped red German-born hybrid that was fashionable back then. Tbh, I don’t love it and it took me quite some time to come to terms with it. Influenced by some great wines I drank, I wanted to get rid of it and replant it with something else, something nobler.
But – the vineyards are in great shape and it felt so wrong to just uproot them. And then, something switched in my head. I lost any ambition to mimic wines made elsewhere and realised that there are other grapes than Pinot Noir and Riesling in the world. And my life became so much easier.
Barvířka is not just Dornfelder though – I love to see diversity in my wines so it also sports some Zweigelt and a secret mix of white varieties (I can be Colonel Sanders too!). It has low tannins, high colour, low alcohol and high drinkability, especially when chilled; I drank a bottle in an hour all by myself so you can take my word for it.
The name means “colour-enhancer” in Czech (teinturier in French) and it comes from the people of Naše maso - a cool butcher shop in Prague that used it to call it Barvířka, my distributor Standa of Veltlin told me. I was a bit in pinch, the vintage 2019 needed to be shipped to clients and any name seemed better than “Dornfelder”, I thought, so there goes “Barvířka" on the label. (Cute lino-cut by my wife btw.)
I picked the name with only the domestic market in mind, so I didn't think much of the cute Czech linguistic particularity that is the letter "Ř", whose tough pronunciation is usually the source of frustration to foreigners (which is, consequentially, source of much amusement to the Czechs). But, without even flashing it anywhere, my importers started to ask for it so there you go – hope you guys abroad are coping.
PS. It's sth like [bar-veezh-kah], you're welcome.
Wanna drink this? These are the guys to ask where to get my wine in your country.
