This balsamic takes 25 years to make 🍇

And costs 100 euros per bottle

Drive out of Modena and the apartment buildings will soon be replaced by vineyards on the flat, green land of Italy’s Emilia-Romagna region. Some of these grapes will become wine – namely Lambrusco – but many will become balsamic vinegar, a complex product that’s far less understood.

Last year while on assignment for Eater, I had the pleasure of meeting Daniele Bonfatti, Gilberto Barbieri, and his wife Laura Maini. The two families run Acetaia del Cristo, a fourth-generation company and the largest of the 250 traditional balsamic producers in the region.

“Traditional balsamic” means that the product is produced and sold under strict legislation pertaining to its Protected Designation of Origin (the Italian acronym DOP is more commonly used). Bottles of Balsamic DOP are denoted by the official EU red and yellow seal.

Before arriving at Acetaia del Cristo, I mistakenly believed that I was about to peek behind the curtain to see how the balsamic I eat at home is made. I soon learned, however, that my large, comparatively cheap bottle of vinegar with a blue EU label is a far cry from traditional balsamic. Unless you are a Modenese or a wealthy emir, you too are more likely to have balsamic IGP (Protected Geographic Indication) in your kitchen cabinet.

The differences between balsamic DOP and IGP are apparent right from the start. While both products are required to be “produced” in Emilia-Romagna, grapes for the IGP product can be trucked in from further regions or even other countries. Grapes for balsamic DOP, however, must be locally grown.

I visited Acetaia del Cristo in early September on the first day of the grape harvest. They plant four varieties of grapes, two green and two black, which are blended to give a more robust taste to the vinegar.

Unfortunately, humans aren’t the only ones who find the grapes tasty. As we walked between the vines, Gilberto pointed out the white, foamy webs of the mealybugs that have been ravaging the vineyard for the past several years. Climate change and mild winters mean the bugs get more time to propagate and destroy valuable hectares of harvest. For now, though, Acetaia del Cristo still manages to reach the maximum quota the law allows them to grow.

The grapes (including the bugs which will eventually be cooked and filtered out) are collected via a combine harvester. Then they’re passed through a special machine that uses a large bag to delicately squeeze out the juice, leaving the skins and unripe grapes behind – a process designed to mimic the more antiquated practice of stomping with bare feet.

The grape juice, now called must, is left to chill overnight to keep it from fermenting before the time is right. The next day it’s pumped into large basins where Daniele and Gilberto bring it to a gentle boil in order to carefully scoop off the impurities trapped in the foam that rises to the top. Then they lower the temperature and let the must simmer for several hours until the volume of liquid is reduced by half.

Once the cooking has finished, they smell and taste the must to evaluate its sweetness and flavor before transferring it to fermentation tanks. These initial stages of the process must be handled with care since the must boiled today will not be bottled as vinegar before 2035 at the soonest.

Here too lies another key difference between the two types of balsamic. IGP vinegar is cooked at higher temperatures to produce a more concentrated must with a flavor Daniele and Gilberto described as “burned.” This intense cooking process also creates a higher concentration of sulfites in the must.

While it’s true that Acetaia del Cristo is the largest producer of traditional balsamic vinegar, that’s more a matter of stock than of manpower. Daniele and Gilberto describe their work as a classic tale of man versus nature. With the help of a single assistant, the pair continually monitor and manage 2,000 barrels containing 120,000 liters of vinegar at various stages of the aging process.

Unlike distilled products which sit in sealed barrels, traditional balsamic vinegar needs to breathe. Each barrel is topped with a simple cloth which keeps the product clean while allowing the air to pass through. Over time, the alcohol in the fermented must oxidizes and gives the vinegar its characteristic dark reddish-brown color.

As we passed through the rows of barrels, I was surprised to see thick and sticky balsamic oozing from cracks and pooling on the floor. Gilberto assured me this is normal. The wooden barrels, some of them dating to the 1860s, expand and shrink with the changing of the seasons.

“If you happen to enter a vinegar cellar that’s completely clean, take a look inside the barrels because there can only be one explanation – the barrel is empty!” Gilberto laughed.

The vinegar doesn’t stay put anyway. The barrels are grouped into a series of seven organized from largest to smallest. The runny must is poured into the largest barrel and thick balsamic is taken from the smallest one. During the winter months, Daniele and Gilberto laboriously move a percentage of the aging product from one barrel to another during the processes of decanting and topping up. As the vinegar moves to each subsequent barrel, some of the liquid evaporates and the flavors concentrate. After 25 years, 100 kilos of grapes will result in 1.5 kilos of balsamic vinegar.

IGP vinegar does not undergo the same transformation. The concentrated must is mixed with wine vinegar and caramel color and is left to rest in a single barrel for 60 days. Meanwhile, according to regulations, traditional balsamic vinegar must be aged for either a minimum of 12 or more than 25 years. Although Acetaia del Cristo produces a vinegar aged for more than 50 years, it must be labeled as belonging to the latter category.

The barrel itself also influences the vinegar’s flavor which is why Daniele and Gilberto often keep their product in a series made from one type of wood. According to law, barrels can only be made from chestnut, cherry, juniper, mulberry, oak, or acacia wood.

In addition to managing their own product, Daniele and Gilberto also look after the barrels of celebrities and sports stars who either come from the region or have discovered the richness of the product and now wish to keep their own stock of balsamic vinegar.

After Daniele and Gilberto retrieve the product that’s ready for sale, they must bring it to the approved bottling facility where all vinegar from traditional producers is checked for quality and bottled under strict conditions. Since 1987, Balsamic DOP is only allowed to be sold in 100-milliliter bottles with a signature bulb shape. The first balsamic bottled in this way belonged to Acetaia del Cristo and is now in the company museum.

Once I had seen the process from start to finish, it was time to experience traditional balsamic for myself. Daniele explained that his balsamic can be used to accompany a variety of regional foods, with parmesan being among the most classic pairings. Balsamic aged in juniper is best suited for meat, while balsamic from cherry wood is the perfect companion for strawberries or gelato. The preferred way of the Modenese, however, is to swallow a porcelain spoonful of vinegar as a digestif at the end of a meal.

I tried the vinegar on a porcelain spoon as Daniele suggested (metal can disrupt the flavor). I was quite surprised to find that it wasn’t nearly as sour as I’d expected. It was rather sweet with a depth of flavor I wasn’t aware was possible in vinegar. I took a bottle home to savor slowly, with a newfound appreciation for the effort that went into making it.

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Check out the video below to see the process I captured during my time at Acetaia del Cristo.

Have you tried Balsamic DOP? What would you pair it with?