Hunter Valley winemaker Mike De Iuliis is a tall man with a deep voice and a quick wit. Friendly, approachable and direct, he’s not the shy and retiring type.
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It’s not surprising, then, to hear that he is emerging from the shadows of his big tin shed at Pokolbin and becoming the face and personality of De Iuliis Wines. He has already organised two new events: the now sold-out Cork & Pork: Made By Mike Butchery Workshop on July 7 at Branxton Quality Meats; and Cork & Pork Wine & Butchery Lunch at De Iuliis Winery on August 4.
“I’m trying to do something a little bit more fun, something different, something that I am excited about,” De Iuliis told Food & Wine. “Winemaking is an industrial process but we want to soften it a bit.”
It was time, he said, to introduce the family behind the unusual name.
“The first thing people say when they walk in the cellar door is ‘How do you pronounce the name?’ Then it’s ‘Why did you use that name?’. We got some family photos done to show that yes, there is a person, a family, behind this. It’s not just a corporation,” he said.
“We explain the Italian heritage of Mum and Dad and my grandparents, and why we make wine. It has always been part of our family. It’s the same with making tomato passata at the end of summer when the tomatoes are cheap. My grandfather would come back from the markets at Sandgate with a truckload of tomatoes that were, like, two bucks a crate and we would spend a weekend boiling them up and making sauce for the year.
“Another family tradition is making salami from scratch. By explaining the processes behind everything we do, we hope to give our product personality and colour.”
The success of a beef barbecue and workshop event held at the winery last year, coupled with De Iuliis’s dissatisfaction with traditional wine members’ events, prompted him to introduce Pork & Cork.
“Year in and year out we’d have a five-course degustation. Everyone would sit down and it’s like ‘In the left hand glass we have a 2018 semillon. Sip, pour out and move on to the next’. It got a bit old,” he said.
“Last year, though, we had a fire pit at the back of the winery and two big tables split into white and red. It was a bit of a free-for-all. If you only want to drink rosé all day, then drink rosé. I don’t care. Go for it. A friend of mine out on Lovedale Road breeds Berkshire pigs and is providing all the meat. At the end of the day we want you to go ‘Gee that was good fun. And I’ve learned something’.”
That’s where Michael Robinson steps in. The learning part. The former head chef of Becasse and Margan now owns and manages Branxton Quality Meats and will run a butchery demonstration at the winery lunch.
“Last year people loved learning how to identify the cuts of meat and how it all works,” De Iuliis said. “People these days are a lot more interested in where their meat comes from, beyond the packaged product at the supermarket.”
