Biography
The estate was created in 1830 when brothers Lucio and Carmelo Mastrogiovanni Tasca purchased the former fiefdom of Regaleali, approximately 3,000 acres of land at Sclafani, near the border between the provinces of Palermo and Caltanissetta. It was directed in those first years by Lucio, who made it into a model estate. Regaleali has never ceased to be in the vanguard of Sicilian viticulture in its subsequent 120 years of activity when, at the end of the Second World War, the agrarian reform led to the confiscation of over a half of the original 3,000 acres, reducing the property to 1,250 acres: Count Giuseppe Tasca d’Almerita had the foresight to react vigorously and with real determination, giving wine and the vineyards a central place in operations and aiming exclusively at high quality. He was a pioneer in the cultivation with wire-trained vines, in reducing yields per hectare, and in the utilization of such native Sicilian grapes as Inzolia and Nero d’Avola. Also in experimenting, without any sense of prejudice, such international grapes as Chardonnay and Cabernet Sauvignon. Current operations are in charge of Count Lucio Tasca d’Almerita and his sons Giuseppe and Alberto: theirs was the decision to create a company, composed almost entirely of young Sicilians, which directs all of the strategic areas of production, from the budgetary matters to marketing, and sells the wine all over the world. From the heart of Sicily, from that ecological oasis which is called Regaleali, issue forth each year three million bottles of wine: four white wines, six red wines, two sparkling wines, and a dessert wine, all produced from authentic crus. Two were created by Giuseppe Tasca d’Almerita, father of Lucio: the Rosso del Conte, a Nero d’Avola perfected long before this grape variety became popular, aged in chestnut casks (which now have been replaced with oak), and Nozze d’Oro, a white wine realized to celebrate the 50th anniversary of his marriage to Baroness Franca Camarata. Among the white wines, the fleshy, elegant Chardonnay merits much attention, as does the aristocratic Cabernet Sauvignon among the reds. Increasing popular as well is the aromatic sweet wine Diamante d’Almerita, a blend of Moscato and Traminer.