Dalmatia-Herzegovina
Chapter: Introduction
The wines of the Slavic people in the Balkans have oft been misunderstood or even disregarded. When we told friends and family about our project to write a book about these regions, the general range of questions were, "Where are Dalmatia and Herzegovina?" followed quickly by, "They make wine there?" People tend to want to believe that the best wines only exist in France, Italy, Spain, and California. But naturally, anyone who starts to scratch at the skin of the global wine trade finds that it is made in a great many places throughout the world.
So where is Dalmatia? It is the area that covers most of the coast and islands of Croatia, a country that once was part of Yugoslavia throughout most of the 20th century. For those familiar with the born of the ashes, vacation hot spot of Dubrovnik, it sits at the very bottom of Dalmatia, bordering recently independent Montenegro.
Herzegovina is a little trickier to define as it is a historical region, not an administrative one. It lies in the southern area of the country of Bosnia & Herzegovina which, like Croatia, is a republic that used to be part of Yugoslavia. Herzegovina used to be much bigger than it is currently and was comprised of areas in neighboring Croatia and Montenegro. This is an overly simple definition of the area, but to get deeper in to this would take up the rest of this book and we're here to talk about wine, not geography, politics, or ultimately, wars.
The second question about people making wine in these two regions is easier to answer: "Yes, they make wine there and it is very good wine." A great deal of the wine is at such a caliber that it is attracting attention from exporters and gaining a good deal of recognition outside the region.
A third question that we heard frequently was "Why are you writing about these wines?" In a world market that is glutted with countless barrels of wine, why should anyone pay attention to these "obscure" wines? To fully answer this we would say that you have to taste the wines to understand.
They have a unique character. There are varietals that are only grown here. The Slavs of the Balkans are amazing people and the winemakers are even more amazing with family histories in wine dating back centuries. But probably the biggest reason we're writing about this is that we love the Balkans and we would like this book to be an entry point and guide in to a region that is largely undiscovered. Don't let horrid, barroque gold labels and websites not updated since 1995 get between you and some of the best new wines being made. Let us share our journeys with you and show you what it is to taste Dalmatia and Herzegovina.
