50% Barbera/50% Bonarda (aka Croatina). Named for an old farmhouse in the midst of the vineyard, La Macchiona is La Stoppa's flagship red. It is made with the estate's oldest vines (up to 45 years old), grown on heavy, silty clay-limestone soils and farmed organically. The fruit is harvested by hand, then destemmed and crushed. The juice is fermented with native yeasts and without sulfur in tank. Maceration lasts around 40 days. The wine is aged for several years in Slavonian oak botti. It is bottled unfiltered and without sulfur and aged for several more years before release. Each vintage is handled truly individually, which also means that vintages are not necessarily released in sequence but instead when they are deemed ready. The "dieciannidopo" or "ten years later" on the 2002 label honors the fact that it was the first Macchiona bottling to be held back and not released directly after the previous vintage, and in fact not until 2012.