Catabbo is a family winery in Contrada Petriera, on the stony hillsides above San Martino in Pensilis on Molise's Adriatic side. The estate works fifty-two hectares of certified organic vineyard across three farms, and is one of the small group of producers building a modern, contemporary expression of Tintilia, the rare native red grape of Molise.
Molise
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Bookable experiences, curated by our editors. External booking where marked.
Guided visit of the Petriera estate cellar with a tasting of Catabbo's Tintilia and Falanghina lines. Booked by enquiry through the Visite Guidate page on catabbo.it or directly to the family at [email protected].
Book this experienceGuided visit of the Petriera estate cellar with a tasting of Catabbo's Tintilia and Falanghina lines. Booked by enquiry through the Visite Guidate page on catabbo.it or directly to the family at [email protected].
Book this experienceCantine Catabbo was founded in the early 1990s by Vincenzo Catabbo. He had spent the previous decade trading grain and cereals in Italy and abroad, and bought his first parcel of land on the hills above San Martino in Pensilis intending to cultivate wheat. The plot turned out to be full of stones and refused to cooperate, giving the contrada the name Petriera, the stony place. A chance conversation with an elderly farmer who still kept cuttings of the almost-forgotten Tintilia vine sent the project in another direction. In 1992 Vincenzo planted half a hectare of Tintilia in Contrada Petriera, and a wine estate began to take shape.
A research trip to Bordeaux and Burgundy convinced Vincenzo that the future of Catabbo lay in the vineyard rather than the warehouse. The decisive shift came in 2004, when his children Sarah, Carla and Pasquale joined the business and pushed the family to build a modern cellar. The brief was simple: bring the estate's grapes into bottle without losing the character of the place, and give Tintilia, Molise's overlooked native red, a serious contemporary expression.
The family today farms eighty hectares of land with fifty-two under vine, divided across three certified organic estates. The historic Contrada Petriera at San Martino in Pensilis sits beside the higher Tenuta al Convento and Tenuta al Calvario. Each plot brings a slightly different soil and microclimate to the same Tintilia vines, which is why the cellar can release several distinct Tintilia bottlings rather than a single estate red.
The Tintilia del Molise DOP range covers an entry-level Tintilia S, the single-vineyard Colle Cervino and the longer-aged Vincè Riserva, with I Diecettari Molise Rosso DOP sitting alongside as the broader Tintilia-led blend. Falanghina del Molise builds the white side of the cellar through Colle del Limone and an amphora-aged version, and Tinduce closes the range as a Tintilia passito. The Petriera line of Bianco, Rosato and Rosso provides the everyday wines, and a small ancestral-method sparkling pair (Ancestrale Bianco and Ancestrale Rosato) sits at the experimental edge.
Catabbo welcomes visitors at the Petriera estate by appointment. Guided tastings and cellar visits are organised through the Visite Guidate booking page on the winery website, with enquiries also handled by the family at [email protected]. The cellar is in San Martino in Pensilis, a short drive inland from Termoli on Molise's Adriatic coast.
Editorially verified by ItalianWines.co.uk.
Plate I · MOLISE
Est. 1990 
Tastings
Tours
Accommodation
Booking required 
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