Maria Canabal, WineNews, Linea Verde and Gambero Rosso receive the “Casato Prime Donne” 2024 Award

Maria Canabal, journalist, writer and charismatic personality of the female universe of food & wine, who, with her “Parabere Forum”, brings together 400 women from all over the world every year to create empowerment; Alessandro Regoli and Irene Chiari, founders of the WineNews website, one of the most important portals of Italian wine & food; “Linea Verde”, the historical programme of “Rai 1”, for the episode dedicated to “The jewels of the Land of Siena” (a special episode that put together the excellence of the Sienese territory, from the Palio to olive oil, from white truffles to terracotta, passing through the vineyards and historic wineries of Brunello di Montalcino, the Crete Senesi and the Val d’Orcia); Loredana Sottile and Gianluca Atzeni of “Trebicchieri”, the weekly economic magazine of “Gambero Rosso”: these are the winners of the “Casato Prime Donne” 2024 Award, edition no. 23, a prestigious award that, every year, crowns important female personalities in politics, sport, science and journalism. The ceremony will be staged on September 14 in Montalcino, coinciding with the start of the Brunello harvest (“the harvest, if the weather is favorable, is expected”, Donatella Cinelli Colombini explains in a press note, “to be as excellent and abundant as the legendary 2010 and 2019 harvests; with the new climate, the Sangiovese vines find their best balance when the soil is well hydrated and the summer is hot and dry”).
The 2024 “First Woman” is Maria Canabal, a charismatic figure in the female universe of food & wine with her “Parabere” Forum, which brings together 400 women from around the world each year to create empowerment (next edition scheduled for March 2 and 3, 2025 in New York). In 2015 Maria Canabal was recognized among the “Most Influential Women in Gastronomy” and her cookbooks were honored by the “Gourmand Cookbooks Awards” as “World’s Best”. In the journalistic section of the “Casato Prime Donne” Award, Alessandro Regoli and Irene Chiari, founders of WineNews, one of the major portals of Italian enology (founded in 2000, it daily reports to professionals and lovers of good drinking, the universe of Italian and international food and wine, through website, newsletter and social) and Loredana Sottile and Gianluca Atzeni of “TreBicchieri”, the weekly economic magazine of “Gambero Rosso”, a prestigious magazine that has been chronicling developments in Italian gastronomy since 1986, were awarded the Consorzio del Vino Brunello di Montalcino Prize.
The “Special Jury Prize” goes to Linea Verde (the presenters are Peppone, Livio Beshir and Margherita Granbassi), a historic Rai 1 program for the broadcast (January 14, 2024) dedicated to “The Jewels of the Land of Siena” (the latter prize will be donated to charity). The episode was dedicated to the city of Siena, starting with the famous fresco “The Allegory and the Effects of Good and Bad Government” by Ambrogio Lorenzetti: here the behind-the-scenes and contrada life in the city of the Palio were revealed; but Linea Verde also featured the excellences of the territory, among traditions, villages and food and wine: in Montalcino focus on Tenuta Greppo Biondi Santi, where Brunello was born in the 19th century and where, in one of the world’s most famous fine wines vaults, the historic Reserves are kept; and then on the Renaissance villa of Argiano, where the best wine in the world is born, according to the prestigious magazine “Wine Spectator”, now also a “museum”, with medieval and Renaissance works by the most important Sienese and Florentine artists; finally, it traveled through the Val d’Orcia, a Unesco World Heritage Site, along the Via Francigena, passing through the Crete Senese of the white truffle and the famous terracotta of Petroio. The beauty of landscapes, the attention to detail, the elegance of “human works” in unique contexts in a tale full of emotions: record ratings, with 24% share and 3.27 million viewers, for the historic transmission of “Rai 1” which, for over 40 years, has been telling the most beautiful Italy, that of the excellence of the territory and traditions, the richness of the villages and food and wine. Information that has intertwined nature, culture, crafts and agriculture as the fruit of the work of generations that gives birth to beautiful, good and well-made products, the “miracle” of a truly blessed land.
By unanimous decision of the jury, the 2024 edition is dedicated to Francesca Colombini Cinelli, who founded the Prize, who passed away in 2022. The Jury includes Donatella Cinelli Colombini (president), Rosy Bindi, Anselma dell’Olio, Anna Pesenti, Stefania Rossini, Anna Scafuri, Daniela Viglione (in the jury of honor also Silvio Franceschelli, mayor of Montalcino, and Fabrizio Bindocci, president of the Consorzio del Brunello). The ceremony is scheduled for September 14 in Montalcino and will close formally at Fattoria del Colle, when Cardinal Augusto Paolo Lojudice, archbishop of Siena Colle Val d’Elsa Montalcino, will bless the new ambulance of the Misericordia di Sinalunga, dedicated to Carlo Gardini, husband of Donatella Cinelli Colombini, who recently passed away. “The award ceremony coincides”, Donatella Cinelli Colombini explains in a press note, “with the beginning of the Brunello harvest: the harvest, if the weather is favorable, is expected to be excellent and abundant like the legendary 2010 and 2019 harvests. With the new climate, Sangiovese vines find their best balance when the soil is well hydrated and the summer is hot and dry”.
The “Casato Prime Donne” Award includes a youth talent incubator aimed at enhancing young people capable of inspiring emulation among their peers; a way of intervening directly in the territory by using the visibility and contacts of the award to stimulate among young people the awareness of how important it is to cultivate their own potential in order to grow themselves and others: this year’s incubator involved artist Luigi Corbini, students from class 4° A at the Istituto Agrario Bettino Ricasoli and the Liceo Linguistico Lambruschini in Montalcino, communicator Massimiliano Manetti from the University of Siena, pastry chef Andrea Sacchetti (Pasticceria Nuovo Mondo, Prato) and three goldsmiths from the Lao Jewellery School in Florence, Martina Bianchi, Beatrice Campagna and Asia Roccazzella.