ITALY: Northern Italia

There is an incredible array of wines made in the Northern part of Italy.   Let's define this region narrowly, including the Val d'Aosta, Liguria, Piemonte (we've got a whole separate page for this area), Lombardia, the Veneto, Alto Adige, Trentino and Friuli.

Some Wines We Like:

 

COLTERENZIO

I have known the wines from this co-op for many years, having done extensive tastings of the wines from the Alto Adige.  On my most recent trip to the area my friend Stoffi scheduled Colterenzio as our final appointment.  Apparently he'd saved the best for last. 

The winery is run by Luis Raiffer, a serious wine man.  The place, located in the town of Cornaiano (or Girlan in German, if you prefer), was started in 1960.  Today they have more than 370 hectares and the production is large.  While many claim the Produttori del Barbaresco to be Italy's model of a cooperative winery, I would have to say, given the quality of the production here, Colterenzio deserves that title.
They make an astonishing range of wines.  The simple bottlings are clean-as-a-whistle.  



"Lafoa" are the "Bordeaux-styled" wines.  Sauvignon Blanc, expensive though it is, shows amazingly intense fruit.  It's a combination of Loire, New Zealand and Bordeaux.  Signor Raiffer explained they use a number of special clones of Sauvignon to achieve such a success.  This is not for the timid or faint of heart.  It's pedal-to-the-metal Sauvignon.



The 2006 Pinot Grigio is exceptional.  This is far better than simple plonk such as the well-marketed Santa Margherita brand and it's priced honestly.  We're amused when customers insist upon paying for all those full color ads in various publications, not to mention the monthly Mercedes Benz' payments for the importer of Santa Margherita.  They could have something better and far less costly.

Currently in stock:  
2006 "Cornell" Chardonnay $33.99
2006 "Lafoa" Sauvignon Blanc $35.99 
2006 PINOT GRIGIO  List $16  SALE $12.99

FORADORI

You can't know the Trentino grape called Teroldego without knowing the wines of Elisabetta Foradori.
You can't.

Her wines are the reference point for this wonderful grape, a variety that's particular to the Campo Rotaliano, a small region north of Trento.  There's lots of limestone and granite to the soil here.  Ms. Foradori has worked diligently to plant and re-plant good "clones" of Teroldego, preferring vines which will produce quality fruit, often at the expense of quantity.  The region, actually, had been carpeted with Teroldego from more vigorously-producing clones, so Foradori took cuttings from her family's oldest vines (heirloom Teroldego, if you will) to propagate.  Elisabetta says they have about 17 clones of Teroldego presently.  

 

The Famous Principessa of Teroldego.


In the cellar...


It was a warm morning, so we tasted outside...a "Fuoradori" tasting.

Her basic Teroldego is labeled simply as "Foradori."  It carries the "Rotaliano" D.O.C.    It comes from various vineyard sites from her major holdings in the Rotaliano "region."   The average age of these vines is older than the winemaker, which is a good thing.   The fermentation takes place in stainless steel and the wine is matured in seasoned oak for about a year.  These are routinely delicious and a great alternative to wines such as Chianti Classico, Barbera, etc.

"Granato" is a wine that's also made entirely of Teroldego, but though it's the more "special" wine, it has the lesser denominazione of the I.G.T. of Vigneti delle Dolomiti Rosso.  The wine comes from various vineyard sites, all cultivated with more severe pruning in the winter to reduce the yields and maximize the intensity of Teroldego. As we are seeing with many vintners these days, the winemaker's preference is to ferment the juice in wood, rather than the more sterile stainless steel tank.  Ms. Foradori employs a high percentage of new oak barrels, crafting a wine of the same level of quality as a Super-Tuscan, Super Piemontese, Napa Cabernet or fairly prestigious Bordeaux wine. This sees about 50% new oak, the rest split between slightly older cooperage.   We currently have some bottles of the highly-acclaimed 2004, a wine with a wonderful dark fruit quality and sweet oak bouquet.   Lovely example!

A trio of other wines rounds out her portfolio.  A white wine called "Myrto" features Sauvignon Blanc, Pinot Bianco and Incrocio Manzoni.  There's a particular red blend featuring Cabernet Sauvignon with Syrah, Petit Verdot and 10% of local, "Foradori" varieties.  And, finally, she's been bitten by the Syrah bug, creating a wine called Ailanpa of which she makes about three bottles every few years.  

Currently in stock:  2005 Foradori Teroldego "Normale"  $21.99
2004 Granato $54.99

 

 

CANTINA PRODUTTORI BOLZANO

This is, in some measure, a "new" winery.  But in reality, it's an old producer.  Make that two old producers.

Two old producers, the Gries winery and the Santa Magdalena joined forces a few years ago, consolidating operations into one major cellar.  Like many properties in Italy's Alto Adige, the place has a couple of names, just to keep us guessing.  As a result, you'll find wines sold as "St. Magdalena-Gries" and some labeled Cantina Produttori Bolzano.  Why make things easy, after all?   Making it even more confusing is the winery down the street called "Muri-Gries."


Located in the town of Bolzano, a rather major "hub" for the region and the big city in the Alto Adige, this winery makes quite a range of reds and whites.  White wine, though, is a relatively new feature here...until the early 1990s, most of the production was in rather light red wine!  In fact, this part of Bolzano, known as Gries, is ideally suited to cultivating the red grape, Lagrein.

The winemaker is Stephan Filippi.  He's the third generation winemaker that's been at the helm for a couple of decades, having spent a couple of years at the famous Lageder winery when he was a kid.  Now he's "taken over" the family business, so to speak.

The white wines are fermented in stainless steel tanks with temperature controls...this is standard operating procedure these days in most of Italy.


They have quite a nice old, underground cellar downstairs and though one sees a lot of oak, I can't say I found any of their red wines to be woody.


If you go to Bolzano for winter sports or wine-tasting, do stop by this place...they have a regular tasting room.

It's open Monday through Saturday.

We have been delighted with several of their basic dry whites.  Currently we have a Pinot Grigio that's delightful.  In tasting through their extensive portfolio on a recent visit, I found all the wines to be well-made and a number of them to be really good examples of their particular varietal.

Their 2006 Santa Maddalena Pinot Grigio is excellent.  The wine captures the pear and apple-like fruit notes of the grape and it's dry and fresh on the palate.   We also appreciate the honest pricing.

Currently in stock:  2006 Pinot Grigio $14.99

 

Old labels tailored to the German-speaking market.

 

 

 

 

 

POJER & SANDRI

This is a famous, highly-regarded winery located way up in the hills overlooking the Trentino region.

We first visited this estate in the early 1980s and they were nearly "cult" figures back then.  Today our European friends, all of whom are fans of this winery, must reserve their purchases long before the wines are even bottled!  

The climate in this area is varied and the list of varieties made here is impressive.  For years Pojer & Sandri were thought of as bianchisti, or white wine producers.  But they even make impressive red wines.  So impressive, in fact, that they were invited a couple of years ago to come to Oregon's famous International Pinot Noir conference!  

Their wines used to be more easily available here in the U.S., but their importer has encountered difficulty in convincing local distributors to buy wines which are known to but a small number of fans.  This means, of course, the distributors would have to learn about the wines and then, in turn, go out and attempt to educate their customers.  Since most people simply want to know "how many points did this wine receive?," few have interest in the esoteric wines coming from this gem of a winery.  

The simple fact that YOU are reading this indicates a "smarter than the average bear" level of intelligence, so perhaps you will be interested in these wines.  

On our last visit to the hillside town of Faedo we tasted an impressive array of wines.  Especially good was a blended white wine called "Besler Bianck" which comes from the "Maso Besler" in the nearby Val di Cembra.   Besler refers to "sheep" and stems from a Latin word.  

The wine is remarkable.  First, it's a five grape blend featuring Pinot Bianco, Kerner, Riesling, Sauvignon Blanc and Incrocio Manzoni.  Everything is harvested at the same time and the juice is then fermented in wood: French oak and barrels made of Acacia!    The wine spends a year in wood and they keep the spent yeast in contact with the wine, stirring it from time to time.  I find it to be reminiscent of some of the wonderful (and costly) white wines of the Pessac-Léognan appellation of France's Graves region.  There's a wonderful fresh citrus note, along with peach and some stony elements.  Quite dry, this has a long finish.  Perfect for seafood.  And it's quite reasonably priced given what's in the glass.

While they're not making large quantities of sparkling wines, they do make an excellent bubbly which is extremely dry.  Like French Champagne, the wine is made of Pinot Noir and Chardonnay.  The wine is a blend of two vintages, in this instance, it's 1995 and 1996 vintages.  The wine spends about two and a half years on the spent yeast before disgorgement.  No sweetening dosage is added, so the wine is too dry for most people.  

Rosso Faye is a very fine Cabernet-based red.  It's Cabernet Sauvignon blended with Cabernet Franc, Merlot and a local variety called Lagrein.  As a result of the addition of Lagrein, this doesn't taste like a Bordeaux or Napa Cabernet, yet it's delicious!  There are red fruits and black on the nose, along with a brown spice character from the French oak aging.  The 2001 is drinkable now and ought to cellar nicely for 5-10 more years.  Elisa Sandri mentioned serving this with a veal shank and polenta.  Lamb isn't a bad match for this, either.  
Rosso Faye seems to be a very highly-regarded wine in Italy, so it's nice that they actually send some bottles to California!  

They also make some top distilled products, grappa and various fruit brandies.  We currently have some 375ml bottles of their fine Traminer grappa.  This is surprising gentle (many taste like rocket fuel) and wonderfully aromatic.

CLICK HERE TO SEE SOME PHOTOS.  

Currently in stock: 2001 Rosso Faye Sold Out
2003 BESLER BLANC  Sold out
1995-1996 EXTRA BRUT SPUMANTE $35.99
2004 SAUVIGNON BLANC  Sale $15.99

Their grappa is currently sold out.

BOLOGNANI

Diego Bolognani runs a large winery, vinifying grapes from area growers and selling off the wine, in bulk, to neighboring wineries.  It is only in the recent past that they've hit upon the notion of putting wine in a 750ml glass bottle, slapping a label on it and selling the wine to private customers.  Located in Lavis between the main road and the train tracks, this winery has a couple of interesting offerings.


The Bolognani family makes a special effort to produce a wine of Müller-Thurgau grapes grown in their Trentino vineyards "Valle di Cembra," a terraced, old viticultural area.  Growers who continue to toil in this region have to drag the soil from one terrace to the next after thunderstorms wash it away!  


The winery is located down below in the town of Lavis.  

Bolognani also makes a fantastically sprightly and bright Moscato Giallo, an aromatic wine which teases with sweet, intensely fruity aromas, only to be bone dry on the palate.  We had a delicious bottle of this alongside a terrific honey-dew melon over which Bob draped some sweet Prosciutto.  These are delicious wines and are best consumed in their youth.




 

Currently in stock:

2006 Moscato Giallo  $16.99

TIEFENBRUNNER

Though they make a lovely range of wines at this family-run property in the Alto Adige, we see but a couple of offerings.  They have a cellar full of interesting wines, however.   Well-vinified is their simple, honest, basic Pinot Grigio, a wine fermented in stainless steel and bottled when it's fresh and young. It used to be "Alto Adige" in denominazione, but recently changed to delle Venezie.  I was worried about a loss of quality, but Christoff explained this change was caused by legislation, not vineyard sources.  It seems some of their vineyards are at an elevation higher than the delimited "Alto Adige" area and so they were obliged to change the label!  

We have visited this place a few times.  The wines are always of good quality, some we like more than others.  They are looking to improve wine quality here, something we always appreciate.  Wineries who rest on their laurels often get left behind as others strive to raise the bar, so to speak.

We were presented a sample of a red a few years ago.  My cohorts had more experience in tasting the wines of this region, so all were surprised when I was the only one to correctly identify the wine as a Lagrein.
In 2003 we stopped by and were shown another "Mystery Red."  I guessed it as an "Alto Adige Syrah," though I had no idea anybody was cultivating that grape in this region.  It turns out Tiefenbrunner has a few barrels of Syrah!

The winery is highly-regarded on its home turf for its Linticlarus Chardonnay and Cabernet wines.  They also make a famous Müller-Thurgau called "Feldmarschall Fenner zu Fennberg" which we see once in a while. 

Currently in stock:  2006 Pinot Grigio (list $16)  SALE $12.99

Photo (above, right) is of Christoff Tiefenbrunner in his weinkeller/cantina.

 

CANTINA TRAMIN/TERMENO

This is a 280 member grower's cooperative winery whose Gewürztraminer is amazingly fine!  The winery was started in 1898 and in 1971 it merged with another co-op.  Winemaker Willi Sturtz is at the helm.

Now the town of Termeno is called "Tramin" in German.  Some people claim this is the birthplace of Gewürztraminer.  Well, that may be the case and the case gets even stronger when you taste their "Nussbaumerhof" bottling of this aromatic variety.  I bought a bottle of it for a dinner event we were having, intending to serve it to someone who claims not to be a fan of Italian wines and who's addicted to Gewürztraminer.  

 

 

Winemaker Willi Sturtz

 

The Nussbaumer Gewürztraminer is extraordinary and holds its own with just about any dry Gewürz from France's Alsace region.  The vineyards are in clay and limestone, the exposure being south and south-west.  A portion of the grapes are picked somewhat late, when they're really ripe and intensely aromatic.  The juice is macerated with the grape skins to further intensify the spice notes.  What a wine!  Intense fragrances of lychees, grapefruits and rose petals waft from the glass.  The wine is quite dry, too, with but 7 or 8 grams of sugar per liter, typically.  This balances the slight bitter finish and balances the wine quite handsomely.

We visited the winery in the summer of 2005 and winemaker Willi Sturtz opened a 5 year old bottle of the Nussbaumer...amazingly good and still very much alive.  The current vintage, from the 2005 harvest, is exceptionally intense and very fine.

 

Currently in stock: 2005 NUSSBAUMERHOF GEWÜRZTRAMINER $35.99

 

 

NINO NEGRI

The Valtellina is probably one of the least-known wine areas of northern Italy.  It's in Lombardia and is a mountainous region north of Milano.  

The main grape variety is Nebbiolo.  If you can read the town names on the map to the left, you'll see one is called Chiavenna.  To confuse unsuspecting American wine drinkers (and even those who might actually be suspicious), they change the name of the Nebbiolo grape here to Chiavennasca. The name is said to be a corruption of the dialect words "Ciu vinasca," translating to "the best for wine."   

The most normal bottlings are "Valtellina"  while a step up gets you "Valtellina Superiore."  The best of these take a site-specific name such as Grumello, Inferno, Sassella or Valgella.  One of the most prestigious wines of the area is the powerful Sfursat or Sforzato wine.  This is the Valtellina's version of an Amarone.  The wine is made of dried grapes and has higher-than-normal alcohol.  

One of the most prominent, if not the most important cellars in the Valtellina is Nino Negri.  It's no longer owned by the Negri family, but the place is in good hands and run with an eye towards quality.

This old advertisement is displayed in the courtyard near their offices and cellar.


We made the pilgrimage to visit the Nino Negri winery and were greatly impressed by the terroir of the region and the dedication to excellence.



We typically have Nino Negri's "Inferno" wine in the shop.   This is a nice example of Nebbiolo and has more interest (to us) than many costly Merlot wines made north of the border in Switzerland.  I am often surprised at how many people actually know this wine.  It's got a really "retro" label and isn't a wine for those who are just getting into Italian wines, yet people routinely pick up this interesting vino rosso.

The Inferno wine takes its name from the steep slopes and rocky soil...the rocks reflect the heat and make the place rather hot.  We were surprised (shocked, actually), when we kept ordering this wine from the local distributor and it did not arrive...it seems it's being "allocated" and it takes a special "okay" to get a case released.  Who would think more than a handful of people around these parts would know what the hell "Inferno" is and would be interested to buy a bottle!   

Negri's Inferno displays a light garnet color with a hint of rusty brown/orange on the robe.  It's a bit leathery in fragrance and has a mildly tannic 'bite' on the palate.  This is a traditionally-styled red wine, so if you're looking for a "gobs o' fruit" sort of bottle, this won't be a good choice.  On the other hand, a plate of a wild mushroom pasta or grilled sausages and you're living right!

Having such a traditionally-styled red, I was totally unprepared for their white wine blend called "Ca' Brione."  The name comes from a vineyard site in the Fracia zone within the village of Teglo (like you're going to remember this and recite it for guests at the dinner table!).  The wine is based on two, maybe three, familiar grape varieties.  Most well-known are the Chardonnay and Sauvignon Blanc.  But they pick these early and dry them a bit...a process which would horrify most U.C. Davis-trained enologists.  Then, when they're ripe, Nino Negri harvests its Nebbiolo (yes, the red grape Nebbiolo plays a supporting role in this show) along with the grape known as Incrocio Manzoni, an old hybrid from the Veneto.  It's a cross (incrocio) of Riesling and Pinot Bianco.  The wine is fermented in French oak and spends more than half a year following in wood.  
We have the 2006 and it's amazingly good.  There are not many Italian oak-aged whites I find to be sufficiently interesting to warrant forking over much money...but this wine gets my commendation.

I served this with an antipasti plate and it was superb.

 

 

The "Cinque Stelle" (5 Star) Sfursat that's in the shop is from the 2002 vintage.  Where to start?  Nebbiolo, 100%.  A long fermentation period on the skins, so the wine has plenty of structure and can age well.  It spends about a year in new French oak.  It's as intense as a good Barolo, but there's less tar and more 'sweet' notes.  Clove spice, vanilla, violets, etc.   

This is now in the same price neighborhood as many Amarone wines and it's as costly as a good number of Barolo and Barbaresco wines.  This will probably come as a shock to old-timers (of which I am one), since these didn't use to cost an arm and a leg.  

Deep, rich, mildly raisiny and showing a touch of oak, you'll want to pair this with some sort of rich cheese or a major, soulful winter stew.    We've had difficulty in obtaining this wine and the new importer doesn't seem to know Negri's regular bottle of Sfursat from the 5 Stelle bottling.  Stay tuned...we're told they will figure out this riddle shortly.

Currently in stock:  2002 Sfursat 5 Stelle (list $80) Sold Out  Waiting for a new vintage
Inferno  $17.99

2006 Ca'Brione  White $39.99

More Northern Italian Wines

 

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Last modified: April 22, 2008