WTI Magazine #74    2015 December 11
Author : Jennifer Gentile Martin for www.vinotravelsitaly.com      Translation by:

Friuli's wine producers pride themselves on the purest expressions of fruit. Most of the region is dominated by whites and some wine producers are using oak, but not like many of the white wines in the rest of the world. The wines here are all about freshness, acidic, aromatic, crisp wines with plenty of personality. It's a shame that there is so much mass marketed pinot grigio on the market because if you taste the whites of Friuli you'll know the real difference between those pinot grigio and the ones produced in Friuli.

Wine regions of Friuli-Venezia Giulia
The terrain of Friuli begins with the Julian Alps to the north that roll down to the plains until it meets the Adriatic and Gulf of Trieste. Some of the top wine zones from this region include: Collio Goriziano, Colli Orientali del Friuli, Isonzo, Carso, Grave del Friuli, Aquileia.

There are plenty of international grapes grown in this region like chardonnay, sauvignon, pinot grigio, pinot bianco for whites and merlot, pinot nero and cabernet for reds. Personally one of the biggest reasons I love Italian wines is because of the hundreds of indigenous grapes that you can't find in other wine countries of the world.

Whites wines of Friuli
Some of the most full bodied white wines come from the Collio and Colli Orientali del Friuli zones and include the grapes of ribolla gialla, Friulano and other whites. Friulano is a wine used to be known as tocai friulano until 2006 when the European Union prohibited the use of this name because of the closeness in name to Tokaji of Hungary. This same region is where you'll find what are known as orange wines. The orange wines are primarily based on the ribolla gialla grape and are oxidized and macerated with the skins for extended periods of time. A lot of times these wines are also agred in clay amphora.

Two of the 3 DOCG wines are dessert wines made in the Colli Orientali del Friuli. One of these wines is primarily made of the picolit grape producing wines of peach and apricot notes, the Colli Orientali del Friuli Picolit DOCG. This grape suffers from flower abortion producing small yields so it's produced in limited amounts annually. For a dessert wine made of 100% picolit seek out the subzone of this area, Cialla. The other dessert wine is made of the grape verduzzo from the Ramandolo DOCG. A historical and one of the oldest wine areas of Friuli the grapes grow on steep terrain and is a wine that is a full bodied, elegant wine with high acidity and some tannins resulting in a wine that is overwhelming sweet.

Red Wines of Friuli
The red native grapes I mentioned previously including pignolo, tazzelenghe, refosco and schiopppettino are mostly found in the Colli Orientali del Friuli. Pignolo, a grape that produces wines of fruit and aromatics. With the refosco grape the profile of the wine depends on the kind of refosco the wine is made from as there are different refosco grapes. The best to seek out are those of the refosco dal peduncolo rosso. Schioppettino, also known as ribolla nera, was another Italian grape that faced extinction at one point due to phylloxera, but was thankfully saved. Although, a tricky grape to find. Lastly, tazzelenghe definitely won't be for the easy drinking wine drinker as it's a sharply acidic and tannic wine.