2020 Zidarich Malvazija Venezia-Giulia Bianco

Friuli-Venezia Giulia, Italy

Malvasia

Fresh, energetic with beautiful bright aromatics of fresh peaches, white flowers, and honeysuckle

Following his father, Benjamin began in 1988 with just one hectare and has since grown his holdings to eight hectares, all of which he farms without the use of chemicals

Benjamin works primarily with Vitovska, the classic local variety of the Carso, but he also has plantings of Malvasia and Sauvignon—as well as small amounts of Teran (another local variety) and Merlot for his reds. Harvest is done entirely by hand, and Zidarich’s modest yields typically hover around 30 hectoliters per hectare.

In the cellar, Benjamin uses an old basket press, and—like others in the region that have re-embraced ancient, more natural methods—he keeps his white wines in contact with their skins for a few weeks during fermentation (which always occurs spontaneously). However, in comparison to the bold, unabashedly tannic, deeply copper-colored wines of someone like Gravner, the skin-contact influence in Zidarich’s wines is remarkably subtle—their color remains relatively brilliant and vibrant, and the gentle tannins weave so tightly and seamlessly around the wines’ pungent, clinging minerality as to be almost undetectable. These are first and foremost wines of minerality, not wines of skin tannins.