The biggest wine trend I’ve observed over the last few years is that bigger isn’t better. We’ve embraced lightness, in red wine especially, and today’s delicious Schiava leaves you wanting for nothing despite its seeming weightlessness. Complexity, persistence, and substance are all there, and this from a variety traditionally associated with simple, uncomplicated refreshment.
Schiava is the workhorse of the Italian Dolomites and a wine that has found fame alongside the likes of Trousseau and Poulsard from France’s Jura—wine-bar staples of seemingly effortless charm. But there’s effort behind them. Lots of it. Urban Plattner’s tiny family farm in the hills outside Bolzano is a bucolic paradise, but also the kind of mountaineer viticulture only the hardiest souls can handle. He farms his steep, high-elevation vineyards biodynamically, and his “Sankt Anna”—named for an old chapel on the farm which dates to the 1300s—is an uncommonly sophisticated expression of Schiava. Drinking this wine reminds me of the window boxes full of geraniums that decorate every house in this region; it blooms in the glass in a riot of reds and oranges, a perfect snapshot of a grape and place. Some wines bowl you over, while others, like this one, charm your socks off. I don’t know about you, but I like having options!
Among the many appealing features of Sankt Anna is its rarity. Urban Plattner farms just 3.5 hectares of vines in Cardano, high above the Isarco River just east of Bolzano, and his plantings include not just Schiava but Gewürztraminer, Sauvignon Blanc, and Roter (Red) Malvasia. Although his father before him had been working organically since the 1990s, Urban took the reins in 2010 and immediately began implementing biodynamic methods. About half the estate is planted to Schiava at altitudes ranging from 450-550 meters. Most vines are between 40 and 50 years of age, in soils of volcanic origin that are rich in minerals like porphyry (a type of quartz).
What we have here is Schiava treated with respect, and it shows: For those unfamiliar with the variety, “Schiava,” which translates as “slave,” is the most widely planted red grape in the Alto Adige region, if hardly the most respected. But, just as varieties such as Trousseau in the Jura have found a new audience, Schiava (a.k.a. Vernatsch, or Trollinger) has been a hit with sommeliers who appreciate having such a distinctive style at the lighter end of the red-wine spectrum. A good Schiava offers a pleasing mix of brambly fruit, wintry spice, and supple tannins, with most just a shade darker than a rosé. Plattner takes it several steps further with Sankt Anna, without sacrificing the ethereal qualities that make the variety so unique.
Within the broader red-wine world, the 2016 Sankt Anna is a tangy, lightweight red; among Schiavas, this is the most complex and layered example I think I’ve ever tasted. This owes not just to the old-vine fruit but to an uncommonly lengthy aging regimen for Schiava—two years in large Slavonian oak casks and a year in bottle before release! In the glass, it’s a shimmering garnet red moving to pink at the rim, with a fascinating assortment of aromas that includes wild strawberry, ruby-red grapefruit, dried rose petals, coriander, tomato leaf, white pepper, underbrush. It is also a touch more linear, with a touch more tannic backbone than the typical soft-shouldered Schiava, with a long, floral finish so mouth-watering you can’t wait to take another sip. A 15-minute decant certainly won’t hurt, nor will a little cooler temperature (55-60 degrees): Serve it in Burgundy stems and watch everyone’s face light up when they take their first sip. Whenever I think of the Alto Adige (one of my favorite Italian regions, however German it may be), I think of
canederli—bread dumplings studded with speck (Tyrolean smoked bacon) and served either in broth or a simple butter sauce. Tackle the attached recipe with a few bottles of this wine and you are officially my hero. Cheers!
