We are back in Friuli-Venezia Giulia with SommSelect’s Editorial Director, David Lynch, where the Zanusso family continues to hit it out of the park with textured, ageworthy Friulano. This is a grape, a place, and a producer anyone who’s serious about white wine needs to know!
When I first came onboard at SommSelect, I was anxious to get some Friulian white wine in the mix, and the one I chose to lead with was a “sister” bottling to this wine from I Clivi. As an Italian wine lover who’s not always enthralled by the ‘orange’ wines that have become a Friulian calling card—the region, home to greats such as Gravner and Radikon, is the spiritual home of skin-contact ‘whites’—I appreciate the crisp, clean, and yes, conventional white wines of I Clivi. If you like minerality, bright fragrances, and energy in your white wines—as in white Burgundy, or Austrian Grüner Veltliner, or Spanish Albariño—the whites of I Clivi need to be part of your repertoire. The Friuli-Venezia Giulia region is best-known for its precise varietal white wines, and Friulano, once known as Tocai Friulano, is the region’s signature native grape. The 2013 “Brazan” from I Clivi is an old-vine, single-vineyard expression of Friulano—a “Grand Cru” if they had such a ranking in Italy. It belongs in the company of the world’s greatest white wines, and I urge you not to miss it.
A few more words about Friulano’s history: It was long known as ‘Tocai Friulano,’ which led some to believe that it was related to the Furmint grape of Hungary’s Tokaji region. Meanwhile, producers in Alsace called Pinot Gris ‘Tokay d’Alsace’ and Australians made ‘Tokay’ dessert wines from Muscadelle. This muddle was resolved, finally, in 2008, when Hungary was officially given sole use of the name, because it is a ‘place’ name there, attached to their famed sweet nectars. Since then, Friulians have bottled wines from the grape as just ‘Friulano’.
As researchers have now figured out via DNA mapping, Friulano is a distant relative of Sauvignon Blanc known as Sauvignonasse, or Sauvignon Vert (‘green’ Sauvignon). While there are occasions when some producers’ Friulanos skew toward Sauvignon Blanc in style, it is only in the subtlest of ways and it is rather rare. Name notwithstanding, the best Friulanos are not especially ‘green,’ either in color (they typically have a more silvery cast) or in flavor (there’s much less, if none, of the pyrazine/herbal influence that characterizes Sauvignon Blanc). Friulano is typically more richly textured and lower in acidity than Sauvignon Blanc as well.
The I Clivi estate is headquartered in the commune of Corno di Rosazzo, which, like all of the best Friulian wine villages, is quite close to Italy’s border with Slovenia—a rather arbitrary border that was drawn in the wake of World War II, which gave the city of Trieste to Italy and effectively sub-divided a historic wine zone. Situated in the shadow of the Carnic Alps but also within eyeshot of the Adriatic Sea to the south, wine zones such as Colli Orientali del Friuli (“Eastern Hills of Friuli”) and Collio see an interplay of Alpine/Adriatic air that leads to dramatic diurnal temperature shifts, prolonging the growing season. The soils are a mix of limestone-infused marl and sandstone, which helps limit vigor and preserve acidity in the grapes.
I Clivi’s “Brazan” is one of two cru, or single-vineyard, wines the estate releases to showcase its best old-vine Friulano. The Brazan site is in the Collio DOC, planted to 80-year-old heirloom vines that produce naturally low yields. As with its sister wine, “Galea” (from a vineyard in the Colli Orientali del Friuli DOC), the wine is subjected to long lees aging (18 months) in tank. This lees contact is critical not just in lending texture to a white that has seen no wood but in lending longevity to the wine—lees aging has proved to help inure whites against oxidation; I Clivi did a special release of a 2001 Brazan that was bottled after spending a whopping 140 months in tank on its lees. It was stunning.
In the glass this 2013 Brazan is a pale straw-gold with silvery-green reflections at the rim. The aromatics show a creamy, bread-dough note from the long lees aging, after which characteristic notes of apricot, kumquat, white flowers, wet stones and a hint of nutmeg show through. It is impeccably balanced, with some pleasing viscosity on the palate balanced by fresh acidity and a stony, savory mineral component. There are some kindred textural/aromatic qualities to certain (dry) Alsatian whites. It is approachable now, but it should continue to improve for 5-10 years to come. I’d say decanting is optional: Serve it in all-purpose whites or Bordeaux stems at 50 degrees. The ultimate pairing for Friulano is the region’s Prosciutto di San Daniele, usually spread out on a wooden paddle and eaten with your hands, but we’ve attached a little more ‘composed’ dish with a great mix of flavors for this wine. It would make a first-class pairing. Cheers!
— D.L.
