Every week, I select an orange wine (a white wine made with extended skin contact) that grabbed my attention. View the whole series here.
I made many discoveries at last Friday’s Orange Wines Festival, in gorgeous Izola, Slovenia (full report coming soon) – but none more pleasurable than the wines of Ronco Severo, based in Friuli Colli Orientali. Having twice visited the village of Prepotto, where Schioppettino is king, I wondered how I’d managed to miss such a great producer.
Ronco Severo is Stefan Novello, who started on his winemaking journey in 1998. Novello makes a delicious skin macerated Ribolla Gialla, and an aromatic, creamy Friulano, but the pick of the bunch for me was his white blend “Severo Bianco 2012”
Severo Bianco 2012 is a blend of Chardonnay, Friulano and a tiny smidge of Picolit, co-fermented and left on the skins for 48 days. Which such a lot of skin contact, you might expect a more extreme “orange” style, but this wine is fresh and pure, with an unctuous texture and fine, featherlight tannins.
Aromas of orange blossom, clove and other spices lead into a wonderfully creamy palate. You can feel the elegance of the chardonnay holding the fatness of Friulano in tow.
The label, depicting a child balanced on top of a chair, reflects Novello’s desire to take risks and find a perfect point of balance. He explains this in a bit more detail in this video (Italian, with English subtitles).
Novello’s wines are not yet available in the UK, but there is a Dutch distributor, Pura Passione.