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LUGANA DOC: The White Wine of Lake Garda
Lugana DOC is just south of Lake Garda, as you’ll soon learn, and one of Italy’s more-distinctive DOCs (and one I’ve written about previously, as well). Here, Charles Scicolone takes us on a quick but comprehensive Lugana DOC tasting trip thanks to Consorzio Tutela Lugana DOC. Please enjoy…
One of my favorite places to visit in Italy is Lake Garda. I like sitting outside in a restaurant along the lake, eating the lake fish and drinking the local wine, in most cases Lugana DOC. While it wasn’t quite the same as Lake Garda, a dinner at La Pizza Fresca in NYC hosted by the Consorizo Tutela Lugana DOC was a good opportunity to try the new vintages.
Luca Formentini from the Selva Capuzza Winery
The Lugana denomination is on the border between the provinces of Brescia (Lombardy) and Verona (Veneto) to the south of Lake Garda. The soil is mostly white clay and limestone, which is difficult to work.
Angelica Altomare from the Cà Maiol Winery
The temperate breezes from Lake Garda influence the microclimate positively; it is mild and fairly constant with little difference between day and nighttime temperatures.
The Turbiana grape, aka Trebbiano di Lugana…
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Hugh Johnson: ‘I do not score wines’
In the rare down time available during the grape harvest, I find my attention called toward the more-learned voices in the wine business. I’m not a wine maker, but still I try to pick up a clue here and there to improve my ability to communicate about the world of wine.
Hugh Johnson
Some (much) of my time is reading but the Internet allows listening to the voices of people pondering their life choices in this world which in the few busy months of pick, press and ferment seems more vocation and less avocation.
I listen often to Levi Dalton’s “I’ll Drink to That” podcast, which I first found through Alder Yarrow’s “Vinography” blog. Most recently, it’s been fascinating to hear British author Hugh Johnson discuss his wine-writing career and the genesis of the extraordinary “World Atlas of Wine.”
In his conversation with Dalton, Johnson takes a shot at wine scoring, which he calls “a shortcut” and of use mostly for wine investors. Here is a brief excerpt (some of which ended up in my Twitter feed) and you can hear the rest here.
“I do not score wines, I don’t see the point of scoring wines. OK, it’s instant opinion and its a shortcut but its particularly useful to wine investors. and I’m not a fan of wine investors. … I deplore it. Because I don’t buy wine to sell, I buy it to drink, if I can afford it.”
He quotes a friend who once told him,”Hugh, fine wine used to be for the worthy and now it’s for the wealthy.”
Wine Openers 