2018 Inama, Vigneti di Foscarino, Soave Classico DOC, Veneto, Italy.
The crisp and mineral laced single cru Vigneti di Foscarino Soave Classico is a beauty, it highlights this vineyard’s cooler exposure and explores the purity of the Garganega grape, as it does not contain any of the lesser varietals, showing a pretty floral dimension and round stone fruit and racy citrus. This fabulous example of modern Soave is the result of Inama’s vision and realization of the potential here, with Giuseppe Inama making some shrewd moves in the 1960s to purchase some exceptional plots that have now really paid great rewards, their potential is right here in the bottle, with the wines now being made under the direction of his son Stefano, who took over the winemaking duties in 1992 and his son Matteo more recently have raised the quality levels to world class status. Giuseppe Inama began buying up small vineyard plots on this peak, where this wine comes from, in the heart of the Soave Classico zone, and as a result, the Inama winery today owns most of the vineyards on Mount Foscarino, the ancient dormant volcano that influences the wines of this region with the volcanic soils playing a big part of the expressive nature in these Soave wines. The Vegneti di Foscarino has a lot to admire with layers of lemon/lime, peach and quince fruits on the taut medium bodied palate that harmonizes the zesty and leesy textural elements and still allows for an exciting tension to build in this brilliant crystalline white, that goes awesome with soft cheeses, briny sea foods and lighter creamy pasta dishes. The Vigneti di Foscarino is east facing, catching the morning sun but avoiding the afternoon heat, it sits about 250 meters above sea level and is mainly vines that are in the 50 year old range and farmed in the traditional pergola style, and though not certified, the Inama’s use holistic organic methods to farm this vineyard to achieve the best possible ripening and quality.
As mentioned recently here, the Inama winery is now on their third generation, it was founded in 1967, and are one of Italy’s finest small family owned wineries with an amazing array of vineyard sites in the Veneto region and well known for their stunning examples of single vineyard Soave wines. It all started In the 1960s, when Giuseppe Inama began buying up small plots on best hillsides in the heart of the Soave Classico zone, and as a result, the Inama winery has some of the most distinct wines in the region, which is seeing a renaissance these days. Inama’s two cru Soave offerings, Carbonare and this Foscarino, with both really showcase their different terroir influences and are fantastic white wine values, it is wines like these and those of Pieropan that have brought renewed attention to this ancient region and the Garganega grape, which is just starting to show its potential in modern times. The walled city of Soave, a place I have on my list to visit, is in the Veneto region, and it has long been a source of quality and well priced white wines. The town dates back to Roman times, who solidified the area’s winemaking tradition in this sleepy and picturesque area not far from Venice and Lake Garda. The Romans, it is well noted locally, were big fans of these minerally fresh and dry floral wines like found here in Soave. The Garganega grape, is main attraction and the most noble of white grapes here and the mainstay in the DOC bottlings, like this one, it has for centuries produced the best Soave wines and come mainly from vineyards in the hills that rise up behind the town of Soave itself. The Foscarino is 100% Garganega, all organically grown, is fermented in stainless then raised in small barriques, where it goes through full malo-lactic conversion and sees batonage (lees stirring) every six weeks for 6 months before it is returned to tank to settle for another six months before bottling. Inama’s latest releases are outstanding from their unique Carmenere and Cabernet reds to their set of Soave(s), I was very impressed with them and highly recommend exploring them.
($28 Est.) 92 Points, grapelive