Morei Teroldego Vigneti delle Dolomiti IGT 2018 1500ml Magnum

A Teroldego that trades its dark promise for freshness on the palate. The nose seems more opulent than what the wine then reveals: brisk, clear, 12.5% vol., with pronounced sense of origin.

The Campo Rotaliano is a valley plain hemmed in by three-thousand-metre peaks, where the Noce river has deposited limestone, porphyry and gneiss over millennia. By day the rock walls reflect the sun's heat, by night cool mountain air sweeps through the valley. The single vineyard Morei sits on alluvial sand, while the Sgarzon site is rooted in dolomitic limestone.

Teroldego was already poured at the Council of Trent and nearly disappeared in the 20th century due to mass-production yields. Elisabetta Foradori took over the estate in 1984 and revived the variety through years of massal selection carried out with the University of Milan and the San Michele research centre. Today 28 hectares are Demeter-certified, 80 percent of them planted with Teroldego. Instead of wood, which would overlay the variety's character, the estate works with Spanish clay amphorae: wine and skins spend eight months breathing in the tinajas. Since 2013, Emilio Foradori has been responsible for winemaking.

The tannin is silky and so fine-grained it is barely perceptible. The dark fruit of the nose dissolves into transparent fruit, vibrant acidity and pulsing freshness. The finish stays ethereally cool, closing bright, fruity and clear with an invigorating hint of austerity.

Red cabbage soup with lamb's lettuce and smoked-almond pesto for a vegan table, pan-fried wels catfish with beurre rouge and cauliflower cream for a fish course, blood sausage ravioli with apple-coriander chutney as the richest course.

The 1500ml magnum format lets the 2018 vintage age more slowly. On the estate, biodynamics extends well beyond the vineyard: Tyrolean grey cattle graze between the rows, Myrtha Foradori tends the vegetable garden and farm market, and Elisabetta Foradori works in the estate's own cheese dairy.