Slatnik Bianco 2019 - Radikon - Venezia-Giulia, Italy 75cl

Radikon is the kind of he kind of producer about which chapters are devoted to in wine books, such is their influence on the wine world. Orange wine to be precise. 
 
The winery and vineyards are based in the ponca rich soils of the north-east Italian region of Venezia-Giulia, a hop skip and a jump from the Slovenian border. Their modern incarnation began in 1995 when Stanko Radikon began playing with extended skin maceration of the local Ribolla Gialla grapes. Taking a single 225 litre oak barrel and fermenting Ribolla on skins for a week  provided a revelatory experience for Stanko, who virtually overnight changed the estate’s production from classic, fresh white wines, to deep orange. ‘For years, it’s as if we were just making rosé from the grapes of Château Pétrus.’

The S-line (Slatnik, named after the vineyard where these grapes are grown) was introduced by Sasa, Radikon junior, in 2002 and is more in-line with the kind of wines made by his grandfather. The wine undergoes a 10 day maceration rather than the three months for the longer macerated orange and results in a slightly lighter, easier going orange wine with bracing acidity. 
 
The farming is organic with a bit of sulphur and copper in the vineyard and they eschew inoculated yeasts and eschew temperature control, instead relying on the thermal qualities of the subterranean cellar. All fermentation is carried out in large oak casks for four months and then transferred into old oak where the wine ages for 18 months (as opposed to four years).