Cantina Terlan Terlaner Classico Alto Adige 2022 (Half Bottle)

Description

This is the new name for the wine that has always been known as the Terlaner Clasico. A blend of mostly Pinot Bianco, then Sauvignon Blanc and Chardonnay. Aged in stainless steel. Notes of white flowers, fresh apples and not that high in acidity but a clear, mineral crystallinity. In the southern part of the Alto Adige is where they grow these French varieties that were brought to the region two hundred years go by the Napoleonic invasion. It is here that you find the greatest expressions of Pinot Bianco from anywhere in the world. While the main town of Bolzano, the capital of the region, is Italian the village of Terlan and the other winemaking villages are very German in character and history and supported by a German concept of making wine with the absence of oxygen.

Pinot Bianco is very similar to Chardonnay. Pinot Bianco is the backbone of the wine, Chardonnay brings the lushness and Sauvignon has the aromatics. You have the freshness of the German alpine climate, balanced by the the texture of the Italian Mediterranean so it has characters of both the mountains and the sea.

Up to 1992 the Cantina Terlan was run by the mythical winemaker Sebastian Stocker, considered the greatest white winemaker of Italy. He was a mountain man, always seen in his blue apron but he was never commercially minded despite managing to make a good living for the member-growers. After 1992 they had new people take over the Cantina who took the vinous treasures to the world and today Terlan is known as one of the very finest white wine producers in all of Italy.