2016 Giorgio Zaglia Pinot Grigio Friuli DOC 750 ml

Friuli White Cellar-Stuffer

Of the many thousands of wines we collectively taste annually, the 2016 Giorgio Zaglia Pinot Grigio from Italy’s Friuli DOC earned our resounding praise, and one Master in the room even called it, “the best $15 Pinot Grigio I've ever tasted.” Drinking more like a $25-$30 Pinot Grigio that calls to mind Friuli legend Silvio Jermann’s round, ripe, tangy $30+ offerings, our own opinions were echoed by Wine Enthusiast’s “Importer of the Year”—the Master Sommelier Fan Kysela, who imports Zaglia. “I was in Italy this spring and met Dr. Giorgio Zaglia, and I couldn’t believe the quality of the wines,” he told us. Kysela compared this dry, full-bodied white to Jermann’s wines from “back in the day, but, at half the price,” which is to say—classically styled and beautifully crisp and dry with refined tangy citrus fruit laced with stony mineral undertones. Pinot Grigio like this doesn’t come around very often. And at $14.99 per bottle, this is a cellar-stuffer we highly recommend as a case-buy.

There’s good reason that Master Sommelier Fran Kysela boasts a great deal of admiration for today’s Pinot Grigio—it can be traced back to the purity of Dr. Zaglia’s fruit. Since taking the reins of the family winery in the mid-1980s, the doctor has employed winegrowing techniques that minimize environmental impact and maximize expression of Friuli’s inimitable microclimate.

Old-school methods like hand-harvesting are strictly enforced, yet he leaves plenty of room for modern innovation. Burgundy-esque techniques like temperature-controlled fermentation and the high-density planting of vines across the property’s 74 acres further enhance the wine’s depth.

These tactics provide the backbone of the 2016 Giorgio Zaglia Pinot Grigio; a refined expression of Friuli terroir packed with floral aromatics and nuanced earthiness. This is a label whose excellence makes its value even more remarkable.