The Wine: Volcanalia Ambarabà 2018
Volcanalia Ambarabà is a sparkling wine made from 100% Garganega. Soft pressing, spontaneous fermentation of the must in steel, maturation in concrete tanks, the addition of the must from dried Recioto grapes of the same vintage for the second fermentation, without addition of sulphites.
The Winery: Volcanalia
The four hectares of Garganega vines lie harmoniously between the provinces of Verona and Vicenza, in the last layers of the Lessini Mountains at about 300 meters above sea level. They are arranged in terraces on the edge of a small unspoiled valley above the village of Gambellara. The dense forest that embraces the vineyards has the great advantage of defending them from any undue contamination.
Volcanalia has the honor of owning the most historic vineyards rising on the black lava soil of Gambellara. Their age requires respectful and manual care. Work in the vineyard takes place without the use of modern machinery, manual work is our great strength. The only neighbors of the vineyard are roe deer, hares, and buzzards peeping out of the nearby woods. Clean, well-made natural wine.
The Region: Veneto
Veneto is one of the most important wine regions of Italy, located in the North-Eastern corner of the Italian peninsula. It borders with Trentino-Alto Adige (north), Friuli-Venezia Giulia (north-east), Emilia-Romagna (south), and Lombardy (west).
The capital of Veneto is Venice, which is also its most populous city, followed by Verona, Padua, Vicenza, Treviso, and Rovigo. The east coast of Lake Garda, the biggest Italian lake, is part of Veneto and so is the tract of Alpine foothills called Venetian Prealps.
Veneto is the leading Italian region for the quantity of wine produced – even though wine-producing regions such as Piedmont, Tuscany, Lombardy, Puglia, and Sicily all have bigger territories.
Some of its most famous wines are Amarone della Valpolicella, Valpolicella, Soave, and of course Prosecco. Other less known but equally delicious wines are Recioto della Valpolicella, Recioto di Gambellara, Raboso del Piave, and Bardolino.
Veneto’s main characteristic is perhaps the great variety of wine types produced, obtained mostly from indigenous grape varietals – Corvina, Glera, and Garganega being the most common.
This is due as much to its specific geography and climate as it is to rather peculiar winemaking techniques such as the grape drying technique employed to make Amarone della Valpolicella, Veneto’s most famous red wine.