2019 Ca' Dei Frati I Frati Lugana DOC Lombardy Italy 750 ml

This is the premier wine from the premier producer in a region that is only starting to gain traction outside of Italy, where it's a favorite at tables from Milan to Rome. As of right now, it’s an under-the-radar star—but with recent press from Wine Enthusiast and no doubt more to follow, we expect attention will start to shift… Among Wine Access members, it already has. 

We haven’t been able to keep the member-favorite I Frati Lugana in stock this year, with repeat orders coming in as fast as we can move bottles from Northern Italy to our shores. “This one hits it out of the park,” wrote one happy member. Another admitted, “I hadn't even finished the first bottle when I decided to buy more… This wine was an absolute treat.” 

For less than $20, you'll be hard-pressed to find a wine that offers so much of what you want, when what you want is a glass or three of delicious. 

The wine is made from the Turbiana grape, a local specialty in Lake Garda, in the Lugana appellation of Lombardy. Lemon-tinged and sea salt-tinted with silvery edges in the glass, it meets the gaze of a grilled branzino as lovingly as it lifts the region’s famed chestnut soup. 

Wine Enthusiast called its nose of spring flowers "delicately enticing." We found that the floral aromatics lead to a complex core of ultrabright candied citrus and apricot fruit, rounded out by a raw-almond creaminess that keeps the palate just rich enough to invite another take, and another. 

As much as we love Chablis and Sancerre, we also love finding killer wines from out-of-the-way places—ones that deliver that crisp, laser-focused quality in entirely new and surprising ways. The 2019 I Frati, from the foothills of the Italian Alps, is our latest must-have discovery for a mineral-driven, daily drinking white. It’s a lightning strike from out of the blue.

When we visited Lugana, we couldn't take our eyes off the medieval castles dotting the shoreline under towering granite cliffs. This is one of the most beautiful places on Earth. But that vivid beauty is only sublimated in Ca' dei Frati's flagship bottle, which lights up and expands in the glass.

The winery has stood for 80 years along the dramatic southern shores of Lake Garda, where Turbiana reigns supreme. For many decades, this grape was assumed to be part of the Trebbiano family. But more recent scientific studies have shown Turbiana, the new name for a grape long hidden in plain sight, to be a unique native variety. Locals say they knew all along, and based on what we’ve tried, we believe it. This is some secret sauce!

Ca’ dei Frati approaches the wine simply, in search of the greatest transparency to the land. The wine sees no malolactic fermentation, instead favoring the crystalline structure inherent in the grapes. And it’s aged on its fine lees in stainless steel, followed by two months in bottle, allowing a subtle richness to develop and lace through the zippy mineral-fresh finish. 

You'll want to go deep and lock in the incredible value of our case price while this wine is still under the radar. For under $20, this wine shines alongside village-level Chablis and goes toe-to-toe with the best Sauvignon Blancs on the market.