2020 Zenato Lugana San Benedetto Veneto Italy 750 ml

Wine lovers have long flocked to the northern Italian region of Veneto to drink wildly popular Amarone and Valpolicella. 

We’ve long detoured west—to sip Italy’s great white wine secret.

Once under the radar of everyone but locals and Italian-wine buffs, Lugana wines are some of the most distinctive in Italy—mineral-rich stunners that Wine Enthusiast calls “some of the country’s premier white bottlings.”

Wine Enthusiast has called Zenato’s crisp San Benedetto bottling “quintessential Lugana,” and their 2020 earned an impressive 92-point score from James Suckling. Crafted from Trebbiano di Lugana—a cousin of Verdicchio that’s grown almost exclusively here in the foothills of the Italian Alps—it’s as pure and mineral as a mountain stream, delivering the same laser-focused quality we love in Chablis and Sancerre.

Lugana’s perfect climate for crisp white wine starts with Lake Garda, Italy’s largest lake. Zenato’s vineyards near its southern border benefit from near-constant winds that refresh vines late into harvest season, allowing the grapes to achieve beautiful ripeness and acidity. The area was once covered by an ancient glacier that blessed the clay-loam soils with calcareous elements and well-draining pebbles, giving the wines their distinctive saline minerality.

Founded 61 years ago, Zenato was an early champion of the region’s indigenous varieties, and those decades of expertise have delivered a gorgeous, supremely drinkable wine today. It’s lively and focused, with fresh lemon, green apple, and floral aromas preceding a palate that rides a wave of minerality and fresh acidity.