Ermacora Friuli Colli Orientali Rîul Rosso with pizza
Monday night Gia Mia carry out pizza dinner with Alec, Vivianna and grand-daughters, I took a robust Italian Red Blend for a wine accompaniment that I had set aside in the cooler for such an occasion.
This is from the Friuli Colli Orientali D.O.C. in the Friuli-Venezia Giulia wine region in the northeastern most corner of Italy near the Slovenian border. Friuli-Venezia Giulia is best known for some of Italy’s best and most distinctive white wines. The styles of wines produced in this region of Italy's far north-east corner reflect the merging of cultures where Italian, Germanic and Slavic cultures converge.
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| Producer supplied vineyards map |
Often shortened to just “Friuli,” the area is divided into many distinct subzones, including Friuli Grave, Colli Orientali del Friuli, Collio Goriziano and Carso.
The most northerly subregion of the Friuli-Venezia Giulia, the Colli Orientali del Friuli (graciously referred to as COF) is also the largest wine producer of the three important DOC zones and ten subregions in Friuli, with 135 producers crafting nearly 2500 different wines.
The flat valley of Friuli Grave is responsible for a large proportion of the region’s wine production, particularly the approachable Pinot Grigio and the popular Prosecco. The best vineyard locations are primarily on the hillsides, as in Colli Orientali del Friuli or Collio. In general, Friuli boasts an ideal climate for viticulture, with warm sunny days and chilly nights, which allow grapes to ripen slowly and evenly.
Many varieties of wine grapes are grown in the Friuli Colli Orientali D.O.C., best known for great whites, but the area also grows and produces red wine varieties, which include the noble Bordeaux classics such as Merlot and Cabernet Sauvignon, but also includes numerous local varietals as well.
We featured another wine from the Venezia Giulia Appellation recently as part of the
Sepia Curated Wine Pairing Dinner in March. That dinner included Mitja Sirk Bianco Europea Friulano IGT 2022, featured in these pages, excerpted here.
That unique white wine, crafted from the Tocai Friulano grape, was also from the Venezia Giulia Appellation in the Friuli Region from the town of Cormons in Collio, Italy, in the extreme northeastern most corner of Italy, just a mile from the Slovenian border.
The major city or town of Friuli Venezia Giulia is the regional capital of Trieste. Until recently, Friuli Venezia Giulia was divided into four provinces, each named after its principal city, however, in 2018 the system changed whereby the provinces were replaced by a series of territories known as UTIs.The largest cities are the three former provincial capitals of Udine, Gorizia and Pordenone, along with the town of Monfalcone.
Mitja focused on the Fruilano grape, the traditional and most widely planted in Collio, prized for its aromatic delicacy pronounced mineral, floral, and sweet almond notes, with a distinctive note of bitterness at the finish.
WWII took a heavy toll on Collio. In the postwar period, Friuli rebuilt its economy based largely on wine, but it did not emerge as a source of notable wines until the late 1960s.
Ermacora Friulano del Friuli Colli Orientali Rîul Rosso 2014
This is produced by the small family-owned winery of brothers Dario and Luciano Ermacora, whose wines have been imported into the US since the 2001 vintage. Back then they were far better known in Italy, where they continuously garnered accolades from Italian wine pundit Gambero Rosso. Their wines sell out very quickly adhering to their motto: “Do little, in order to do better”.
This producer Ermacora produces a broad portolfio of wines include ten whites, eight reds, a sparkling wine and this red blend.
While Colli Orientali is best known for crisp, flavorful white wine made from indigenous varieities like Friulano (formerly known as Tocai Friulano), Ribolla gialla and Malvasia Istriana, red wines, though far less common here, can be quite good, especially when made from the deeply colored, rustic Refosco variety. Many of the classic international varieties like Merlot, Cabernet Sauvignon, and Cabernet Franc are also common.
They tend to be Loire-like in style with herbaceous character and mellow tannins, but Carso’s star grape is the red Teranno, notable for being rich in iron content and historically consumed for health purposes. It has an earthy, meaty profile and is often confused with the distinct variety Refosco.
The landscaped succession of terraced hills are protected by the Julian Pre-Alps and tempered by the Adriatic breezes, with climate moderating forests full of biodiversity, a vast variety of microclimates and vineyards are cultivated between 100 and 200 meters above sea level. The hillside ponca soils imput strong minerality, acidity and structure, conferred by temperature excursions.
The horseshoe-shaped region of eastern Friuli is referred to simply as Collio (“hills”), lying midway between the Julian Alps and the Adriatic Sea. The climate is classic Mediterranean, warm in summer, but, as a classic Alpine area, cold and wet in winter, which provides ideal conditions for the thin-skinned but early-ripening Friulano grapes.
Ermacora Friulano del Friuli Colli Orientali Rîul Rosso 2014
This is the only blend produced by Ermacora, composed of estate grown Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot and the local variant,
Refosco dal Peduncolo rosso.
Produced only in the best vintages, it is a blend of select best barriques and tonnaux produced as an interpretation of the famous Bordeaux blend (Merlot and Cabernet), but with a Friulian twist (Refosco), “A tribute to the masters beyond the Alps, but with roots in the territory”.
Winemaker’s Notes - “The three wines - Merlot, Cabernet and Refosco - that make up the blend are vinified separately until just before the Rîul is bottled. After destemming, we prepare the grapes for maceration in steel tanks with pumping over and punching down for a period varying between 10 and 12 days. The racking of the three red wines takes place in stainless steel containers where they complete, again separately, the alcoholic and malolactic fermentation and rest for a few months.’
“We then leave them to mature in small (barriques) and medium-sized (tonneaux) French oak barrels from the Allier forest for a minimum of 36 months. At the end, we choose the barrels that have shown the best evolution and we blend them. We bottle it and wait for a further refinement in glass lying down for a few months in conditioned rooms, then we put it on the market.”
Winemaker’s Tasting notes - “Ruby red, the aroma is elegant with pleasant hints of red fruit where black cherry, plum, and blueberries prevail, leaving room for notes of hay and hints of licorice to close with balsamic puffs. Soft and well structured on the palate with velvety tannins and an almost perfect correspondence between aromas and flavors. Very long finish.”
Bright ruby colored, medium bodied, vibrant expressive full round plum, cherry and berry fruits are accented with notes of liquorice, balsamic tones and cedar with soft velvety tannins on a tangy acidic finish.
I wrote back then, “This could likely improve with some further aging as it could benefit from some time to settle and should improve with a couple more years to achieve more balance and harmony as it reaches the apex of its drinking window, which clearly will be another decade or more. With our deep cellar, we'd normally hold a bottle like this for a while before consuming but we tried it now since it is available still at Binny's, our local wine super store so we can go get some more to replace this bottle and stock up some more, (even though we're in the highest level of the Long Shadows wine club and will be receiving some in our shipment allocation; but that will be the next 2016 vintage and we'll want to hold the '15, as it is birthyear of two grandkids, Reid and Jessie.).” 
