Orange Wine & Skin Contact White Wine

Orange wine is made from white wine grape varieties that have spent some maceration time in contact with the grape skins. It is commonly found in countries with very old wine making traditions such as Armenia and Georgia. More recently the technique has become popular in certain areas of Europe in particular Friuli in Italy. The pioneer of these wines in the region was Josko Gravner and prominent exponents today include Radikon, Skerk and Vodopivec.

Orange wines are becoming increasingly popular as they offer a half way house between red and white and display an intriguing array of flavours and nuances. Orange wines also tend to have a mature savoury element to them which makes them fantastic partners for food.

An entry point into orange wine would be the Slatnik from Radikon, a wine made made with 10 days skin contact. More extreme versions are Biancospino from Fonterenza, Ograde from Skerk and the Ribolla Gialla from Radikon which spent 3 months on the skins.