Zenato Amarone della Valpolicella Classico DOCG 2020, Veneto

Zenato Amarone della Valpolicella Classico DOCG is the flagship red of this Lake Garda family estate, made from vineyards around Sant’Ambrogio di Valpolicella in the Classico zone. The blend is mostly Corvina Veronese, with Rondinella and a little Oseleta and Croatina, grown on stony, chalky-limestone slopes at 300 to 350 metres. After hand-picking, the bunches are laid out to dry for three to four months in the traditional appassimento way, concentrating sugars and flavour. The dried grapes are then fermented on their skins and the wine ages for around four years in large oak casks before further time in bottle.

The result is a powerful, opulent Amarone. Expect a red turning to garnet with age, and an intense nose of cherry, dried plum and fig, with tobacco, spice, leather and cocoa. The palate is warm, full and velvety, with firm tannins kept in check by good freshness, and a long finish of ripe fruit, spice and balsamic notes.

Pair Zenato Amarone with braised beef, roast game, slow-cooked lamb shanks or a wedge of aged Parmigiano or Monte Veronese. Serve at about 18°C, ideally decanted an hour ahead. It is drinking well now and will age gracefully for ten years or more.

Zenato’s story begins in 1960 at San Benedetto di Lugana, on the southern shore of Lake Garda, where Sergio Zenato and his wife Carla Prospero set out to show what this corner of the Veneto could do. Today their children, Nadia and Alberto, run the family estate from Peschiera del Garda, farming nearly a hundred hectares of vineyards across Lugana, Valpolicella and Bolgheri. The range is built on two pillars: crisp, characterful Lugana whites from the lakeside clay soils, and rich, generous Valpolicella reds from the chalky hillsides above Verona, crowned by Ripassa and Amarone. Sustainability matters here too, with the family following the Equalitas programme since 2021 and keeping bees on the Costalunga estate in Valpolicella.