Ronc Platat Nuvolaio Bianco 2024

The Land

The Colli Orientali are the last step the Julian Alps take down toward the Adriatic, and that position is the entire story of white wine from Friuli. Cold mountain air drains down the valleys at night, warm sea air pushes up in the afternoon, and the diurnal swing that results is what holds aromatics in place through a long, late ripening. The soil has its own name here: ponca, a crumbling alternation of marl and sandstone laid down when this was seabed. It holds water in a dry stretch, sheds it in a wet one, and gives Friulano and Malvasia a chalky grip. Ronc Platat works the southern end of the zone, under the hill of the Badia di Rosazzo, on north-facing sites chosen specifically because they ripen slowly.

The Wine

Nuvolaio Bianco is a Friuli white blend of Friulano, Malvasia and Sauvignon, with Ribolla Gialla joining in some vintages. Whole clusters go straight into a horizontal press, very softly, so there is no skin maceration and no extracted bitterness. Fermentation and ten months of aging both happen in stainless steel, which is a deliberate refusal: no oak, no new wood sweetness, nothing between the ponca and the glass. The wine sits at 13 percent. White peach, exotic fruit, citrus blossom and crushed garden herbs, then a lean, almost taut middle and a salty, mineral finish that lasts longer than the fruit does. 2024 was the wettest season on record in the Colli Orientali, 1,367 millimeters between April and October, concentrated in May, September and October, with a bone-dry August in between and a season averaging 20.1°C against a 18.9°C norm. Downy mildew pressure was relentless, and hillside vineyards came through it far better than valley sites.

The People

Tommaso Zanuttini was practicing law in Milan when he decided to go home to Friuli and make wine instead. He founded Ronc Platat in 2020 and learned the cellar under Serena Palazzolo and Christian Patat of Ronco del Gnemiz, about as good a white-wine apprenticeship as the region offers, and it shows: tension first, weight second. The name means hidden hill, for the position beneath the abbey at Rosazzo. He farms six hectares using biological methods and chases cool, north-facing parcels with old vines, where he says he can pull length out of fruit that would taste merely ripe somewhere warmer.

Food Pairing

This is a salinity-forward white, so start with raw fish. Sea bass crudo with olive oil, lemon and flaky salt is close to a perfect match, the wine's acidity standing in for a squeeze of citrus. Frico, the Friulian pan-crisped Montasio and potato cake, needs exactly this kind of cutting acidity against all that browned cheese. Grilled branzino with charred lemon and a handful of oregano picks up the herbal edge. Or prosciutto di San Daniele with ripe melon, where the wine's salt mirrors the ham's. Open it for the first warm evening of the year, when dinner is mostly a cutting board and someone is grilling.