As we drive through small vineyards dotted with small and large homes in Lombardy’s Lugana DOC beside large glacial Lake Garda, we suddenly and surprisingly arrive at Cantina Ottella which looks more like a Frank Lloyd Wright home complete with modern sculptures on manicured lawns and beautiful, colorful vines than a contemporary winery with productive vineyards.

This is dictated both by history and by design: Cantina Ottella is where Lugana DOC began and where “wine, art, nature and culture come together in perfect harmony, creating emotions that touch the heart.”  No wonder the vineyards and the landscape seemed more ornamental than practical!

We learned that the name Ottella is historic: around 1500,  octuplets were born; hence the name and their coat of arms featuring the faces of the eight babies.

The Montrosor family has owned and farmed this land producing Lugana wine for over 100 years and for four generations. In 1964, Lodovico Montrosor, a wine entrepreneur and a passionate art collector, worked for three years with Professor Michele Vescia of the University of Brescia to create the Lugana designation of origin. In the mid-1980s, Lodovico’s son Francesco, a lawyer, joined his father, and in 1993, son Michele became involved. 

The Cantina Ottella facility is a work of art inside and out, with the elements of winemaking beautifully showcased and lit.

The aesthetic environment is such an important part of the experience that even the bottling line has natural light with windows looking toward a green garden.

Even visitors become one with the art!

The lighting at Cantina Ottella is not only luminous but lovely. The barrel room features a 2018 installation by artist Julia Bornefeld called “Golden Drop.”

The tasting room is also beautifully lit, and I fell in love with the colorful grape like glass balls that descended from the ceiling:

In the tasting room beside the large windows, we enjoyed a late lunch of several courses paired with Ottella Lugana DOC wines…

…with a standout course being a huge ball of mozzarella served simply with delicious local olive oil.

Read more about Lombardy wines and one Lugana in particular in the invite to write, and read about visits to two Lugana wineries in the preview here. Find more articles about Lombardy by my fellow Italian Food Wine Travel writers below.

Wine from Lugana DOC Lombardy

• 2021 Ottella Back to Silence, Lugana DOC, Lombardy

Menu 

• Charcuterie Board 
  Meats: fennel salami, spicy salami, truffled proscuitto, plus salt cured olives
  Soft cheeses: Gorgonzola, plus Monte Trento Tartuffo and pepper flake cheeses 
  Hard Cheeses: Pecorino, Aged Peccorino, Parmisano Reggiano
• Pasta
  Sue’s homemade pumpkin ravioli 
• Salad 
  Spiced pecans, spring greens, roasted beets, baked lemon ricotta cheese 
• Game
  Duck quarters braised in citrus, herbs, and garlic 

2021 Ottella Back to Silence, Lugana DOC, Lombardy

ABV: 13%
SRP: 
Grapes: Turbiana (Trebbiano di Lugana)
Importer: Vias Wine
purchased at a discount at the winery; not available in the US

Appearance:  Golden, gold, gold and more glorious gold. 

Aroma: Pollen, honey, mead, apricot syrup, fennel, pennyroyal, chamomile, amber,

Palate: Very tart, bright acidity, lemon, white flower, clove oil finish, orange, rose water, a bit of effervescence when first poured and it diminishes as it sits in the glass. , complexity increases as it sits in a glass, cherry essence, eucalyptus, 

Pairing: Hard Italian cheeses are so nice with the wine. The wine makes the cheese creamier and brings out a toasted nutty flavor, the cheese makes the wine creamier and together there is a caramel flavor It was alright with the Tartuffo and Spicy Italian cheese, but they were creamier and the wine really did better with the hard Italian cheeses.

Of the two salami on our plate it loved the spices in one of the salami and the fennel in the other, fantastic with the truffled proscuitto, lovely with the gorgonzola which I was reticent to try until Sue reminded me of how well Roussane and a good blue cheese go together; this is very much the same surprise.

I liked our salad best with this wine as the wine has rich complex flavors as does the salad. The kick in the pecans in the salad sends the wine over the top. Both have texture and depth to highlight each other.

The ravioli is so fabulous with the wine and the wine really loves the spice and fennel in the Ventura Meat Market house made Italian sausage; you definitely get what you pay for and this house made sausage is significantly more flavorful than the kind you might find at the supermarket.

As fabulous as this pairing was, the rich braised duck was even better, and I was in heaven. 

Join us in Lombardy this month! 

• On Wine Travels with Dr. Sharon you’ll find“Lombardy’s Oltrepò Pavese wines and stories of the women behind them” 
• Susannah Gold shares “Mountain Wine from the Valcamonica, A New Discovery” on Avvinare.com
• Camilla Mann says “‘Ci Vediamo Presto!’ with a Franciacorta Sparkler + a Favorite Brinner” on Culinary Cam 
• Robin Bell Renken shares “Moscato di Scanzo and the Pharmacist’s Daughter” on  Crushed Grape Chronicles
• Wendy Klik has “La Pappardella Croatina served with the Pasta for which it is named” on A Day In The Life on the Farm

• Here on Wine Predator, we are “Getting Back to Silence with Otella’s Amphora Wine from Lugana DOC” 

As I just completed a 12 week, late start full time teaching gig at Ventura College, I am looking forward to “getting back to silence”– and getting lots of great writing done about the past years travels to Italy twice, Portugal, and more.

Happy holidays!