Why it matters
The producer
Tenuta Marcati is the wine label of Gagliano Marcati, a Verona-province drinks company registered in Sona, in the hills west of Verona city. The label covers the main appellation ladder of Verona wine: a hillside white from the Custoza DOC south of Lake Garda, a traditional Valpolicella Superiore, a Ripasso, and an Amarone della Valpolicella DOCG at the top. A Prosecco Extra Dry rounds out the range.
The company behind the label did not begin in wine. It began in a pharmacy in 1919 and spent its first decades in spirits. Wine came later, built on a family business that had already survived wartime destruction and a postwar rebuild. The range covers five appellations and reaches more than 40 countries.
Place and vineyards
Where the wines begin
Verona sits at the western edge of the Veneto, where the Alps drop into the Po plain and the hills hold the climate in place long enough for grapes to dry. Two distinct wine zones define the Tenuta Marcati range.
Custoza DOC lies south of Lake Garda on low limestone and clay hills. The appellation is built around blended whites led by Garganega, the same grape that anchors Soave to the east. Here the blend runs Garganega, Trebbiano and Riesling, an unusual combination for the zone that adds a lifting aromatic thread to the more neutral Trebbiano base.
In the cellar
Vineyards and cellar
The Custoza DOC white is assembled from hillside plots in the Custoza area, selecting Garganega, Trebbiano and Riesling. Garganega provides the base; Riesling adds aromatic lift and acidity not typical of the appellation; Trebbiano contributes body and volume.
For the Amarone, Corvina and Rondinella bunches are harvested and then dried in ventilated rooms until late winter, a process called appassimento. The extended drying period loses around 30 to 40 percent of the grape weight to evaporation, concentrating sugars, phenolics and flavour compounds before fermentation begins. The wine then ages in oak barrels for at least two years, followed by bottle refinement before release.
Wines to know
The range in view
The range covers five appellations across two colour lines.
The Custoza DOC is a dry white from Garganega, Trebbiano and Riesling, drawn from hillside vineyards south of Lake Garda. The Riesling proportion is an atypical choice for the zone and pulls the wine toward a fresher, more aromatic profile than many Custoza blends.
A useful way in
A bottle to begin with
The Valpolicella Ripasso DOC is the bottle that shows what the Tenuta Marcati range is built around. It takes the Corvina and Rondinella base of the Valpolicella Superiore and runs it through a second fermentation on the unpressed skins left from Amarone production. Oak ageing for at least one year follows. The outcome is a wine with more colour, more tannin and a dried-fruit overlay over the fresh cherry core, without the full weight and concentration of the Amarone itself. It sits at the mid-point of the red range deliberately, demonstrating the ripasso technique in its clearest form.