Slovenia Orange Wine
Josko Gravner visited Georgia in 2000, brought back clay qvevri, buried them in his cellar in Friuli, and reinvented winemaking. The Italian side of the border calls the grape Ribolla Gialla. The Slovenian side calls it Rebula. Same vine, same flysch soil, different countries forced onto them by the Cold War. In 1784, Emperor Joseph II decreed farmers could sell their own wine eight days a year — hang an ivy branch above the door. The osmice tradition survives. Aleš Kristančič at Movia disgorges sparkling wine at your table by inverting the bottle underwater — hydrostatic pressure pushes the yeast out.
A Wine Memories experience · winememories.fi
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The border between Italy and Slovenia runs through the middle of what used to be one wine culture — until politics tore it in half.
🍷 Log Memory📍 WHERE: The hillside above Šmartno village (Šmartno v Goriška Brda, coordinates 46.0058, 13.5557) — look west toward Italy from the village walls.
💡 WHAT: The rolling hills you see on both sides of the valley are the same. The soil is the same flysch — the 'Opoka' marl and sandstone that gives Rebula its mineral character. The grape is the same. But after WWII, the Iron Curtain cut directly through here, and the families on one side suddenly had different labels, different language, different country. In Italy it became Ribolla Gialla in the Collio DOC. In Slovenia it stayed Rebula in Goriška Brda. Same grape. Two identities. Seventy years of separation baked into the bottle. That's what you're drinking when you open a wine from here.
🎯 HOW: Walk up to the main lookout point inside Šmartno's fortified walls — the village was first documented in 1317 and the walls with five towers were built to repel Turkish raids. The Baroque church of St. Martin at the center is dedicated to the patron saint of winemakers. Stand at the walls and look west: those hills are technically Italy. The same winemakers' grandparents picked the same grapes on both sides. Ask any local winemaker about their Italian counterparts across the border — watch their face.
🔄 BACKUP: If you can't access Šmartno (rarely closed), any high point in Goriška Brda offers the same view. The ridge road between Šmartno and Medana gives an unobstructed panorama of both sides.
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Rebula was first documented in 1336 — a sales contract in the village of Višnjevik. For six centuries it was dismissed as provincial. Then the world discovered orange wine and everything changed.
🍷 Log Memory📍 WHERE: Vinoteka Brda, inside Dobrovo Castle (Grad Dobrovo, 5212 Dobrovo v Brdih). The tasting cellar occupies the original vaulted stone basement — the same cellar used by the counts who owned this castle when Rebula was first being documented in 1336.
💡 WHAT: On May 27, 1336, a man named Henrik of Rittersberg signed a sales contract in the village of Višnjevik for a vineyard producing six buckets of Rebula per year. That contract — 690 years ago — is the oldest documented mention of this grape anywhere on earth. For most of those centuries, nobody famous cared. Then Jancis Robinson declared Slovenia 'possibly the most unusual wine culture in the world, certainly in Europe.' Then the natural wine movement discovered what Gravner and Radikon were doing 10 minutes away. Suddenly every wine journalist in Europe wanted a bottle.
🎯 HOW: Ask for a tasting that includes at least one macerated/orange Rebula alongside a conventional Rebula — this comparison is the whole education. The tasting runs €12-15 per person and includes 5 wines with cheese and raisins. Staff will walk you through the difference. The orange version will be amber to deep gold in color and have structure a white wine 'shouldn't' have. Tell them you want to understand what skin contact actually does to the grape.
🔄 BACKUP: If the castle cellar is closed for maintenance (it has periodic closures — verify ahead at +386 5 331 01 44), the region's Klet Brda cooperative offers tastings at their facility just outside Dobrovo. Same wines, less dramatic setting.
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Movia's Puro sparkling wine is sold with the yeast still inside. To open it, a sommelier inverts it in a bowl of cold water and pops the cork — the pressure pushes the yeast out while the wine stays in. It's the only sparkling wine in the world that works this way.
🍷 Log Memory📍 WHERE: Movia winery, Ceglo 18, 5212 Dobrovo v Brdih. Open Monday–Saturday, 13:00–18:00. Phone: +386 5 395 95 10. The Kristančič family has farmed this exact land since 1820.
💡 WHAT: Aleš Kristančič is the 8th generation of his family to make wine here. His Puro is made from Chardonnay, Ribolla Gialla, and Pinot Noir — bottled without disgorgement, meaning the dead yeast cells (lees) that created the bubbles are still inside. For the Champagne method this is usually done at the winery before shipping; Aleš refuses. He says the yeast keeps the wine alive. To open the bottle, a sommelier stores it upside down for 24 hours, then submerges the neck in a large glass bowl of cold water and pops the cork. The hydrostatic pressure from the water is greater than the pressure in the bottle — the yeast plug shoots out, the wine stays in. Then it goes into Movia crystal glasses.
🎯 HOW: Call ahead to book a visit — walk-ins work during opening hours but the Puro ritual is best with advance notice. Ask specifically for the Puro tasting experience when you book. A standard visit with multiple wines runs approximately €20-35 per person depending on what you taste. While there, also ask about the Lunar — his macerated Ribolla Gialla, deep gold, long-aged, one of the most singular white wines in Europe.
🔄 BACKUP: If you can't visit in person, Movia Puro is exported internationally — but the underwater disgorgement ritual only happens in the cellar. The bottle purchased to take home will need disgorging yourself in a large bowl of ice water, which is an adventure in its own right.
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In 1784 Emperor Joseph II of Habsburg decreed that farmers could sell their excess wine for eight days a year. The tradition survives. The sign is still an ivy branch. No app will find them for you.
🍷 Log Memory📍 WHERE: The roads around the villages of the Vipava Valley, Karst region, and Goriška Brda hills. Spring and autumn are peak osmica season. The word 'osmica' comes from 'osem' — Slovenian for eight — those original eight days of permitted selling.
💡 WHAT: Osmice are not restaurants. They are farm families opening their courtyard for a few days at a time, pouring last year's wine alongside ham, salami, cheese, and eggs produced on the same property. No menu. No reservation. No sign except 'fraskas' — bundles of ivy or laurel branches tied to fence posts, gate pillars, and road intersections leading to the farm. You follow the branches until you find the farmhouse.
🎯 HOW: The best resource is winedineslovenia.com/osmice which maintains a map and calendar of active osmice. But the real method is to drive slowly on the country roads between villages and watch fence posts. When you see ivy tied to something, slow down and follow it. You'll typically find 3-4 locals already there, sitting in a farmyard, drinking from mismatched glasses, eating cured meats cut directly from the whole leg. A glass of Rebula or Terrano will cost €2-4. This is layer 3 Slovenia — what only people who live here know.
🔄 BACKUP: If osmice season is over or you can't find one, the wine bar inside Šmartno's walls serves local wines by the glass in the same spirit — informal, farmer-grown, without ceremony.
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Kabaj's 'Amfora' is what wine tasted like 6,000 years ago. Jean-Michel Morel — a Frenchman who married into a Slovenian winemaking family — traveled to Georgia in the 1990s and brought back the qvevri method. His wine spends 10-12 months fermenting on skins in 3,500-litre terracotta vessels buried in the ground.
🍷 Log Memory📍 WHERE: Kabaj winery, Šlovrenc 4, 5212 Dobrovo v Brdih (GPS: 46.00511, 13.51288). Book directly via kabaj.si. The estate also has a B&B if you want to wake up surrounded by vines.
💡 WHAT: Jean-Michel Morel is French. He came to Friuli to work a harvest. He met Katja Kabaj. He never left. In 1993 they made their first vintage together. Then he traveled to the Kakheti region of Georgia — where archaeologists believe wine was invented 6,000 years ago — and watched winemakers ferment white grapes on their skins for months in qvevri buried underground. He came home and did the same. His Amfora (a blend of Rebula, Malvasia, and Sauvignon) is hand-stirred up to 6 times daily for ten months in these buried jars, then aged another year in 2,000-3,000L French oak barrels, then another year in bottle. Three years total before it reaches you. Wine & Spirits magazine named Kabaj one of the 100 best wineries in the world — four times.
🎯 HOW: Email or call to book a cellar tour and tasting. Ask specifically to see the buried qvevri in the cellar floor — seeing 3,500-litre terracotta vessels disappearing into the earth, knowing the wine inside has been sitting there for nearly a year, is the moment this all makes sense. Tasting typically includes several wines across styles; expect €20-30 per person. Ask Jean-Michel about Georgia — his eyes light up.
🔄 BACKUP: If Kabaj is fully booked, Klinec winery in nearby Medana (klinec.si) offers a comparable biodynamic approach: 5th generation, 6 hectares, a terrace where you can see the Adriatic on clear days, and macerated Rebula with zero sulphur.
Tagged
- orange-wine
- natural-wine
- indigenous