Monte Tondo

Azienda Agricola Monte Tondo sits on Via San Lorenzo in Soave and takes its name from one of the three hills, Monte Tenda, Monte Foscarino and Monte Tondo, that its site names as the starting point of the Magnabosco family's work (a fourth, Monte Gazzo, supplies the Soave DOC). The estate catalogue dates it to the early 1970s, when Aldo Magnabosco bought 3 ha of Garganega at the foot of Monte Tondo and built his house there; his son Gino joined at the end of that decade and built a larger cellar, and the third generation (Stefania, Luca and later Marta) came in during the mid-1990s, when the family also bought Valpolicella vineyards at Campiano in Cazzano di Tramigna. The US importer August Imports dates the founding to 1979 instead. Between 1985 and 2015 the estate acquired around 40 ha in Soave and Cazzano di Tramigna; the site today gives over 32 ha of vineyard in the Soave Classico zone and Valpolicella, which August Imports splits as 22 ha Soave Classico and 10 ha Valpolicella, naming Gino, Luca and Marta Magnabosco as winemakers with Nico Danese consulting. Whites are the core: the plain Soave Classico that the site ties to the Monte Tondo hill's clay loam and calcareous stones, Casette Foscarin (Soave Classico) and Foscarin Slavinus (Soave Superiore DOCG Classico) from basalt on Monte Foscarino, the Mito and Frog Soave DOCs, a Recioto di Soave, Charmat-method sparkling Soave and Recioto, a Garganega frizzante and metodo classico Garganega spumante, and a Lessini Durello Riserva metodo classico, plus Corvina, Valpolicella, Ripasso and Amarone from Campiano. The catalogue says that since 2009 the estate has produced its own clean energy, a figure it gives as 85 kw; back labels carry the Veganok logo and the SQNPI integrated-production mark, and August Imports describes the farming as organic but uncertified. The estate also runs an agriturismo with rooms and tastings.