Trebbiano Toscano is a green grape from Italy, one of several Trebbiano varieties grown in Italy. In France, it is known as Ugni Blanc.

Characteristics
Trebbiano Tos­ca­no is char­ac­ter­i­sed by high aci­di­ty, low sug­ar and low on aro­mas.

This makes it a per­fect “work horse” as a blend­ing part­ner, con­tri­buting with vol­ume and aci­d­ty. It is often that it is used for adding these two char­ac­ter­is­tics also to red wine.

The grape’s char­ac­ter­i­stics also makes it an excellent base for distilling into spirit. Therefore, the majority of the grapes grown in France end up as Armagnac or Cognac.

Wines
Apart from Cognac and Armagnac, France’s Charente region produces also a delicious fortified wine called Pineu de Charentes.

In Italy is is mostly used for blending. If you want to try a dry varietal Trebbiano Toscano you should look for wines from the region Abruzzo or the area around the city of Orvieto.

Food pairing
High acidity and low sugar tells us that excellent food pairing with a dry varietal Trebbiano Toscano will be Oysters or fresh Goat Cheese. The wine is best served at 8-10°C/46-50°F.

A Pineu de Charente can be enjoyed with dessert cake or pie, or, perhaps even better, as it is, on its own. The wine is best served at 12-14°C/54-57°F.

Where is it grown?
Trebbiano Toscano is widely planted. The world-wide acreage is 110.786 ha/273,758 ac, a decrease with nineteen percent. Nevertheless, the decrease it is still the ninth most planted grape in the world.

The countries with the most plantings are France and Italy. In France, more than ninety percent are grown in Charente. The remaining acreage is divided between the regions South West, Provence, and southern Rhône.

In Italy, large plantings are reported from Apulia (6.179 ha/16,603 ac), Abruzzo (5.818 ha/14,377 ac), Tuscany (2.637 ha/6,516 ac), Lazio (2.425 ha/5,992 ac), Sicily 2.005 ha/4,954 ac), and Umbria (1.453 ha/3,590 ac).

  • France 83.445 ha/206,196 ac (a decrease of 8%), MPG 3, PTPA 10%
  • Italy 22.702 ha/56,099 ac (a decrease of 42%), MPG 5, PTPA 4%
  • Argentina 1.922 ha/4,749 ac (a decrease of 32%), MPG 19, PTPA 1%
  • Uruguay 762 ha/1,883 ac, MPG 4, PTPA 10%
  • Bulgaria 723 ha/1,787 ac (a decrease of 60%), MPG 14, PTPA 1%

Apart from the countries listed above, an additional eleven countries report plantings of the grape. They are (in order of decreasing acreage, starting at 297 ha/734 ac), Greece, Portugal, Croatia, Brazil, Australia, USA, South Africa, Russia, Spain, Romania, and Canada.

History
Trebbiano was documented as being widespread already more than four-hundred years ago, meaning that it has to be considerably older than this. Genetic testing has shown that the variety Trebbiano Toscano is a parent of other Trebbiano varieties. It is therefore likely that it was this variety that was documented. Otherwise, as it is very difficult to know which of the six or seven varieties that has been documented, neither will it, with certainty, be possible to assign an age to any of the other individual varieties.

Trebbiano Toscano is thought to be indigenous to Tuscany.