Lazio is best known for its capital city, Rome — and by any measure, that’s already quite a calling card. Yet wine drinkers, even savvy ones, still tend to walk right past Lazio’s bottles on their way to the Tuscany and Piedmont sections. That’s a mistake, and one BevX has been trying to correct for years.
Rome and its surrounding region hold plenty of the world’s great treasures, but Lazio is also one of Italy’s more consequential wine producers, quietly so. Only four regions — Tuscany, Piedmont, Veneto, and Puglia — claim more DOC and DOCG appellations. Even in antiquity, when Rome imported wine from every corner of its empire, the hills just outside the city walls were already supplying wines with a real reputation. They still are.
Today, Lazio holds 27 DOCs and three DOCGs: a dry white, a serious red, and a sweet dessert wine. Most of the good stuff clusters in the hills ringing Rome and in the provinces to the north and south. Volcanic soils do the heavy lifting in central Lazio, where ancient eruptions built the Colli Albani and the rest of the hill country that now holds the region’s best vineyard sites. Head north, and the geology turns more mixed. Head south, and hills, volcanic ground, and the Tyrrhenian Sea all share the credit.
Frascati and the Revival of Lazio’s Whites
White wine has always been Lazio’s calling card — and for a long time, that was the problem. Frascati and Orvieto (the latter a DOC shared with neighboring Umbria) found easy export markets because they were cheap, broadly likable, and almost never memorable. Neither showed much of what Lazio’s vineyards can actually do.
That has changed, and it didn’t happen by accident.
Frascati makes the case best. The appellation sits just southeast of Rome on the volcanic hills of the Colli Albani, where elevation, well-drained volcanic soil, and a Mediterranean breeze do the grapes real favors. For too long, the wines leaned hard on high-yielding Trebbiano, with local Malvasia brought in only to add a little perfume around the edges. Better growers have since cut yields, chosen sites with more care, and put Malvasia back where it belongs — front and center.
Two Malvasias matter most here. Malvasia Bianca di Candia brings fragrance and body. Malvasia del Lazio — also called Malvasia Puntinata — delivers sharper aromatics and real varietal character. In the right hands, the wines no longer taste like anonymous café white. They’re fresh and mineral, laced with citrus, stone fruit, and floral notes, with enough texture to sit at the table rather than just precede it.
The quality tiers are officially spelled out. Frascati DOC is the broad, everyday denomination. Frascati Superiore DOCG is reserved for wines held to tighter production rules — and it shows. Cannellino di Frascati DOCG is a different wine altogether: a sweet white made from at least 70% Malvasia, picked riper, with concentrated flavor that the volcanic hills and naturally high acidity keep from turning cloying. The best examples are genuinely fine dessert wines, and in my view, they deserve far more attention outside Italy than they get.
Cesanese: Lazio’s Red-Wine Ace
Lazio’s white-wine reputation has long overshadowed its reds, which is a shame, because the region has a serious indigenous grape in Cesanese. The name covers a family of related varieties — chiefly Cesanese di Affile and Cesanese Comune — and the resulting wines range from easy, fruit-forward pours to structured bottles built for the cellar.
The grape thrives in the hills east and southeast of Rome, where altitude and day-night temperature swings preserve acidity even as the fruit ripens fully. Expect dark cherry and plum, violet, herbs, spice, and earth, often wrapped in firm tannins that soften nicely with age.
For years, Cesanese suffered the fate of too many Italian natives: too much volume, not nearly enough vineyard care. That’s changing. Better plant material, lower yields, smarter canopy management, later and cleaner picking, and more careful cellar work have finally let the grape show what it can do.
Cesanese del Piglio DOCG is the benchmark, and for good reason. Around Piglio and the neighboring communes in the province of Frosinone, the grape’s structure, acidity, and perfume come through with real clarity. Riserva bottlings, given extra aging, pick up depth and savory complexity that reward the wait. Cesanese di Affile DOC is a much smaller appellation but increasingly worth hunting down — Affile can be especially distinctive, and its Riserva is where the grape looks most serious. (For more, see our story on Cesanese.)
Lazio — Beyond Frascati and Cesanese
The indigenous story doesn’t stop there. Lazio keeps a deep bench of local varieties and small appellations that remain nearly invisible outside Italy — which, frankly, is part of the appeal.
Bellone is one of the more interesting whites in the mix. Long associated with coastal and southern Lazio, particularly around Anzio and the Castelli Romani, it can show ripe citrus and orchard fruit with a mineral or saline edge. It’s finally being treated as a grape worth bottling on its own terms, not just another blender. Greco turns up in several Lazio appellations too, though don’t confuse it with Campania’s better-known Greco — different grape, different story. Moscato di Terracina is another local specialty, capable of both dry, aromatic whites and sweeter styles, and it’s tightly bound to the coastline around Terracina.
The coast does real work here. Vineyards run along the Tyrrhenian and climb inland from there. Warm maritime sites suit grapes that crave heat; cooler, higher ground preserves acidity and perfume. Nero Buono, centered around Cori, is another red worth keeping an eye on. And Est! Est!! Est!!! di Montefiascone remains the region’s most famous name joke — and, in the right producer’s hands, a considerably better white than its punchline reputation suggests.
Volcanic Hills and the Roman Landscape
The most underappreciated fact about Lazio wine is the ground itself. Ancient volcanic activity shaped the hills around Rome, and the Colli Albani, southeast of the city, are the remnants of a large volcanic complex that blanketed the countryside in ash, tuff, pumice, and related material.
Those soils drain well, hold just enough moisture, and give Frascati and the wines of the Castelli Romani their snap and mineral line. Altitude adds another edge as vineyards climb off the warmer plains below. Proximity to one of Europe’s great cities hasn’t hurt serious viticulture here — if anything, it built it. Vineyards fed Rome for centuries, and the wines of the surrounding hills became part of the city’s food and culture long before “wine tourism” was a phrase anyone needed.
Why Lazio Matters
Lazio is no longer a source of cheap white and little else. Frascati has recovered its nerve. Cesanese is becoming a red of genuine personality. Bellone, Moscato di Terracina, Nero Buono, and a scatter of small DOCs round out a picture that export markets barely know exists. For drinkers willing to look past Italy’s usual suspects, Lazio offers something rare: wines with a direct line to the landscape around one of the world’s great cities.
Rome gets the postcards. Lazio deserves the glass.
Permitted grapes include:
White – Malvasia, Trebbiano, and Bellone
Red – Cesanese, Ciliegiolo, Montepulciano, Nero Buono, Sangiovese.
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Lazio Appellations
Aleatico di Gradoli – Red and Sweet wines are made here primarily with Aleatico.
Aprilia – White, Red, Rosé, and Sparkling NA wines are made here.
Atina – White and Red wines are made here.
Bianco Capena – White wines are made here.
Cannellino di Frascati DOCG – Sweet wines are made here primarily with Malvasia.
Castelli Romani – White, Red, and Rosé wines are made here.
Cerveteri – White, Red, and Rosé wines are made here.
Cesanese del Piglio DOCG – Red wines are made here primarily with Cesanese.
Cesanese di Affile – Red wines are made here primarily with Cesanese.
Cesanese di Olevano Romano – Red wines are made here primarily with Cesanese.
Circeo – White, Red, , Sparkling, and Rosé wines are made here.
Colli Albani – White and Sparkling wines are made here primarily with Malvasia.
Colli della Sabina – White and Red wines are made here.
Colli Etruschi Viterbesi – White, Red, Sweet, and Rosé wines are made here.
Colli Lanuvini – Red, White, and Sparkling wines are made here.
Cori – White and Red wines are made here.
Est!Est!!Est!!! di Montefiascone – White and Sparkling wines are made here primarily with Trebbiano.
Frascati – White and Sparkling wines are made here primarily with Malvasia.
Frascati Superiore DOCG – White wines are made here primarily with Malvasia.
Genazzano – White and Red wines are made here.
IGP Anagni – White and Red wines are made here.
IGP Civitella d’Agliano – White, Red, and Rosé wines are made here.
IGP Colli Cimini – White, Red, Sweet, and Rosé wines are made here.
IGP Costa Etrusco Romana – White and Red wines are made here.
IGP del Frusinate – White, Red, Sweet, and Rosé wines are made here.
IGP Lazio – White, Red, Sparkling, Sweet, and Rosé wines are made here.
IGP Passerina del Frusinate – White, Red, and Rosé wines are made here.
Marino – Sparkling and Sweet wines are made here primarily with Malvasia.
Montecompatri-Colonna – White wines are made here primarily with Malvasia.
Moscato di Terracina – White wines are made here primarily with Moscato.
Nettuno – White, Red, and Rosé wines are made here.
Orvieto – White and Sweet wines are made here primarily with Grechetto.
Roma – White, Red, Sparkling, and Rosé wines are made here.
Tarquinia – White, Red, and Rosé wines are made here.
Terracina – White and Sparkling wines are made here primarily with Moscato.
Velletri – White, Red, and Sparkling wines are made here.
Vignanello – White, Red, and Sparkling wines are made here.
Zagarolo – White wines are made here primarily with Malvasia.
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