Fetească albă
The style profiled here is a dry, light-bodied white Fetească albă wine: delicate, floral, apricot, soft. Typical alcohol is 11.5 to 13%. Serve it at 8 to 10 °C.
Also called Păsărească, Vărătic, Leányka, Mädchentraube.
The grape
Fetească albă is the older half of the Fetească pair, and the ancestor rather than the descendant: it is one parent of Fetească regală. Its name means the white maiden. It has been grown in Romania and Moldova for centuries, and it is one of the varieties that gives the region its own identity rather than a borrowed French one.
The wine is delicate and floral, with white peach, acacia and a soft, almost creamy texture. Its acidity is lower than that of Fetească regală, which is precisely why the younger crossing overtook it in plantings: in a hot vintage Fetească albă can go soft and broad while its offspring stays fresh.
That makes site selection the whole game. Grown at altitude in Transylvania or in the cooler Moldavian hills it is perfumed and balanced, and it also makes convincing off dry and sweet wines, because it takes botrytis well. Grown on the hot plain it flattens out. Cotnari, the historic sweet wine of Romania, uses it alongside Grasă de Cotnari.
BuyingPrefer a cool site: Transylvania or the Moldavian hills. If you like a floral white with softer acidity, this is the Romanian grape to start with, and the sweet Cotnari bottlings are the region's great old wine.
Style profile
Our rating of a representative wine- Sweetness
- Dry
- Body
- Light
- Tannin
- Very low
- Acidity
- Medium
Sweetness and structure vary with the producer, region and winemaking. These ratings describe the style above; check the label for the bottle in front of you.
Food pairings
Planting snapshot
2015 observations, OIV 2017 study- Romania
- about 12,000 ha (2015)
Historical, rounded figures, including all uses of the grape. OIV’s variety study covers 75% of world vineyard area. A country absent from this table may still grow this grape.
Countries that build on it
Similar grapes
Sources
- Facts: Wikipedia, Fetească albă (CC BY-SA 4.0) and Wikidata Q600463 (CC0).
- Variety record: Vitis International Variety Catalogue, VIVC 4119.
- Style profile, pairings and serving figures are our own assessment.
- Planting observations: OIV, Distribution of the world's grapevine varieties (2017).