Emilia Romagna

Emilia Romagna runs across the top of the Italian peninsula, south of the Po River, from the Adriatic Sea almost to the west coast. Its capital and largest city is Bologna. Tourists know Emilia Romagna as a food mecca, including the cities of Bologna, Modena, Reggio Emilia, and Parma. In the wine world, Emilia Romagna is best known for the once wildly popular fizzy red wines made from Lambrusco, which are making a strong comeback. It has 2 DOCGs, 19 DOCs and 9 IGPs. In 2017, bad weather hit Emilia Romagna hard, reducing its wine production by a million and a half hectoliters (22.5%) to less than 5.5 million hl (60.6 million cases), though it remained the third largest producer of any Italian region (after Puglia and Veneto). The region’s primary grape varieties are Trebbiano (30%), Lambrusco (18%), and Sangiovese (16%).