In 2025, I was lucky enough to make it to the Balkans. My first trip there and I went with my friends at Holly’s Hill here in El Dorado County so it was a curated wine tour. My wife and I added on Vienna and (Ljubljana) Slovenia to our trip and so I was able to look into wines alone before the winery group segment. My biggest impression was how good the orange (or amber) wine was in Slovenia (specifically). I noticed after the full trip that Slovenia seems to take orange wine a little more seriously and with greater offerings after spending 2 weeks in neighboring Croatia. Croatia does orange wine as well, but Slovenia does it more broadly. In fact aside from Italy and France which both have orange wines, both Slovenia and Georgia seem to be hot spots for the amber or orange variety of vinification. Both these countries are worth looking into.
Simply put, orange wine is white wine grapes that have seen a good amount of skin contact making the wine amber or orange in color. The seeds of the grape also import color to the wine. These wines like all wines of a specific color can run the gamut from highly structured and even heavy with higher alcohol (~14%) and noticeable tannins, to lighter and sweeter. I always prefer the middle of the spectrum with the highest aromatics and complexity, that’s just me. Can orange wine from Slovenia offer highly complex and aromatic wines? Most definitely.
We had a wonderful experience with orange wine in Slovenia, and a bit in Zagreb Croatia as well. In fact I have a shipment of more Slovenian orange wine heading to my house now! What I notice in the Krasno and with other orange wines from Europe is that the lemon note is not the dominant or even common flavor. It tends to be more apricot, stone fruits and even some tropical notes over the classic citrus that many crisp white wines impart.
Is it easy to find European orange wine in America? Probably not, it is for the oenophile for sure, and finding it in the United States is a bit difficult. Below are some resources. You either need to go to a specialty online retailer like Flat Iron or Astor or have a wine shop in your area that knows the right importers that can get you these wines. If you are curious you should spend the time, and try these wines.
I am going to give you a recommendation here based on some tasting from a region of Slovenia that made the CNN list for most underrated wine regions, and that is Goriška Brda. This little region in the northwest corner of Slovenia is very close to Italy (which takes orange wine seriously as well). There are many hilly terraces here and they produce some of the best wines of Slovenia, including orange wines. This Krasno wine is one example. Krasno is a little hilltop village and wine area of Brda.
Give this area a look or something else from Slovenia (or Italy or Georgia) and see if you like this kind of wine. Slovenian wine is both mature and of excellent quality and they love all colors of wine in Slovenia but something very special is their orange variants.
If you want to get a little deeper on orange wine offerings and how they might taste and where to look you can go to Wine Folly’s orange wine page for a broader and deeper view. You will see Slovenia is represented right after Italy, and this topic is a deep one, and the regions from Italy, France, Slovenia, Croatia, and Georgia are some of the best regions to find this amber treasure. And in the United States the east coast and New York State specifically seems to have some orange wine culture developed. It takes a demand spectrum, and I would say California is not it. But other places are alive with orange wine.
Cheers!