A group of Italian wine makers got together in the early 1960's to find a way to raise the quality standards for Italian wines and classify regional wines. The goal was to give the consumer a way to gauge the quality of the wine and determine if it is made with a consistent quality and style. They created this 4 distinction system of ranking wines according to local wine making traditions.
VdT or Vino Da Tavola is considered the lowest class of wine in Italy and are table wine. This is wine created by the producer as they see fit to make it. Most of this wine is insipid, thin, weak, and acidic. The kind of wine that was sold in jugs. However, in the past there were also some spectacular Vini da Tavola, wines made by extremely good producers who decided to make something that didn't qualify for a superior status because of its composition or the way it was made. Because of laws in Italy almost all the quality wines that were once VdT are now IGT or wines that are produced in specific areas like
IGT or Indicazione Geografica Tipica - Typical of a local region wines. Most of these wines come from Tuscany. Cheap and great for everyday drinking with pasta or pizza, but not the type of wine that will knock your socks off. You can find some super Tuscan wines that are great, but most are still classed at the IGT level.
DOC or Denominazione di Origine Controllata - These wines convey a regional wine making style with specific grapes and the quality of the wine tends to be higher than Vdt and IGT. . Similar to the French AOC distinction, these wines are produced in specific rules and regions that are designed to preserve the traditional wine making practices. These wines also are more expensive than Vdt and IGT.
DOCG - here the "G" stands for Garantita. This is a wine that is guaranteed to follow specific wine making rules and where you will find some of Italy's best wines and most expensive. They require longer aging practices and require a tasting to obtain this distinction. The government actually will stamp the distinction along the side of the bottle/cork.
All this said, you may find you like a ITG or DOC over a DOCG, so get out there and start tasting now that we all better understand the classifications of Italian wines.
