It’s been a minute, but I’m back to blogging after a couple of weeks in Italy. Though I’ve been to the country before, this visit took me to the south. Primarily Sicily, where my great-grandfather fled from in the early 20th century due to a debt he owed the mob.
Because it’s Italy, we drank a fair amount of wine, even though we only had room in our itinerary for one full day of wine tasting. Incidentally, before I continue, if you’re ever in Sicily and have the opportunity to spend a day with a wine guide, work with Helen Bezane at Bespoke Wine Tours Sicily. Helen was incredibly knowledgeable about wine and had terrific relationships with the local producers.
Anyway, for those who are unfamiliar, Italy has a ridiculous amount of wine varieties, over 350 in fact, and most of them only exist there. The most famous one, of course, is Chianti, which comes from Italy’s most famous region, Tuscany. Side note: Chianti is based on the Sangiovese grape, which grows all over the country and has dozens of different names… for some reason.
Because of the confusing nature of the ridiculous number of Italian grapes and names, combined with my strong preference towards cool-weather grapes, I haven’t paid a lot of attention to southern Italian wines. I expected them to be like a lot of warm-weather varieties – heavier, less crisp, tasting more like jam, that kind of thing. It’s one of the reasons I’ve started edging away from California Pinot Noir as climate change continues to do its thing in the state.
So I was surprised when Helen introduced us to the wines of Alessandro Viola in the Trapani Province, which is on the hills overlooking the west coast of Sicily. We sat with Alessandro for a couple of hours.
Sicily’s biggest red grape is Nero d’Avola, a grape I’d heard of but didn’t know anything about. I was surprised to find a wine that tasted like a fuller-bodied Pinot Noir. Though the two grapes aren’t supposedly similar – at least according to Google’s AI – I found Nero to be more enjoyable than the overcooked Pinot that has come out of California the last couple of years. It has hints of black cherry with a bit of spice. Consequently, its tannins are slightly higher, but I find it balances well.
This is doubly surprising given that Sicily’s summers consistently go over 40 Celsius (104 F), and in its more desert-type regions, which aren’t all that far from Alessandro’s vineyard, have approached 50.
Our second stop of the day was with the Tonnino winery a bit further inland and down the side of the mountain. My favorite there was a white wine based on the Grillo grape. The fact that I’m mentioning Grillo at all is a testament to how quickly Sicilian wine is advancing in the fine wine market. Up until recently, Grillo, if you’d heard of it at all, was mostly known as a blending grape for Marsala wine (yep, the same stuff a lot of us cook with).
Like Nero d’Avola, I was surprised to find Grillo was crisp and fresh, also reminiscent of cooler weather grapes vs the warm weather feel I was expecting. It compares favorably to a cross between Pinot Gris and a cool-weather Chardonnay. It has minerality notes, with a mix of citrus and honeysuckle.
On a final note, let me share this: You can get some amazing deals on Sicilian wine in their grocery stores. Out of the half-dozen or so bottles we picked up for our AirBnB while we stayed there, none cost over five Euros, and all compared well to bottles that would cost around $20 in a similar US store.
So, let me sum up by saying – Sicilian wine is somewhat hard to find, but if you can, give it a whirl. Even if you’re a cold weather wine guy like me.