I tasted a full flight of wines from their two whites, Athilia&Lighea, to their 3 reds, Sedara, Tancredi and Mille e unaNotte, finishing with their dessert wine, Ben Rye. My favorites from the tasting that I want to share with you are the two whites and the red Tancredi.
I chose both whites because they both had unique qualities. Anthilia is made of a grape indigenous to Sicily called Catarratto that has some Inzolia blended in. Inzolia is most similar to a chardonnay and is also known as ansonica in Tuscany. Catarratto is the most planted grape in Sicily and is only found there. It's best blended with other grapes as it is in Anthilia. This wine was crisp, juicy and fresh with a little saltiness and minerality on the lengthy finish. The Lighea is made of 100% Muscat of Alexandria, also known as moscatobianco or known in Sicily as Zibibbo. This wine had a florally, beautiful nose and was a dry, crisp style muscat. Very enjoyable!
For the reds I chose the Tancredi. This wine consisted of mostly nerod'avola and cabernet sauvignon, but also had 10% tannat, which is typically very austere and tannic. It was very structured with intensity and the cabernet lended nice body to the wine. It's aged 14 months in barriques and another 24 months in the bottle. A great wine to pair with some food.
I can't ever pass up a good dessert wine as well and Donnafugata makes the delicious Ben Rye made from the moscato, zibibbo, grapes on the island Pantelleria. This wine is made in the passito style where the grapes are dried to provide that deep concentration of fruit making for a very enjoyable, unctuous wine. Rich sweetness of honey and apricot. Need I say more?
Donnafugata's sustainability
One of the admirable qualities of Donnafugata is their focus on sustainability. One of the biggest actions they take part in is night harvesting. By harvesting their grapes at night they save 70% of their energy that is normally needed to cool off the grapes for fermentation. They also use a lot of solar panels for energy and their latest cellar is built underground for additional savings
By Jennifer Gentile Martin
12
Italian Wine: Donnafugata and the unique grapes of Sicily