Contrada C 2018

Description

Still red wine Terre Siciliane IGT, 13% ABV, produced by Passopisciaro (Vini Franchetti). 100% Nerello Mascalese. 0.75 l bottle, 2018 vintage. A wine made on the slopes of Etna, in Contrada C, from grapes grown at 550 meters above sea level. Aged for 15 days in steel tanks, malolactic fermentation in large oak barrels for approximately 18 months. Intense array of fruity and spicy aromas with notes of undergrowth and white pepper. Ruby red in color. Savory, expansive, and persistent, a wine that expresses the power of the volcano.

Details

Perfume

Intense range of fruity and spicy scents with notes of underbrush and white pepper.

Color

Ruby red.

Taste

Savoury, expansive and persistent.

Serve at:

16 - 18 °C.

Longevity:

10 - 15 years

Decanting time:

1 hour

Producer

Producer

Passopisciaro (Vini Franchetti)

From this winery

• Start up year: 2000
• Oenologist: Andrea Franchetti
• Bottles produced: 90.000
• Hectares: 27

“Volcanoes are gloomy places, and when I arrived, Mt. Etna was even gloomier because it was an abandoned volcano. Wineries lay collapsed all over its slopes; stonewalled terraces disappeared everywhere up the mountain in the bushes. There was the misery of blackened streets and ashen churches in large old towns. These were the feelings I had in the winter of 2000 when I first came to Etna. It seemed crazy to restore vineyards so high up the mountain – above, it was erupting – but I liked that they were planted so high.

At the top of the steep Passopisciaro property looms a hump of black gravel. It’s where the lava spill from a big eruption in 1947 had stopped, caking up just before it could submerge whole terraces below it, vines, walls, and buildings: on Etna you can lose it all.

Here, it’s always very cold at night, even in August. During the day in the vineyards the lava powder penetrates in the skin and you get intoxicated, tired. The first wine I made was pale and meager, and I was discouraged. I planted other grapes; whatever is planted there the wine always tastes of citrus and camphor, without that generous body that you like earth to lend right away to a wine.

There’s no mold, no moss; the ground sparkles black like the night; the wine slowly becomes very elegant and strange. During the day a soft light penetrates everything and then there are starry nights; Etna has enormous poetry. Making wine, you have access to it. There isn’t Mother Nature here. You are conducting your viticulture on stuff that comes out of the terrible below.” (Andrea Franchetti) Read more

Sicily

Technical Sheet

Name	Passopisciaro Contrada C 2018
Type	Red green still
Denomination	Terre Siciliane IGT
Vintage	2018
Size	0,75 l
Alcohol content	13.0% by volume
Grape varieties	100% Nerello Mascalese
Country	Italy
Region	Sicily
Vendor	Passopisciaro (Vini Franchetti)
Origin	Castiglione di Sicilia (CT)
Climate	Altitude 550 m. a.s.l.
Plants per hectare	8000 plants per hectare
Yield per hectare	30.7 hl/ha
Wine making	15 days in steel vats. Malolactic fermentation: in large oak casks.
Aging	In large oak barrels for about 18 months.
Allergens	Contains sulphites