2023 Cantina Gallura, Vermentino di Gallura DOCG “Piras” Sardinia, Italy.
The bright and expressive 2023 version of Cantina Gallura Piras Vermentino is fabulous and has more charm and personality that the impressive 2020 I had last year and I highly recommend chasing some of this down, it is a great wine and awesome value. This vintage shows off some exotic tropical notes to go along with its classic vibrant fruit intensity and mineral tones, delivering a medium/full palate of apricot, citrusy tangerine, Kaffir lime along with saline infused stone and orange blossoms. Grown up at elevation with granite soils with a topsoil of coarse granitic sand. Cantina Gallura is llocated in the town of Tempio Pausania on the foothills of Mount Limbara. The picturesque setting in this remote area of Sardinia sees ancient white granite mountains shaped by the North wind, where almost only you find cork-oaks and grape vines, unchanged for hundreds of years. The clarity and precise detailing, as I have remarked on in previous reviews, make this Piras wonderfully compelling and while it only saw a couple of months of aging and lees contact in the cellar. This light straw/gold Vermentino di Gallura gains a pleasing viscosity in the glass and makes for a wine that can deliver flexibility in cuisine choices as well as being a confident Summer sipper. Vermentino di Gallura is Sardinia’s only DOCG appellation, so far, and covers the northern end of the island. It was DOC status from 1975 until September 1996, when it officially was granted the DOCG.
The Cantina Gallura, as noted in prior reviews, a co-op, founded in 1956, is located in Tempio Pausania, that currently has 160 producers contributing their grapes, at the foot of the Limbara Mountain in an area of Sardinia that has some conditions that feel like a continuation of the Dolomite Mountains with ancient granite based, sandy soils. While sunny here there are cool Mistral like breezes that give these wines an extra degree of complexity and balance, as this Piras Vermentino di Gallura shows. Cantina Gallura does quite a series of offerings, all terroir driven and made with traditional methods with stainless steel primary fermentations, in most cases, though some whites see a barrel fermentation, and mostly used barrel or cask aging to promote freshness and transparency. The wines of the Gallura have always been prized and now Vermentino di Gallura has a full DOCG, confirming to the world that this one of Italy’s top sites and guarantees an extra degree of quality. Interestingly Cantina Gallura does a sparkling version too, which I hope to try at some point, especially if I get a chance to visit this mysterious and historic island. The winery is mainly known for their 100% Vermentino bottlings, with this all stainless steel ferreted and aged Piras being a single cru effort, expressing the true nature of the place and the grape. Not a wine that we usually see in the states, sadly, but it is imported by Vinity Wines in California, and it is one that deserves a search for!
($22 Est.) 94 Points, grapelive