Good Afternoon: Thanks for another very good article. Tried the $27 Benanti last night with ratatouille. Surprisingly, the Etna Bianco did not get overwhelmed and complemented the dish very nicely. Worth sticking a few bottles in the cellar.
Dear Eric, thanks for the great report on this great grape varietal, but one detail: when I googled Cusumanos Alta Mora Bianco, I found it (in the wine-searcher) at 16,- Dollars - not 58,- as suggested in the article?
This is great value for this delicious wine...
@alexander
yes – this is a mistake. around 14€ here in europe (outside italy). this should make it best value for money in this group.
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I wonder though why the wines are “purchased retail” from distributors instead of wine shops. I looked for the top two on this list and none were being sold anywhere in New York. One is not sold in the US according to wine-searcher. Too bad because I would love to try them.
@Dana Lumetta
I beg to differ, Dana. It is illegal for NY wholesalers to sell to anyone who does not have a license to purchase wine. I doubt that the NYTimes has such a license. If they were purchased, it was at retail wine shops.
Not every retailer participates in wine-searcher. Most don't
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The “Big Island” of Hawaii has a winery near the summit of the active shield volcano Kīlauea. Worth stopping by and won’t break the bank. Aloha!
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Sorry to spoil your pleasure, but the judgement of medical research is that ‘any’ amount of alcohol is unhealthy. Read about dementia & Alzheimer’s if you’re lucky enough to live to old age. That’ll frighten you onto the wagon. I stick to coffee.
@JGSD
Why are you even reading this article if that is your view.?Wine has been a valuable element of a well lived life for millenia. Sooner or later "medical research" will catch on to the benefits.
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Guys, mind if I restrict this post discussion to quality/price/value?
These Sicilian whites are largely from very small producers who are pricing their wines to the export sommelier market. $90 dollars for a carricante? Please.
There are good carricante blends in the U. S. market for under $20. But you have to sniff them out like a truffle-pig to find them. May I suggest the next Italian island wine region that seems headed for traction in the U.S. market? The island of Salina, off the Campana coast.
It's whites deliver the same floral, herbal, saline taste profile as Sicily (Malavasia; rather than Carracante), but at prices far less. Unfortunately, every time the NYT wine panel covers a region prices climb like summer temperatures. Cheers!
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@Thomas Molitor Just to be exact, Salina is an eolian island off of Sicily (in front of Messina), nowhere near Campania - which is the region where Naples is. Off of Campania are different islands: Ischia, Ventotene, Ponza and the most famous of all: Capri.
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@Thomas Molitor
DM is correct: Salina is one of the *Aeolian* islands, not far off Sicily's northern coast. Another Aeolian island is more well know: Stromboli, which is also the name of the famous film made there, which brought together Ingrid Bergman and Roberto Rossellini.
These islands are volcanic (Stromboli and Vulcano have active volcanoes) which probably accounts for the flavor profile of Salina's wines
I don't drink $90 bottles of wine but that does not mean I don't want to know about them. Often, I read or hear about these wines and try to find other bottles from the region and/or of the same varietal if so interested and that usually works out wonderfully. If you are a follower of the wine articles in the NYT, you'll know a few things. The first is they often write pieces about affordable, and usually accessible wines as well as expensive and esoteric wines-a good journalist does covers the entire story. The second is wine (domestic and imported) is expensive in the States for a whole lot of reasons so if you are into it, you pay the price and do the work to find them even if it means educating your local wine shop. The third is that if you travel overseas, you can find these wines or others like them in those countries which is great, especially if you can visit them, and cheaper there too. Lastly, check out Wine School in the Times. I first discovered these white Sicilian wines in one of the lessons and now love them and have sought out other Italian whites from different regions because of it, something I did not think I was at all interested in until exposed to them, they are now my favorite whites.
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Thanks for an interesting article, Eric. We will be going to Sicilia in September and will be sure to try some of these interesting “salty” wines!
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When asking perhaps the largest wine seller in the Chicago area about these wines they look at you as if you had three heads.
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When I am in the area I stop by Jerry's,a wine shop in Englewood,NJ that carries wines from every region of Italy.They have a large selection of Etna wines including Benanti and Terre Nere.Ask Michele for recommendations.He's a true encyclopedia on Italian wines in general
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Hey, hey- let's give Eric a break. His job is to report about interesting, sometimes unique or unusual wines. That is what he did here- and well. I have been to Sicily 5 of the last 6years- and going again in September. I can assure you that there wines will be way less expensive there. When a few years ago I visited one of the Planeta wineries in Sicily and bought a case the shipping was nearly $15 per bottle as I recall. So there are cost factors here- shipping and the relative unavailability of these fine wines. That doesn't make them any less interesting to write or read about- perhaps dream about. What I did after reading the article was to email my local shop to see what Etna Biancos they had and at what prices. They didn't have these particular bottles, and what they had was a bit pricey. But after reading this fine article, and perhaps not wanting to wait till September since this hot summer is perfect for this wine, I might buy one and enjoy it. So chill folks- and of course yes, there are less expensive wines to drink from our favorite shops. Enjoy!
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Here we go again with wine recommendations that are unnecessarily expensive. Our creative little local wine shop recently marketed a quartet of delightful, unusual summer-drinking wines in a customized cardboard carrier for $44. Every day, the owner is offering something interesting for under $20 and often far less.
It’s easy to drink well on an expense account. It’s far more interesting and satisfying to do so on a budget.
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@Lichef, In these wines that you buy, can you taste the salty ocean breeze, the volcanic minerality? Can the grapes be identified and compared to another? Eric's column is written for people who, no matter their current wine knowledge, would like to expand it.
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@Rob D Yes, you’d be surprised at how interesting some of these inexpensive wines can be. And I’m not talkin’ Kendall-Jackson here, but a well-curated selection from some more obscure parts of the winemaking world. It’s a lot harder to expand your horizons at $11 a bottle than at $90, but some of us enjoy the challenge and may find that exercise much more satisfying than, say, popping open the $4500 Petrus that languishes in my cellar.
Eric is usually discussing $25 to $50 bottles, not collectibles such as the Petrus you referenced. I believe he walks a moderate path not an extravagant one.
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These prices are ridiculous for a just now evolving wine that is showing promise but only some accomplishment. For some of those prices you can get futures of top rated Bordeaux and other truly and dependably outstanding wines. This kind of experimentation is only for the wealthy who can throw away $50 or $90 on the off chance they’ll get a pleasant wine. For under $25 you can get a dependably fine Italian white, e.g., Vietti‘s Roero Arneis. Or nicely saline Albariños. Asimov needs to get real.
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@pb
It's true that there are some imperfections in this article and it is not easy to speak about Etna; Sicily was first famous for whites (not reds) and Carricante is a variety that for its own nature was not cultivated all around Sicily, but just in the area of Etna already since 1760 when Mr. Sestini in his report speaks about Mascale valley.
However, we cannot argue with these prices.
Etna, AKA the Burgundy of the Mediterranean Sea, it is fantastic, unique terroir where wines are able to express a complexity that is not easy to find in other areas.
I also like the selection and I want to say that Donnafugata recently made a wonderful Etna Bianco which in my opinion is same level or even superior to some of the wines named in this article.
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@pb But have you tried any of them? The Sicilian whites are like no others. Whenever we are in Sicily we bemoan the fact they are so hard to come by here but they are truly fantastic and refreshing.
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@Salvo Calling any region in the world the "Burgundy of of X" is fast becoming a transparent price boosting marketing maneuver. Second only to the "Barolo of the Y."
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