(text taken from the NDA – Guida al Nero d’avola 2018)
Nero d’Avola is a strong, vigorous vine, always fresh and young, with a good acidity, sometimes excessive. Over the years it has helped and continues to help, stimulates and corrects many other vines that blend with it to create exceptional wines.
The Nero d’Avola, however, is sometimes tired, locked up in schemes from which it can’t get out, it seems old, left to its own demise and cultivated by producers who no longer believe in it.
And yet, the Nero d’Avola, the “prince” of the Sicilian native grapes, the one who made the history of this “wine-making continent”, which has given joys and sorrows, hopes and great satisfaction, is always there ready to give strength and character to every grape produced every year.
The vine guards all the typical elements, there are many good enologists in fabulous wineries, and there are even brave entrepreneurs in Sicily, so what is missing? A disciplinary system for wine production that allows the use of Nero d’Avola for a classic method?
What’s missing in Sicily is called “Will”, which doesn’t have the same meaning as the term of the Italian language (man’s own faculty of striving with determination and full autonomy for the realisation of certain ends). What’s missing is that “Will” that creates a real “Dream”, a production protocol, the determination to protect a future brand, experiments, failures, and successes to create a “little bubble” of Nero d’Avola.
It suffices to look at the “Muntagna” Etna, with its full-bodied and excellent wines, structured and long-lived, but in its heart, it hosts bubbles, a classic nerello mascalese method that because of its structure and intensity is just as good as many high-end champagnes.
Perhaps, this dream of mine will come true, some producers have already put into production “the classic method of Nero d’Avola”, others will attempt it. I am sure I will soon savour a Classic Method Nero d’Avola of Sicily – Brut, 48, 60 and even 72 months on the lees, with fine and intense bubbles. On the nose, a crust of bread surrounded by full but not ripe red fruits can be perceived, with a scent of sea breeze that fills the nose. On the palate, it’s full and persistent, enjoyable to drink, medium structure and body such as to be a good companion of raw and cooked seafood dishes. An ideal drink to toast to good business or just to make young ladies fall in love.
