September 2022 Wine Club
Sicilian September Year 2! Return to Etna with I Custodi!
Welcome back to Sicily, friends! This is a region that continues to captivate us, and we’re excited to continue to reveal layers of our fascination with Sicily this month.
You can read our previous features on Sicily below. A year ago we shared wine from Massimiliano Calabretta and Marc de Grazia near Randazzo on Mount Etna, focusing on Etna’s unique volcanic soil:
Then we revisted central Sicily via Castellucimiano near Palermo in February of this year, with a focus on Sicilian history and indigenous varietals:
This month we’re returning to Etna to focus on traditional Sicilian agricultural practices and a team of producers that are bringing them back.
The Contradi of Etna
First off, where are we? Yes, we’re in Sicily again, yes, we’re in Etna — but Etna is a big mountain. So let’s get specific — we’re on the northeastern side of Etna, in a political and agricultural area called Contrada Moganazzi.
Contradi are traditional divisions of land on Sicily, and throughout Italy. They have been incorporated into the modern political system as administrative subdivisions, but on Etna they take on a special significance. Because there are 144 contrada on Etna, and the soil composition and climatological characteristics of each is so distinct, these divisions take on a new significance in this context. As I mentioned in my last blog post, place is distinct from identity in that it is open — constantly changing, informed by its history, but never fixed and always defined by its relationship. This is a perfect example of this — a political designation taking on new significance because it approximates a real and distinct relationship between practical and natural elements.
Because of this, Etnean winemakers are beginning to designate the Contrada on the bottles, and make bottlings to bring out the distinct character of each Contrada. This is an example of deterritorialization — the contrada designation (the signifier) now has almost nothing to do with politics (the territory) and everything to do with aesthetic character (the signified). I want to highlight this process because it contextualizes the significance of this month’s winemakers.
Salvo Foti and I Custodi — Indigenous Sicilian Agriculture
Salvo Foti is a native Sicilian, an oenologist to whom I feel comfortable crediting the resurgence of Sicilian wine. Although other winemakers have played critical roles in promoting, representing, and normalizing Sicilian wine, Foti occupies a unique position within this milieu, because he has been uniquely focused on describing what makes a wine Etnean.
Salvo Foti has dedicated his career to restoring several signature techniques of Sicilian winemaking to common usage. To this end, he has reinstituted a medieval winemaker’s guild, I Custodi delle Vigni dell’Etna — “the keepers of the vines of Etna”, or I Custodi for short. I Custodi practices and trains winemakers in traditional albarello pruning and the construction, restoration and maintenance of dry masonry terraces — a requirement for traditional farming on the steep and rocky slopes of Mount Etna. Because the soil is so loose, the vines actually play a significant role in erosion control. In order to be effective, planting density may need to be up to 10,000 vines per hectare! To achieve this density, I Custodi is bringing back what’s known as quincunx planting — planting 5 or 7 vines in the space conventionally used by 4, using an equidistant planting pattern.
Of course — and those of you that know me well will not be surprised — the element of Salvo Foti’s work which I am most excited about is his revival of the medieval guild. In their words:
Salvo had understood that to make a real Etna wine — and not just a wine produced on Mt. Etna — he couldn’t do without the native men of the Muntagna. Around him, Salvo saw how the ancient knowledge was in peril of disappearance with a generation growing older. Hence the intuition to create a group of men with which to revitalize the ancient vineyards on the Vulcano, men of all ages — just as the vines they take care of — where the old can pass on their gestures and their wisdom to young people.
Really putting the culture in permaculture here.
The Wines
Both wines for this month come from the vineyard below:
These are young vines — only 10 years old — planted in a quincunx pattern and bush trained. High up at 2300ft of elevation, these vines are working in soil defined by high silica and volcanic ash content. The farming here is certified organic, and the main grapes are Nerello Mascalese, Nerello Cappuccio, and Carricante.
Both of your wines this month are an 80/20 blend of Nerello Mascalese and Nerello Cappuccio. Grapes for the rose, named Alnus, are harvested at the end of September and whole-cluster pressed almost immediately; within the next 2 weeks, grapes for the red, named Pistus, will be harvested and fermented on skins without temperature control for 10 days. After press, both are rested in steel before bottling.
Tellingly, the rose never undergoes malolactic fermentation because it presses out with a pH of 3.12, which is low — too low for malo to happen. The red, harvested no more than 2 weeks later, undergoes full malo.
The results are vibrant and refreshing. The rose is suffused with citrus flower aromatics fading into tropic fruit on the back palate and finish. The red, by contrast, expresses the aromas of rich dried fruit and a spicy earthiness that evokes the bazaar.
The lesson in these bottles is both of technique and vintage. The red is from 2020, whereas the rose is from 2021 — both hot and dry years, with 2021 being a hotter and drier year with a wetter winter. Keep all this in mind as you let these bottles to you their stories.
Love it? Want more? Check out this beautiful and poetic interview with Salvo Foti at grapecollective:
Thanks as always for reading, friends.
