Andrew Guard

2022 Etna Bianco 'Outis', Ciro Biondi

This is made mostly with Carricante, a white indigenous grape variety to Sicily with a distinctive stony minerality, is blended here with several other more aromatic local varieties, including Moscadella dell'Etna. The combination ofbright acidity and minerality from the Carricante and the complex aromatic notes from the other varieties come together harmoniously in the glass. This is a superb mountain wine inflected with volcanic minerality, moreish and complex it is zesty and powerful. A beauty!

Spanning just five hectares, the Ciro Biondi winery is relatively new, having been founded in 1999. Ciro Biondi’s ancestors bottled wine under the Biondi name more than a century ago with an assortment of vineyard holdings passed down through the generations.

Ciro, an architect, renovated an old stone winery structure in one of the three small, lovingly restored vineyards he owns in and around the village of Trecastagni. All three sites sit at altitudes ranging from 600-700 meters, with east/southeast expositions and soils comprised mainly of Etna’s black, mineral-rich volcanic pumice.

Biondi's white wines come from Etna’s native Carricante grape, which continues to grow in esteem among wine lovers and comprises 90% of the blend supported by Catarratto, Malvasia, and Minella.

The red wines are produced from Nerello Mascalese, with the permitted addition of up to 20% Nerello Cappuccio. The south side of Etna tends to produce wines that are more subtle, more Pinot-like, often paler in color than the north side (and for this reason often blended with Nerello Capuccio, a darker variety than Nerello Mascalese).

This is indeed an exiting source of fine wine and we are very proud to be representing them.