Today’s featured winery is a first-ballot SommSelect hall-of-famer, as many of you already know. Murgo’s entry-level Etna Rosso, a perennial favorite, has redefined what’s possible at the $20-a-bottle price point, and today’s single-vineyard “Tenuta San Michele” is similarly game-changing.
This 2016 is a significant upgrade in quality for a very modest increase in price, further cementing Murgo’s reputation as one of the greatest value-for-dollar performers not just in Italy, but anywhere. Frankly, given the massive increase in popularity and critical acclaim Etna wines have enjoyed in recent years, I wouldn’t have thought it possible for a wine of this pedigree to exist at this price. But as one of the longer-established wineries on Mount Etna, Murgo manages to do it—but for how much longer I don’t know, because as more people catch on to the exceptional wines of this region, even stalwarts like Murgo might be inclined to raise prices. For now, we can revel in the fact that this lithe, perfumed, aristocratic red performs like a Côte de Beaune Burgundy costing at least twice as much. Sourced from a single, high-altitude vineyard parcel on the eastern slope of the volcano, Tenuta San Michele is a bona-fide “grand cru” wine in a rapidly evolving fine wine region. This 2016 is elegant, place-expressive, and yes, it will age gracefully. That’s not just “good” for $28. That’s unheard-of!
Like its home region, Etna’s Nerello Mascalese grape has catapulted to international fame. By law, it represents a minimum of 80% of any wine carrying the Etna Rosso DOC designation, typically buttressed by the color-enhancing Nerello Cappuccio. The aromatic, Pinot Noir-like personality of Nerello Mascalese is what has put Etna reds on the map; they are not inky, syrupy reds fitting the (outdated) “southern Italian” stereotype, but rather true cool-climate reds of finesse and nerve.
Murgo is an Etna original, farming 25 hectares of vineyards in and around Zafferana Etnea, on the eastern slopes of Etna, which is home to fewer producers than the more densely planted north slope. Baron Emanuele Scammacca del Murgo, a longtime Italian diplomat, decided to re-dedicate his family’s property to wine production back in 1981, a time when Etna wine was little talked-about; most of what was produced from the ancient vineyards here was sold to cooperatives for bulk wine. The Murgo family’s diverse production also includes excellent Champagne-method sparklers and deeply mineral whites, and at the Tenuta San Michele, where the vineyard source for today’s wine is located, they run a restaurant and inn offering the ultimate ‘full immersion’ in the local wine culture.
The Tenuta San Michele vineyard sits at about 2,000 feet elevation, near the village of Santa Venerina, with vines between 10-20 years of age. Only made in select vintages, today’s wine combines 90% Mascalese with 10% Cappuccio, ferments it in stainless steel, then ages the wine in a combination of tank and French oak barriques for 18 months. The gentle oak usage allows the bright red fruit and volcanic minerality of the wine to take center stage. In the glass, it’s a bright ruby-red moving to garnet and pink at the rim, with a beautifully perfumed nose of red and black cherries, red currants, wild strawberries, blood orange, baking spices, rose petals, underbrush, and a telltale ‘volcanic’ note of ash and smoke. It is just above medium-bodied now but is likely to put on weight over time: I can see it aging well for a decade-plus, which hasn’t yet become common among Etna reds (even though so many are sourced from very old vines). Whereas the ‘entry-level’ Murgo rosso is buoyant, fruity, and eminently gulp-able, Tenuta San Michele has more structure, showing its best after a brief decant and time in the glass. Serve it in Burgundy stems at 60-65 degrees and maybe slip it onto a table next to some serious red Burgundies—I’m confident it will more than hold its own. For a food pairing, check out the attached recipe for lasagna, which this wine’s laser-beam freshness and fine-grained tannins will foil beautifully. Enjoy!
