An immediately enchanting expression of Catarratto (seriously, we were smitten from first sip), pulled from a forty-year-old vineyard planted just a few hundred meters from the Mediterranean over black volcanic soils. Nino blazed his own path starting with the 2004 vintage, rigorously organic from the start, producing single-vineyard, monovarietal, mostly white wines of real character, highlighting the sunny, but fresh and salty imprint of this seaside, high-limestone terroir. In the beginning the wines had little to no maceration. From 2008-2012, the wines became fairly orange, as Nino interpreted a different side of his land. Since then he has steadily dialed back the macerations, returning to the origins of his career. His range of wines feels as complete and resonant as ever. His Catarratto spends a day on skins, before being pressed off to concrete; aged in steel for 10 months, it sees no oak to showcase the style and vibrant aromas of citrus, yellow flowers, and nutmeg. A beautiful shade of gold, it pairs ripe stone fruits with a pronounced smokiness from the land and a lick of salt from the sea. Medium-bodied and softly textured. A wine with an incredible sense of place.
Nino Barraco has been instrumental in rewriting the story of wine in Marsala. Nino took over his family’s vineyards in 2004 and from the outset he has done things differently, working organically, focussing on the native grapes of his Western Sicily and producing single vineyard wines in the hope of showing others the region’s true potential. He has spent the past few decades acquiring small parcels and now farms a total of twenty hectares of vines spread along the coast north and south of Marsala. Nino’s work is tireless and he can usually be found driving his beat up Fiat through the dunes to check on his vines. There he works organically and with a great respect for nature. In the cantina his aim is simply to guide the wine from vineyard to glass. Whilst the majority of his wines are bottled the year after harvest, in his parent’s garage, Nino has embarked on a project to rediscover the Marsala of old. Here, old casks of various sizes hold oxidative wines in various stages of evolution. They are left to evaporate for up to a decade, producing highly concentrated wines of astounding length and complexity. Nino’s wines possess an uncanny sense of place. Salty, sunkissed and radiant, they are as Nino says, the sea in a glass.