Wednesday, 18 October 2017
The town of Ragusa was renowned for having two Michelin star restaurants. Another lovely baroque town.
With some very interesting balconies.
As in lots of places around the world, Sicilian wine has a long history of bulk produced, low quality wines. Those house wines were often shipped to other parts of the country for blending because their rich, bold, sun-ripened vines added a bit of oomph to the wines grown further north. However, the region around Vittoria has gained a reputation in recent years for a new commitment to producing high quality wines. Two wineries from this area, Occhipinti and Cos Wines have been leading the charge. Of course, we had to visit both of them.
The tasting room at Occhipinti which was remodelled and renovated from a couple of remaining walls into a beautiful, modern space.
Cos Winery is regarded as one of the leading wineries in Sicily. They use traditional approaches to wine making, including using amphoras instead of barrels producing a more natural style of wine. It was interesting to compare the different styles between Occhipinti and Cos Wines. While both were excellent, we leaned more in our preference towards Occhipinti.
These are the amphoras in the floor.
At Cos, they were putting in a new cellar and where they had cut the earth, you could see how deep the roots of the vines go. A bit of top soil, then lots of clay, with the roots going quite a way down.
