ORANGE features a selection of macerations which invigorate and excite. Offering examples so filigree and fine they could be classified as genre-defying, alongside those with enough flesh and grip to stand up to the most robust of cooking, few wines are as versatile on the table as these.
DOMAINE DE L’OCTAVIN
Mystère 2023
Jura, France
This charming expression of Muscat d’Alexandrie comes from grapes harvested with longtime friend of Alice, Vincent Lafage, at his farm in the Pyrénées. The grapes fermented as whole bunches for four days before being pressed off to cuve for a year. The result is an easygoing maceration heady with tropical fruits and flowers, offset by refreshing flavours of salt, pith and zest. A wine that screams apéritif.
Muscat d’Alexandrie
BARRACO
Cover 2022
Sicily, Italy
This remarkable Catarratto comes from a thirty year old parcel planted over volcanic soils staring out at the Mediterranean. The grapes were destemmed and put into a large chestnut cask to infuse for ten months. The wine was bottled directly from the cask with no additions, producing a golden, savoury and layered wine of great depth and complexity. One of the best we’ve tried from Nino.
Catarratto
ORSI SAN VITO
Posca Bianca NV
Emilia-Romagna, Italy
This non-vintage wine is drawn from a big old concrete vat which contains a blend of Pignoletto, Alionza, Albana and Malvasia from different vineyards of various ages, from every vintage back to 2010. The wines are made in different ways, in a variety of vessels. The majority of the blend is made up of wine from the most recent vintage and the vat is constantly being topped up with young wine to prevent oxidation. This is a great trattoria wine that while easy to drink, is anything but simple. While the younger wines are all fruit and flowers, there’s a salty, nutty backbone to this which makes for a wine of real intrigue.
Pignoletto, Alionza, Albana, Malvasia