A Wine Offer You Can't Refuse

Vineyards, olive trees, cacti in full bloom, birds chasing one another in a game that feels more like a dance. A long and winding road, snaking across this incredible scenery. I like driving like this, I find it relaxing; you follow the road that follows the shape of the land, crafted by millennia of natural evolution. Humans built the road, but they had to adapt to the place; Nature decides how many turns you need to make to get to where you want to be.

Entering the baglio is like stepping into another time; you know this is a modern property, but the feeling is that of joining something that has been here for longer than me. Stones that could tell a story, plants and flowers that grow oblivious of what goes on around them. Everything is so peaceful and welcoming.

I spent the last couple of days in this paradise – the Baglio Soria estate by Firriato, near Trapani. I was of course wine hunting, but I did not expect this experience, nor all the things I learned during my ten days in Sicily. Which is as good a reason as any to discuss the evolution of winemaking in this beautiful and difficult land.

The First Vines

The story of wine in Sicily begins before written history. Archaeological evidence from Monte Kronio suggests that viticulture on the island may have been practiced as far back as 4,000 BC, which predates the Phoenicians, the Greeks, and everyone else who usually gets credited with bringing wine to the Mediterranean.

It was the Phoenicians, arriving in western Sicily around 800 BC, who first introduced systematic vine cultivation. They found wild vines already growing on the island and understood their potential. Among their contributions was the alberello, the bush vine training system of pruning the vine low to the ground to manage heat and conserve water. Perfectly adapted to the Sicilian climate, and still in use today: in fact, the Pantelleria alberello was inscribed by UNESCO as an Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity in 2014.

The Greeks followed, bringing more advanced pruning and cultivation techniques from the Aegean world. They called this part of the world Oenotria, the land of trained vines. Sicily's wines began to travel, and their reputation grew. The most celebrated was Mamertino, from the northeastern corner of the island near what is now Milazzo. Even Julius Caesar served it at the feast marking his third consulship in 46 BC, a recognition that, for an island wine, is no small feat.

The Palmento

The technology that underpinned Sicilian winemaking for centuries was the palmento, a multi-level stone structure built into the natural slope of a hillside, using gravity to move grapes and juice through every stage of production. No pumps, no machinery, just the shape of the land and the weight of the liquid. On the side of Etna, where the terrain is steep and lava stone perfect for carving, palmentos were built in their hundreds.

This production method represents a winemaking philosophy rooted in working with nature rather than against it. They fell out of use in the mid-20th century and were eventually prohibited under EU hygiene regulations; yet some producers on Etna have since restored them, adapting the gravity-flow logic to modern winemaking rather than abandoning the principle entirely. The palmento has become a symbol of the region's renewed connection with its past, and you can even go and experience it yourself in some guided tours.

Conquerors and Consequences

Between the Greeks and the modern era, Sicily was ruled by almost everyone: Romans, Byzantines, Arabs, Normans, Aragonese, and Spanish. Each left a mark.

The Islamic period (from the 9th to the 11th century) is the chapter that most visibly affected wine: production contracted significantly, viticulture shifted toward table grapes, and the wine culture went quiet. Knowledge survived, the industry did not.

What followed was a slow recovery. By the 18th century, Sicily was producing wine again, though mostly anonymous, high-alcohol bulk destined to add body to the thinner wines of northern Italy and France (you’re welcome). Then, a Liverpool merchant named John Woodhouse was blown into the port of Marsala by a storm. Presumably desperate and in need of a pick-me-up, he tasted the local wine and was amazed; he saw its potential, fortified it with brandy for the sea voyage, and sent it to England. And since it sold well, he came back and set up a proper facility at the end of the century.

Since then, others followed, and eventually Vincenzo Florio built Italy's most modern wine plant in Marsala in 1832. For the first time in centuries, a Sicilian wine had international demand and a defined identity.

The phylloxera crisis hit Sicily as it hit the rest of Europe (if you want the full story of that particular catastrophe, we covered it here).

For Sicily and most of the Italian south, the aftermath was particularly brutal: a long era of high-yield, low-quality bulk production with nowhere meaningful to go. It is also not coincidental that cooperatives began to dominate the landscape (a model we have written about here).

The awakening came in the 1980s, driven by a handful of producers who decided that Sicily's indigenous varieties deserved serious attention. Nerello Mascalese on Etna, Nero d'Avola in the south, Grillo, Catarratto, Carricante, Zibibbo – grapes that had been grown here for centuries, some for millennia, finally being vinified with care and bottled under their own names. The island was reclaiming its identity.

One of the producers at the center of that shift was Firriato.

Firriato

Salvatore Di Gaetano came from Paceco, in the Trapani province, and his wife, Vinzia Novara, came from a family with land and roots in the same territory. In 1978 they founded Firriato, the name taken from the Sicilian verb firriare: to turn around, to observe, to watch over. A deliberate choice, signaling from the start how they intended to relate to the land.

Production began in the early 1980s. They brought oenologists to Sicily to understand what the territory was genuinely capable of, investing in quality at a time when the island's reputation still sat firmly in the bulk era. They were not alone: Planeta was emerging at the same time, and Donnafugata was doing similarly serious work. Each moving independently, but the collective effect was to pull Sicilian wine toward a new identity.

Vinzia became the face of Firriato through years of international travel and representation, a recognizable and much-admired figure in the wine world. Salvatore directed from behind the scenes, with the focus of someone who never stopped being in love with what he was building. About a decade ago, Vinzia passed her public role to their daughter Irene, stepping back from the front line; still, she was at Baglio Soria during my visit, present and engaged, the kind of detail that tells you more about a family's relationship with their estate than any press release could.
Salvatore remains at the head of the company today.

When EU development funds began flowing into southern Italy in the early 2000s, Firriato was already positioned to move fast. The estate grew. And Salvatore made a decision that would define the winery's next chapter: to go to Etna.

Volcanic winemaking on Etna was not yet fashionable when they arrived in the early 2000s. Firriato stayed, collaborated with oenologists who helped shape the area's emerging style, and today stands as the largest producer in the Etna DOC, with a range that includes Sabbie dell'Etna, Cavanera, and other volcanic expressions that have contributed directly to the mountain's international profile.

There is also the ongoing experiment on Favignana, in the Egadi Islands off the western coast of Sicily (right in front of Trapani); a collaboration with research institutions to understand what winemaking in extreme conditions can produce. The results have been challenging and the quantities tiny, but Firriato continues to push the project forward. It is the kind of thing only a producer genuinely committed to understanding their territory would attempt.

The Wines We Carry

If you want to start your journey in discovering Sicilian wines, these are the bottles I would start with.

	Jasmin – IGT Terre Siciliane, Zibibbo A grape historically destined for sweet passito wines, here given a completely different treatment, and vinified dry. Fermented in steel on fine lees, fresh and aromatic, with jasmine flowers, citrus, and a saline edge that reflects the proximity of the vineyards to the Tyrrhenian coast. A natural aperitivo, and one of the most distinctly Sicilian whites we carry.
	Santagostino Baglio Sorìa – Sicilia DOC, Nero d'Avola and Syrah Firriato's flagship red, thirty consecutive vintages and counting. Nero d'Avola and Syrah from the Baglio Sorìa estate, eight months in American oak. Dark fruit, spice, tobacco, and velvety tannins. A wine built for the table: grilled meats, aged cheeses, anything with weight and character.
	Ribeca – Sicilia DOC, Perricone 100% Perricone, a variety that nearly vanished and that Firriato is widely credited with bringing back as a serious bottling. Aged 10 to 12 months in French oak, deep ruby, blackberries and Marasca cherries on the nose, with spice and a fresh, elegant finish. Pairs well with game, braised red meats, aged cheeses.

Coming soon: Harmonium and the Gaudensius line
Harmonium is Firriato's top-tier Nero d'Avola, from three single-vineyard crus at Borgo Guarini, aged 12 months in French and American barriques. The Gaudensius line is Firriato's Metodo Classico from Etna: a Blanc de Noir from Nerello Mascalese (40 months on lees) and a Blanc de Blancs from Carricante (36 months), both from high-altitude vineyards on the volcano's northern face. Mineral, precise, and unlike almost anything else produced on the island; we are very much looking forward to bring them to the Little Red Dot.

The New Generation

Firriato represents one trajectory of Sicilian wine, arguably a step aside our usual target: ambitious, highly scaled, built over decades. But the island's most exciting recent energy is something different: a generation of small, independent producers working with indigenous varieties with a focus on freshness and precision over the power Sicily has traditionally been associated with.

Among the most interesting are Gunther and Klaus Di Giovanna, brothers running their family estate in Sambuca di Sicilia in the Agrigento hills. Their work with Nerello Mascalese, Nero d'Avola, Grillo, and Catarratto (all varieties I had the chance to try during my time at their estate) points toward a Sicily that is confident enough to let its grapes speak quietly rather than loudly.

Sicily, Finally on Its Own Terms

Sicily spent most of the 20th century making wine for other people's labels, in other people's bottles, on other people's terms. The transformation of the last forty years has been a reclamation of indigenous varieties, of specific terroirs, of an identity as a wine region in its own right.

That transformation is still ongoing. Etna alone has become one of the most discussed appellations in Europe. The whites are finding audiences that would have been unimaginable a generation ago. And producers like Firriato, who were part of the first wave of that change, are still here, still turning around, still watching over the land their name promised to protect.