Region: Pantelleria, Sicily, Italy

Varietal: 100% Zibibbo

Tasting notes: Pantelleria is a tiny island off the coast of Tunisia that is considered part of the Sicilian island chain. Most of the wines from Pantelleria are sweet dessert wines, but a few dry styles exist and are tremendously fun, as evidenced by this beauty from Donnafugata. Lighea has a brilliant straw yellow color with greenish reflections. The nose offers a rich and fragrant bouquet with classic notes of orange blossom combined with citrus scents (citron and bergamot) and exotic fruit (lychees). The fruity and flowery notes return on the palate accompanied by marked freshness, with good persistence and a pleasant mineral finish.

Producer: In 1983, the experienced winegrowing couple Giacomo and Gabriella Rallo decided to invest in a new Sicilian project that they called “Donnafugata.” Their vision was to create a contemporary winegrowing operation based around three sites in western Sicily and to produce a range of international and indigenous variety wines to showcase the potential of Sicily. Today the estate is comprised of an historic family cellar in Marsala that dates back to 1851, a 667-acre estate at Contessa Entellina planted to a diverse range of grapes, and a third cellar on the volcanic island of Pantelleria, where Donnafugata cultivates 168 acres of Zibibbo vineyards. The company employs state-of-the-art, sustainable viticulture techniques at all three estates for wines of the highest quality.

Vineyard and Winemaking: At Donnafugata, stewardship of the environment is taken as seriously as the production of wine. The winery was one of the first wineries in Italy to produce all of its electricity from solar energy, taking advantage of the bountiful Sicilian sunshine, and in 2015 the island of Pantelleria was given UNESCO certification recognizing its unique vine training method. The vines are cultivated in hollows, low alberello pantesco, which protects them from the hot, dry winds coming off the African continent while retaining night-time humidity. The low bush vine of Pantelleria has been inscribed on the UNESCO Representative List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity as a “creative and sustainable” practice.