Cardedu Orange Wine, Bucce | 2022

This is, as we like to say, orange wine lite. It's a blend of the white grapes, Vermentino and Nasco, with the noble red of Sardinia, Cannonau, Bucce refers to skins, and orange wines are an exaggerated version of white wines, in which the clear juice sits in contact with its skins longer than a typical white wine fermentation. The degree of color depends on many things: the concentration of pigment within the skins (depending on variety), the thickness of the skins, how those pigments react, how long the juice sits with its skins, and the ratio of skin to juice. Note: wines can be orange colored for other reasons like oxidation or botrytis.

Cardedu, named after its village, is located in the southeast quadrant of Sardinia, about a two-hour drive north of Cagliari. Here, Sergio Loi is the 4th generation gatekeeper, whose family has always practiced no chemical farming and minimum intervention in the cellar since the 1900s. Natural wine is not a trend at Cardedu, it's a way of life. In the glass Bucce intrigues the senses with peach, apricot, and rosemary. It's expansive on the palate, stretching out like a blanket, but has that Mediterranean tang, lift, and glide. A wine that makes you feel like you're close to the sea, with a platter of curly seafood in front of you. Now, who wouldn't want that? ~Allegra Angelo