Winemaker Notes
Deep ruby red colour, with deep violet flashes. Its strength and complexity immediately stand out at the nose. Blackberry and cherry notes balanced with vanilla scent. Soon there are tobacco aromas, and towards the end balsamic notes, and elegant vegetal notes. Fruity taste, intense, elegant tannins and freshness. Very long at the palate.
Professional Ratings
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Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
This is one of the bottles that symbolizes the Sicilian Wine Renaissance that started a few decades ago. The Morgante 2019 Sicilia Nero d'Avola Riserva Don Antonio is a real beauty with bold lines and big intensity. The inky and extracted style does evoke a winemaking style that was popular during the first decade of the new millennium, but Don Antonio pulls off that style with pride and confidence. There is plenty of black cherry and baked plum with spice, tobacco and tarry smoke over a full-bodied style. The alcohol content is high at 15%.
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James Suckling
A creamy and round-textured red with firm, juicy tannins and plenty of blackberry and dark-chocolate flavors. Medium to full body and medium-chewy tannins. Hints of licorice and asphalt at the end.
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Wine Spectator
A graceful red that shows seamless integration to the core of creamed black and red cherry fruit, with fine-grained, sculpted tannins and a minerally underpinning. Fresh and focused, expanding on the palate to reveal details of dried lavender, spicy cedar, wild sage and graphite.
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Wine Enthusiast
Tanned leather and top soil dominate the nose, before turning to graphite, black pepper and herbs and finally black cherry. Savory notes take center stage on the palate again, with meaty, fermented flavors shining through cherries and plums. Structured, solid tannins and peppy acid hold everything in balance.
Boldly opulent and robust, Nero d’Avola is Sicily’s most widely planted red grape. Nero d’Avola performs well both as a single varietal bottling and in blends. It loves hot, arid climates and Sicily's old vines are aptly head-trained close to the ground, making them resistant to strong winds. A few pioneering producers in California as well as Australia farm Nero d’Avola in the same way. Somm Secret—Nero d’Avola's other name, Calabrese, suggests origins from the mainland region of Calabria.
A large, geographically and climatically diverse island, just off the toe of Italy, Sicily has long been recognized for its fortified Marsala wines. But it is also a wonderful source of diverse, high quality red and white wines. Steadily increasing in popularity over the past few decades, Italy’s fourth largest wine-producing region is finally receiving the accolades it deserves and shining in today's global market.
Though most think of the climate here as simply hot and dry, variations on this sun-drenched island range from cool Mediterranean along the coastlines to more extreme in its inland zones. Of particular note are the various microclimates of Europe's largest volcano, Mount Etna, where vineyards grow on drastically steep hillsides and varying aspects to the Ionian Sea. The more noteworthy red and white Sicilian wines that come from the volcanic soils of Mount Etna include Nerello Mascalese and Nerello Cappuccio (reds) and Carricante (whites). All share a racy streak of minerality and, at their best, bear resemblance to their respective red and white Burgundies.
Nero d’Avola is the most widely planted red variety, and is great either as single varietal bottling or in blends with other indigenous varieties or even with international ones. For example, Nero d'Avola is blended with the lighter and floral, Frappato grape, to create the elegant, Cerasuolo di Vittoria, one of the more traditional and respected Sicilian wines of the island.
Grillo and Inzolia, the grapes of Marsala, are also used to produce aromatic, crisp dry Sicilian white. Pantelleria, a subtropical island belonging to the province of Sicily, specializes in Moscato di Pantelleria, made from the variety locally known as Zibibbo.