M-m-m-my Shardana

Santadi 2004 Valli di Porto Pino “Shardana” (Sardinia) – I very well know, through experience, that Sardinia’s reds can be on the burly side, and yet somehow I’m perpetually surprised when I get an especially gravitic one. I shouldn’t be, anymore. This is black-hearted fruit with tiny shots of espresso and charred rosemary, and though there’s a diagonal rinse of strong acidity it’s not enough to make the wine anything other than heavy. Needs the right food. (7/11)

Romangia the stone

Dettori 2007 Romangia Bianco Badde Nigolosu (Sardinia) – 100% vermentino. Looks, tastes, and feels like an orange wine, though the maceration isn’t all that long (ten days). It’s perhaps that it’s unfiltered and un-everything-else that leads to an orange sort of palate impression, though there is evident tannin. The luxuriant yet not overly polished texture is the wine’s primary highlight (among rather a sea thereof). Dried white flowers, some fresher buds, grasses, herbs, dried citrus, leaves, minerality to spare, and gravity without weight, density without concentration. Brilliant wine. Absolutely brilliant. (11/10)

Friends, Romangia, countrymen

Dettori 2006 Romangia Rosso Badde Nigolosu (Sardinia) – 100% cannonau (grenache). Subtle, seeming to rise from its lotus position with a slow unfolding of limbs. The subtlety never really goes away, though, and those expecting a more standard Sardinian cannonau – that is, one with a big and fruity palate impact – might be disappointed. Well, their loss. This requires attention to its graceful swirls of dusty berry and rich, semi-volcanic earth. The finish is so quiet that the inattentive will consider it to have departed long before it actually does. Not as showily brilliant as the white, this has more peaceful charms, and they’re more than OK. (11/10)

So farra, so gooda

Sella & Mosca 2002 Alghero “Tanca Farra” (Sardinia) – Swaggering, but the calloused mountain man and the fancy suit don’t necessarily cohere. Angry, dark-souled fruit with a fierce lash of skin and strap. It’s not overly big, though it is thickened by ambition, but the essential core of this wine survives its commercial acculturation without taking too much damage. (8/10)

Mosca on the Hudson

Sella & Mosca 2005 Cannonau di Sardegna (Sardinia) – A normally-reliable crowd-pleaser, here tasted from two bottles and found wanting from each. The strawberry bubblegum with a little more grate to it is present, as expected, but it cannot escape the two-ton lead weight pressing down on it. It’s not that the wine is overly heavy, it’s that it’s squashed. If both bottles are corked, it’s imperceptible and they’re identically-infected, which seems low-probability. Maybe a bad batch, or damaged, or just not very good. (2/10)

Mosca on the Hudson

Sella & Mosca 1999 Cannonau di Sardegna “Riserva” (Sardinia) – Over the last nine years, this has turned from grenache to aged cabernet franc. How’d that happen? Razor-edged fruit, sharp and porcupine-y, bristles with narrow-gauge redness around a gravelly core. It’s interesting, but I think the wine’s more appealing in its fresh and fruity youth. (12/08)

Sella & Mosca 2004 Cannonau di Sardegna “Riserva” (Sardinia) – Strawberry, sun, and bubblegum…though the latter is a very minor component in comparison to the other two. It seems somewhat insulting to call any wine gluggable, but this one definitely is. One of the most reliably appealing quasi-mass market labels out there. (12/08)

Serra smile

Argiolas 2006 Isola dei Nuraghi “Serra Lori” (Sardinia) – In contrast to earlier bottles that were exhibiting some fading, apparently from being held too long, this is singing with spiced, edgy strawberry. (8/08)

Isola-ted incident

Argiolas 2006 Isola dei Nuraghi “Serra Lori” Rosato (Sardinia) – Simple strawberry fun, but turning a bit more candied than before while losing some of the vivacity it once possessed. I’d drink up. (6/08)

Fired

Sella & Mosca 2004 Cannonau di Sardegna “Riserva” (Sardinia) – Fruity, fresh, and fun. Strawberry bubblegum with a gravel foundation and fine balance. This is an extremely reliable wine, though I suppose it sacrifices some uniqueness for that reliability. (2/08)

Costera someone else for a change

Argiolas 2006 Isola dei Nuraghi “Costera” (Sardinia) – Quite tannic, perhaps overstructured. Dark, dark licorice notes rest atop a thick stew of fire-roasted black cherry and coffee. This is grenache? The finish is more telling, with the lighter fruit and expected bubblegum notes in evidence, but this is a very broody wine. (2/08)

Another word for a truck

Argiolas 2006 Isola dei Nuraghi “Serra Lori” (Sardinia) – Vivid strawberry with a rocky edge. Less fun than many rosés, but not exactly serious either; call it pleasantly battleworn. (2/08)

Limbara rock

Cantina del Vermentino 2000 Colli del Limbara “Galàna” (Sardinia) – Odd, woody nose precedes big black fruit. Tar and leather, with ripe, hard, dense tannin and a powdery finish. There’s more acidity apparent at the end, which is welcome. (2/07)

Tàmara paste

Cantina del Vermentino 2004 Cannonau di Sardegna “Tàmara” (Sardinia) – Chewy, juicy, and wet. Slightly hollow, however, and roughens up on the finish. There’s lots of polish, but I’m not sure what’s being polished. (2/07)

Rouges Gallura

Cantina del Vermentino 2005 Vermentino di Gallura “Funtanaliras” (Sardinia) – Almond, pink grapefruit, and green notes. Clean on the finish, with a salty accent. (2/07)

Hey, Arakèna!

Cantina del Vermentino 2004 Vermentino di Gallura “Arakèna” (Sardinia) – Soft peach, nectarine, and apricot. Some papaya. There’s vanilla and a soft, fluffy finish of good length. (2/07)

Shot from a cannonau

Sella & Mosca 2004 Cannonau di Sardegna “Riserva” (Sardinia) – Showing the beginning stages of a faint browning in both color and taste, but still a fun stew of sun-dried fruit, perhaps a bit of tomato skin, and a gravelly texture. One of my favorite red wines for things that usually go better with white. (2/08)

Serra smile

Argiolas 2006 Isola dei Nuraghi “Serra Lori” (Sardinia) – A rosato of cannonau (grenache). Deep pink verging on purple, with a concentrated ripe berry flavor hit by little pellets of graphite and fizz, plus a keening anise note. This could pass as a light red wine, but it’s by no means overly heavy, and it avoids the common pink grenache pitfall of excess alcohol. A very good wine. (8/07)