Richard Crena

Punta Crena 2008 Riviera Ligure di Ponente Vigneto Isasco Vermentino (Liguria) – Delicious. Simultaneously arboreal and saline, with a sizzle of structure helixed with minerality. This is a wine that’s both fun and an intellectual pleasure. (8/11)

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)

Benjamin Isasco

Crena 2008 Riviera Ligure di Ponente Vermentino Vigneto Isasco (Liguria) – People who insist Italian whites are worthless are…well, they’re idiots, but they’re apparently also idiots who’ve never tasted a vermentino. Even in its paler, more industrial expressions, there’s plenty going on. When given a little more attention and terroir, I fail to understand how anyone could not, at least, appreciate the goings-on. Here, there’s grayish-tan soil, a lot of sun (but with shadows lurking in corners and crannies), a light oxidativeness that adds rather than detracts, and plenty of complexity and interest to hold attention. Not a great vermentino, but certainly a good one. (9/10)

Uncle Quinis

Sardi Giustiniani 2008 Colline Lucchesi Vermentino “Quinis” (Tuscany) – Starts tentatively, then grows in interest as vermentinos so often do. Water-marked aquatic leafery, subtle shadings of sunlight, an ascending finish. Good. (7/10)

I keep on searching

Edmunds St. John 2007 “Heart of Gold” (El Dorado County) – 54% grenache blanc, 46% vermentino. It should amaze me that wines with this sort of acidic presence can be made in California, given the endless evidence to the contrary, but then I remember who’s behind it. Crisp greenness, lemon, mixed citrus and orchard fruit rinds, with a dry minerality that hums along in the background; a rocky feedback that never achieves prominence until very, very late in what is almost a shockingly persistent finish. Really striking, and extremely drinkable. (5/08)

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)