Recent investment in Mount Etna has seen the arrival of ambitious producers from all around the globe armed with significant financial resources and modern winemaking techniques. While much has changed in this part of Sicily over the last two decades, pockets remain where time seems to stand still. Driving down the dusty road to Masseria del Pino, Cesare Fulvio and Federica Turillo’s little farm upslope from Randazzo, on the volcano's northern face, it is hard to tell which century we are living in. This is Etna in all its pastoral serenity, with only the sights, scents, and sounds of the mountain to stimulate the senses.

This simple, peaceful lifestyle is precisely what the couple envisioned when they settled here in 2005. Catania natives, they left their jobs—Cesare as a commercial air pilot, Federica as an archery instructor—to cultivate the two hectares of terraced vineyards at Contrada Pino, elevation 800 meters. They renovated the property’s ancient palmento, a traditional farmhouse featuring an old press and large fermentation vats made of lava stone, and began to work the 120-year-old pre-phylloxera vines, plus some olive trees and vegetable gardens, according to organic and biodynamic principles.

Upon bringing in the grapes—for the red, Nerello Mascalese with a bit of Nerello Cappuccio—Cesare and Federica stomp them by foot in these vats. An open-air fermentation begins, then the must is ultimately pressed off into old 500-liter tonneaux, where the wine stays for over a year until bottling. These primitive techniques have changed little since vines first appeared in Contrada Pino in the ninth century, and one can imagine this is what the wine might have tasted like back then. It is a profound Etna Rosso, richly flavored with black cherry, balsamic spices, and a smokiness that recalls the fresh-laid-tar suggestions often found in young Barolo. Its intensely gripping, yet silty-fine tannin is a trademark of wines from Contrada Pino. Cesare proudly remembers when an elderly local peasant identified his red in a blind tasting: “This wine hails from Contrada Pino!” the man exclaimed. For Cesare and Federica, there could be no better compliment.

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Kermit Lynch Wine Merchant