Vernaccia di Oristano DOC

Sardinia’s great oxidative wine, and one of the few in the world made under a veil of yeast outside Jerez and the Jura. It comes from the flat land around the Tirso river north of Oristano, and almost nobody makes it any more.

The Terroir The registered file describes a sub-level zone of central-western Sardinia on substrates that are predominantly alluvial, silty-sandy, often stony and mixed with clay. The climate is Mediterranean with rainy winters and dry summers; the training systems are guyot and alberello. Sunlight, temperature swings and solar radiation, it says, allow regular ripening and the exaltation of the wine’s aromas. It also records that viticulture here goes back to the nuragic era — the Bronze Age civilisation whose stone towers still stand across the island.

Flor The wine is fermented dry and then left in part-filled chestnut or oak casks, unfortified and unsealed, where a film of yeast — flor in Spanish, flor here too — forms on the surface and protects the wine while feeding on it. Years pass. The result, in the file’s own words, is golden to amber in colour, with a delicate, alcoholic nose carrying shades of almond blossom, and a fine, subtle, warm palate with a light and pleasant aftertaste of bitter almonds. Minimum actual alcohol is 15 to 15.5 per cent, reached without fortification. A liquoroso version is also permitted.

Grape Varieties Vernaccia di Oristano alone. It is unrelated to Vernaccia di San Gimignano and to Vernaccia Nera; the name simply comes from vernaculum, local, and has been attached to a dozen unconnected grapes up and down Italy.

The Critical Take This is one of the most remarkable wines in Italy and it is in serious trouble. Oxidative styles lost their market in the 1970s, the casks and the patience required are expensive, and the vineyard area has collapsed to a few hundred hectares. What is left is extraordinary: dry, saline, nutty and enormously long, closer to an old Palo Cortado than to any other Italian wine, and it costs a fraction of what its Andalusian cousins do. If you want to understand what Italy nearly threw away, this is the bottle.

The Flood Plain The classic vineyards sit on the Campidano di Milis, ground that the Tirso used to flood. Alluvial sand over clay, low fertility, high sun — it produces small crops of very ripe fruit with the acidity intact, which is exactly what a wine that will spend years under flor requires.

At the Table The Sardinian answer is bottarga, and it is the right one. Also almonds, aged pecorino sardo, cured tuna, and seadas with the sweeter versions. Serve at 12–14°C in a small glass, and open the bottle days before you finish it — it will not suffer.

Benchmark Producers Contini, whose Antico Gregori is the benchmark of the entire category, and Silvio Carta.