ALDO VIOLA

Among the most accomplished and complete skin-contact whites we've ever tasted, Aldo Viola works without synthetic chemicals in his Sicilian vineyards, harvesting everything by hand and conducting almost all vineyard work entirely manually as well. He has long embraced skin maceration in the production of his white wines, not as a trendy affectation for certain cuvees but wholeheartedly; all his white wines are macerated for periods up to eight or nine months. Aldo does this because he finds that long, slow extractions produce the truest expressions of variety-plus-soil as well as the most satisfying textures—and his wines are textural masterpieces bar-none. These are not “funky orange wines” that dazzle with their exuberance despite their lack of balance or restraint; they probe they outer limits of aroma and flavor, but they do so with rigor, clarity, and harmony. His reds are produced with a similar appreciation for balance, and though they viscerally evoke their wild sun-baked hills of origin, they remain lifted, digestible, and refreshing.