2019 Vigne Rada Stria Vermentino di Sardegna

If you’re going to buy just one bottle from a rising region, make it this Vermentino. In Sardinia, a “Mediterranean melting pot” of terroir and a must-know winemaking Eden, Vermentino has emerged as “without a doubt [the] most important white wine,” says Vinous, who called it “the variety that keeps the island on the map.” Sardinia produces some of the grape’s most profound, unique expressions, and this Vigne Rada Stria is among its very best.

Those who aren’t sipping its lean elegance are not only missing out on one of the Mediterranean’s greatest values, but hands down one of the best Italian white wines, one scarcely available outside the region’s eateries and wine shops. 

When Decanter listed four reasons for why Sardinia’s “fascinating wines” deserves to be better known, critic Andrew Jefford wrote: “The first is Vermentino: maybe the world’s best?” The island’s unique climate results in a gloriously crisp take on the grape from Vigne Rada. The oily almond richness and mineral complexity recall world-class Arneis, while the salty, herbal-tinged intensity is typically only found in $40+ Sauvignon Blancs. 

Transposed between continents, Sardinia is a place where beauty arises from the meeting of extremes. Picture ocean-sprayed, rocky coasts and long, flat plains; hot southern winds from Africa that collide with the cool gusts funneling down from France. A diverse combination of soils—clay, limestone, quartz—gives wines lift and depth. Generations of foreign influence from Greek, Roman, Phoenician, Catalan, and Arab cultures have fostered the adoption of innovative winemaking and vineyard management techniques. “Sardinia is a true Mediterranean melting pot, and nowhere is this more evident than in its wines,” says Robert Parker’s Wine Advocate.

Handcrafted in Alghero, an old village on the Italian island’s northwest coast, the gorgeous 2019 Stria Vermentino distills the thrilling dynamism of Sardinia’s wine scene. It’s part of a new wave fueled by tiny, family-run wineries like Vigne Rada that are elevating expressions of native grapes to unprecedented levels of quality and site specificity. Yet because these small-production bottles tend to fly under the mass-market radar, they come at a value as stunning as this wine’s ripe citrus freshness.

In the past, much of this complexity and terroir transparency was lost in the island’s vast co-op system that prioritized volume and efficiency over character. But small farms like the one run by Vigne Rada’s Luigi Bardino, a former banker turned proselytizer of Sardinian viniculture, are now the talk of the town among sommeliers and wine writers.

There’s a passion and a proud regional identity to the people of Sardinia—qualities abundantly evident in every sip of this high-energy, first-class Vermentino.

• Fruit Intensity
• Oak Intensity
• Body
• Sweetness
• Acidity

• ABV 13.50%
• Enjoy right away
• Drink Up
• % Vermentino
• Serving temperature – 46°
• Cork