Cantina Atzei Saragat Monica 2024
£14.45
The wine
Brilliant ruby red with purple reflections. Intense marasca cherry and plum with a hint of depth.
Monica is a Sardinian red grown almost nowhere else, giving a supple, medium-bodied wine with soft tannins and a bitter-cherry finish. It is thought to have arrived with the Spanish during four centuries of Aragonese rule, as Cannonau did. Cantina Atzei work vineyards around Mogoro, south of Oristano in the south-west of the island.
The producer
Cantina Atzei
View all Cantina Atzei winesOn the sun-baked island of Sardinia, where the Mediterranean shapes everything it touches, Cantina Atzei makes wines of genuine island character. This is a land of maquis scrub, sea breezes and long, bright summers, and its wines carry that warmth and freshness in equal measure. Few places feel so completely their own.
The focus falls on Sardinia's own grapes, the crisp, saline Vermentino and the supple red Monica. Both are farmed under the southern sun and made in a clean, modern style that keeps the fruit vivid and the wines honest. Nothing here is over-worked or over-dressed.
These are everyday wines with a real sense of place, unpretentious and endlessly drinkable. They speak of the island at every turn: of the sea, the wild herbs and the heat of the day, captured in the glass.
Pour them freely at the table or under the sun, lightly chilled, and taste a little of Sardinia in every mouthful.
