Planetary Model
Planeta for the People | Generous Gavi
I find it hard to write about the wine people I really like. Not because I am afraid I am going to libel them (though it could happen), but because when I hang out with them I am more likely to ask them questions about them and their lives rather than whether the wine we’re drinking went through full malolactic fermentation and how the growing season of 2023 compared to 2022. I manage to enjoy good company and good wine (the best pairing), but leave without any notes.
So it was this week with Patricia Tóth, head winemaker at Sicily’s Planeta, who was in Toronto briefly at the end of a promotional tour that took her from Southern California to the Bay of Fundy, and many point in between. She was in Toronto partly to host a winemaker’s dinner with her local importing agent, Noble Estates. I managed to finagle an invitation to the dinner from my friends at Noble, but I couldn’t go. Was there any way I could see her before she flew back to Italy the next day?
There was. I work and live next to one of the city’s bigger, flagship LCBO1. Patricia and Carolyn from Noble we’re going to check in there, since there’s a Planeta wine in this week’s Vintages Release (see below). I would meet them for a late lunch at one of my neighbourhood restaurants, which just happened to have the 2024 Planeta Etna Bianco on their list by the glass.
I can report from our lunch that the Etna Bianco, made from 100% Carricante at the Feudo di Mezzo2 winery on the volcano’s slopes, was delicious. Fresh but weighty: a pure line of stone fruit and maybe almonds on the finish. It ran well through a meal of shared plates that began oysters and featured more raw seafood.
As per usual, beyond inquiring how people were at Planeta, we mostly talked about what was going on in our lives, including adventures from her travels, and her relief and happiness over the government change in her native Hungary following this year’s historic elections. If we talked about wine, it was in a general way and in its proper context: what food we liked to cook with what. I never even took my notebook out of my bag.
That’s okay, because I know the story of Planeta, which is in many ways the story of modern fine wine making in Sicily, will continue and there will be many more opportunities to tell it. Planeta is not just a sustainable winery because it’s organic, it was built into its creation in 1995 and expansion across Sicily. Planeta is in fact, seven wineries, each according to the wines it makes. Patricia Tòth and her CEO, agronomist, winemaker Alessio Planeta, spend a lot of their time driving around.
Alessio Planeta, who has assumed leadership of the family business since the death of his pioneering uncle, Diego in 2020, once explained to me why Planeta has so many wineries. Every family member is also a shareholder. As the family grows with each generstion, so to has the business. The way to expand the business without compromising the quality of the wines was to recreate wineries like the original at the family estate in Ulmo across the island. I think of it as a model for intelligent growth, not just for wine.
What’s worked for the family has worked for wine consumers. The Planeta name serves as a recognizeable brand for over thirty different wine labels, made at the seven sites. It’s a bit like they are their own negociant, making everything from Grand Cru’s to Villages to well made table wines.
All of them to be enjoyed in good company.
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NEW WRITING AT THE HUB
In this month’s Hub column I get into as much as I can on the 2026 Calgary edition of the Terroir Symposium in 1,200 words… I still missed lots, but it was quite a time. Click here to read it now.
WINE RECOMMENDATIONS
Michele Chiarlo Le Marne Gavi 2024
Price: $19.95
Channel: LCBO Vintages
Producer: Michele Chiarlo
Country: Italy
Region: Piedmont
Appellation: Gavi
Grapes: Cortese
Alcohol by Volume: 12.5%
Sugar Content: 2 grams per litre
This is the love that the world needs now: a $20 summer sipper, fancy enough to pour to guests, affordable enough to open another bottle. Cantina Michele Chiarlo is a well established maker of cru Barolo, and fancy wines in the Langhe. They also make fancier Gavi, the light crisp whites made for the seafood restaurants just over the hills in Genoa. Some of that is also fancy,
The fruit leans toward apple or Japanese pear, though the acitidy also hints toward lemon and lime citrus, rounded out with a few months on the lees to give it some weight in the mouth. It’s a summer evening refresher, and work well with a salmon tartare, if there’s a cook brave enough to make it at home. More likely, the hint of salinity on its finish will pair nicely with salty snacks before dinner.
https://www.lcbo.com/en/michele-chiarlo-le-marne-gavi-2024-228528
Planeta Plumbago 2022
Price: $24.95
Channel: LCBO Vintages
Producer: Planeta
Country: Italy
Region: Sicily
Appellation: Sicilia Menfi DOC
Grapes: Nero d’Avola
Alcohol by Volume: 13.5%
Sugar Content: 3 grams per litre
Everything is déjà vu all over again. I have a vague memory of writing about Planeta’s Plumbago wine within the last few years, and a distinct memory of thinking it tasted a bit like plums, dismissing the note as evidence of my suggestibility, then reading the back label to find out that it’s supposed to taste like plums, even though the word “plumbago” is in fact the name of a wild flower that grows in the vineyards it comes from near the Southwest shore of Sicily. So it does taste like plums, as well as blackberries and blueberries: it’s a deep purple-blue kind of a wine, that despite the purity and depth of the fruit keeps a kind of elegance. Maybe it’s a bit like a really well muscled ballet dancer, a mix of elegance and strength.
The Plumbago wants to go with something from the grill, it might have a slightly smoky character itself. All things being equal, I would go for lamb, in any form from garlicky sausages to chops off the rack.
https://www.lcbo.com/en/planeta-plumbago-nero-d-avola-2018-19491
I swear it’s not on purpose, but it’s been helpful over the years. It’s one of the prettiest stores, so producers are often taken there, and it’s easy for me to meet them or have come over for an interview.
Feudo di Mezzo is Planeta’s modern winerry on Etna, not to be confused with their older, restored winery, Sciaranuova, that was featured in the second season of The White Lotus