winery
Centopassi
Sicily, Italy
Philosophy
Giovanni Ascione oversees winemaking with meticulous attention to terroir expression. Whites ferment with neutral selected yeasts in stainless steel; reds use indigenous yeasts. Emphasis on manually harvested, site-specific fruit from high-altitude vineyards where altitude and diurnal temperature swing preserve acidity and complexity in indigenous Sicilian varieties—Grillo, Catarratto, Nero d'Avola, Perricone—historically dismissed as mere bulk wine material.
Reputation
Centopassi crystallized in 2005 when the Italian state confiscated 100 hectares from Cosa Nostra mafia in the Alto Belice Corleonese and granted the land to Libera Terra, the anti-mafia social cooperative founded by Don Luigi Ciotti. The name—One Hundred Steps—honours Peppino Impastato, the activist murdered by the mob for his resistance. What began as reclamation became resurrection: Maurizio Alongi and Giovanni Ascione transformed overlooked terrain into the most compelling expression of western Sicily's indigenous grapes.
No benchmark products catalogued for this producer yet.