Made with oak-fermented Chardonnay from the Vigneto del Ventaglio Tenuta Ficuzza property, the 2020 Sicilia Jalé opens to an off-gold color and saturated aromas of honey, apricot and dried sage. The wine is soft and silky with a supple, medium-bodied approach. This vintage doesn't have the spicy zest of past releases, but the freshness is good. The 2020 vintage puts more emphasis on textural richness. Some 24,000 bottles were made.

The Cusumano 2019 Sicilia Jalé is a pure expression of Chardonnay that draws its fruit from 30-year-old plants in the Vigneto del Ventaglio (a fan-shaped plot) in the Tenuta Ficuzza. This single-vineyard expression ferments in oak and then ages on the fine lees for eight months. Production is 20,000 bottles. The wine reveals a soft and enriched personality, with stone fruits, dried apricot and Sicilian acacia honey. There is a point of pleasant sweetness here, but the wine is also savory and mineral.

The 2017 Sicilia Jalé is a pure expression of Chardonnay with fruit from the Vigneto del Ventaglio on the Tenuta Ficuzza property. This wine opens to a bright off-gold appearance with saturated color intensity. The bouquet is thickly redolent of honey, canned peach, toasted almond and vanilla bean. The style is big and broad, and the overall dimension of the wine feels even bigger and broader in a hot and dry vintage like 2017. This is a sophisticated and well-made effort, although such a full-bodied white might prove difficult to pair with foods that are not roasted or baked. This wine ages in barrique for eight months. Production is 25,000 bottles.

The Cusumano 2016 Sicilia Jalé (with 30,000 bottles produced) is a pure expression of Chardonnay from the family's Tenuta Ficuzza property. Executed in a Southern Mediterranean-meets-Burgundy style, the wine offers toasted almond notes with lemon preserves, honey, apricot and Golden Delicious apple. It ages in French oak for eight months. This is a medium-bodied white with moderate creaminess, smoke, ash and flint on the close. Some 30,000 bottles were released.

Cusumano has fine-tuned its Chardonnay philosophy in recent years. The 2015 Sicilia Jalé is a medium to full-bodied expression with apricot, honey, yellow fruit, candied almond and grilled herb. There are many suitable descriptors that apply to this versatile, 360-degree oak-aged white. Some 30,000 bottles were produced.