Atmospheric Noto wine bar in a historic vaulted cellar, focused on Val di Noto Nero d'Avola, Frappato and orange wine. Intimate candlelit atmosphere on the main corso.
The list: Intimate Noto wine cellar with stone-vaulted interior; 15 by-the-glass selections focused on Val di Noto Nero d'Avola and orange wine
Tip: The stone cellar setting makes this Noto's most atmospheric late-evening pour; ask for the orange Zibibbo by a small-producer if the season's allocation has arrived.
Address: Corso Vittorio Emanuele 150, 96017 Noto, Italy, Sicily
Contemporary Palermo wine lounge in the Liberta neighbourhood with a wide Italian and Sicilian list and regular producer evening events.
The list: Modern Palermo lounge-bar with a 300-plus Italian wine list; 25 by the glass; weekly producer evenings
Tip: Vinodromo holds weekly producer tastings with Sicilian winemakers; check their social media for the calendar. The lounge setting attracts a younger Palermo professional crowd than the older enoteche.
Contemporary Catania wine lounge in the San Berillo neighbourhood with a modern aesthetic and rotating weekly by-the-glass list focused on Etna and Sicilian producers.
The list: Modern Catania wine lounge with 250 Italian labels; 20 by the glass rotating weekly; Etna DOC and Sicilia DOC prominently featured
Tip: One of Catania's newer and more design-led wine spaces; the courtyard is the main attraction for warm evenings. Etna Rosso by the glass with a charcuterie board is the standard order.
Taormina hotel terrace lounge bar with panoramic Etna and Ionian coast views, offering Sicilian wine by the glass alongside classic cocktails.
The list: Hotel terrace lounge bar with cocktail-and-wine programme; 20 Sicilian and Italian selections by the glass; Etna DOC featured prominently
Tip: Terrace lounge with one of the best views in Taormina: the Ionian sea on one side, Etna on the other. The Etna Rosso pours are surprisingly good for a hotel bar.
The tasting bar at the historic Florio bagli on the Marsala seafront: the definitive venue for a structured Marsala by-the-glass experience, from the lightest Fine to 20-year Vergine Stravecchio.
The list: The in-house enoteca bar at the Florio bagli offers the full Marsala range by the glass: Fine, Superiore, Superiore Riserva, Vergine and Vergine Stravecchio
Tip: Ask the bar staff for a Vergine Stravecchio aged 15-plus years alongside the Fine to experience the full complexity arc of Marsala in a single sitting.
The tasting room at Carlo Pellegrino's Marsala winery, one of the city's founding bagli, offering structured Marsala pours from Fine through Vergine and vintage dessert wines.
The list: Pellegrino's in-house tasting room offers the full range of Marsala DOC styles alongside the producer's dry Sicilian wines; 8 by the glass
Tip: Pellegrino's Marsala Superiore Riserva and Vergine are the standouts for quality; try the Zibibbo dessert wine alongside the dry Grillo for a full taste of the Pellegrino range.
The Marco de Bartoli estate in Petrosino outside Marsala offers the most intellectually rigorous fortified and oxidative wine tasting in western Sicily, anchored by the Vecchio Samperi.
The list: The de Bartoli family's estate tasting room pours the full range including Vecchio Samperi (unfortified oxidative), Marsala Superiore and the Josephine Doree single-cru
Tip: Vecchio Samperi is the signature pour: unfortified, perpetual-blend oxidative Grillo. It technically cannot be sold as Marsala (no added spirit) but it is conceptually the most intellectually honest version of what Marsala could be.