Red Wine

I was recently watching Oprah which featured Dr. Oz and the author of the "Blue Zone" book. The Blue Zone book speaks of all 5 places in the world that feature the most centenarians. One of the blue zones mentioned on the show was Sardinia, Italy. The item of most interest to me was the red wine made from the Cannonau grapes that are native to that area. I decided I had to try the wine and I set out to find a source. Here in Florida, I was able to find it by contacting ABC Fine Wine and Spirits. It is approximately $15.00 bottle and well worth the money. It is a smooth red wine without a bitter aftertaste. Check out the information below:

Mehmet Oz, a prominent heart surgeon and professor at Columbia University's College of Physicians & Surgeons, is well known for touting the health benefits of various ethnic diets. In a recent column in Esquire magazine, Oz highlighted Japanese green tea, Indian curry spices and, yes, Sardinian wine.
Sardinia, a large Mediterranean island that belongs to Italy, is the source of red wine that "contains five to 10 times the procyanidins -- powerful antioxidants with cardiovascular benefits -- of most other varieties," Oz wrote.
Whether or not it's the wine they drink, Sardinians are famously long-lived, with an unusually high percentage of centenarians -- not just compared to the United States, but to other parts of Italy. A 2005 report in National Geographic credited the island's isolated gene pool, little changed over the centuries; a Mediterranean diet rich in fruits, vegetables and meat and cheese from grass-fed animals; physically active jobs such as farming and animal husbandry; and red wines made from a little-known, indigenous grape called cannonau.
Because it is separated from the mainland by more than 100 miles of water, Sardinian culture, cuisine and wine are quite distinct from the rest of Italy, reflecting centuries of invasion by outsiders including Phoenicians, Greeks, Romans and Spaniards.
Even today, some islanders speak a dialect of Catalan, evidence of early invaders from that part of Spain. And it was from the Spanish, apparently, that Sardinia adopted some of the unusual wine grapes that have come to define its viniculture, including cannonau, a relative of Spain's garnacha grape (grenache in French).
The wine Oz was talking about is cannonau. It may very well be good for your heart, but I can think of plenty of other reasons to drink it as well. Cannonau yields red wines with unusually complex flavors, ripe and very earthy. They go great with any number of red meat dishes, the heartier the better. And the wines are cheap, even by Italy's standards.
Sardinia may be the least recognized among Italy's 20 wine regions, though it is one of the most exciting, producing wine varieties and styles found nowhere else. The island's indigenous grapes include cannonau and monica, among the reds, and nuragus, torbato and vermentino among the whites, though the latter is said to be similar to the rolle grape of France's Provence region.
Sardinian wines may not all possess the antioxidant effects of cannonau, but they're consistently well made and very food-friendly. The fact that they're different than anything from California, or other parts of Italy for that matter, makes them a cool choice for entertaining.
Perhaps the only drawback for Americans is availability, or the lack thereof. When's the last time you saw a Sardinian wine at your local liquor store?
Fortunately, two of the best Sardinian brands are distributed in New Jersey.
Argiolas, imported by Winebow Inc. of Ho-ho-kus, makes a fine vermentino called Costamolino ($13) and a delicious cannonau called Costera ($15). Another red called Pedera, made from the monica grape, is a soft, medium-bodied wine that matches nicely with a wide variety of food. The current vintage is 2006.
The other Sardinian label with good availability in New Jersey is Sella & Mosca, the best known of the island's wineries. I recommend the 2006 Sella & Mosca La Cala Vermentino ($14) and the 2004 Sella & Mosca Cannonau Riserva ($14). The brand is imported by Palm Bay International of Boca Raton, Fla.