Barone Ricasoli 2010 “Brolio” Chianti Classico

Posted by Keith Wallace on Dec 17, 2012 in Wine Reviews | 0 comments

The Castello di Brolio (the castle of Brolio) has been in the Ricasoli family since the 12th Century. Two of the family’s top wines (they produce a  total of 11) are labeled as Brolio. The top luxury bottling is named “Castello di Brolio” which is their premier Chianti Classico, and this second bottle, named “Brolio”.  The primary difference between the two is the amount of time left in oak (9 months versus 20 months).

This bottling is memorable in it’s own right, in a very modern and international style. The fruit is right up front, playing down the typical rusticity of  a Sienna vineyard. New oak flavors of sweet vanilla and cinnamon are evident on both the nose and palate. Other notes include black tea and anise on the nose, with just a touch of new car smell. On the palate, flavors of cherry and plum are the clear winners, and a finish that rides out in style. Rich and voluptuous  this wine is luxurious in composition.  A highly pleasurable bottle of red.

Michele Satta 2005 Cavaliere (Super Tuscan)

Posted by Keith Wallace on Dec 5, 2012 in Wine Reviews | 0 comments

A voluptuous Sangiovese with a slight salinity that veers to black olive but pulls back into a beautiful layered expression of chocolate. A glass-staining beauty with plump blackberry and kirsch notes, and just a whiff of Cuban tobacco in the mid palate. One of the best Super Tuscans of the vintage.

Michele Satta’s vineyards are located in Castagneto,  just south of  the Tuscan town of Montepulciano.   The wines are fermented in open oak  barrels. Maceration of the fruit continues in the barrels for another twenty days, with the cap of the wine pushed down by hand several times a day. The end result is worth the effort. Robert Parker of the Wine Advocate gave this 92. Our original rating was a 91-93, but this wine has surpassed our expectations: it has aged wonderfully. We are increasing our rating to 94-95 (which translates to 5 stars at Epikur).

Available at Bacchus Selections.

About SUPER-TUSCANS

This term was coined in Italy in the 1980s for the Cabernet-boosted vini da tavola blends that were infinitely better and far more expensive than Tuscany’s traditional Sangiovese based wines.

Passitivo 2010 Primitivo, Puglia (Italy)

Posted by Keith Wallace on Dec 4, 2012 in Wine Reviews | 0 comments

Judging wines isn’t a linear job.  It’s not really about grading all wines as a spectrum of quality. We don’t judge a Red Zinfandel from Russian River next to a bottle of Lafite Rothschild. They may get the same 90-point rating, but that doesn’t mean they are the same. We judge wines against  there peers.

I mention this because I am rating this $15 dollar bottle of wine from Southern Italy as high as I have rated some much more expensive wines.  This is a remarkable bottle of Primitivo, one of the best in the past few years. Perhaps only the Tormaresca Torcicoda has risen to this level of quality.

Full bodied, the wine offers up aromas of lavender and vanilla, along with with Amarone-like notes of black tar and raisin. On the palate, it starts of with fruit cake and fresh figs, leading into black cherry and a port-like note of smokey plum. The finish goes to anise and chocolate and then lifting into fresh fruit and an edge of rustic charm.  This is a fun and rich bottle of wine that offers a lot of pleasure.

One of the reasons for the high quality and balance of this wine stems from the unique way in which it is grown.  Primitivo ripens very early in Puglia,  often as early as August. The winemaker does what is called  “il giro del picciolo” which roughly translates to “strangle the leaf”.  Instead of harvesting, the stem leading to the grape bunches is twisted, which effectively starves the fruit of water and nutrients.  The grapes then start dry on the vine: this is a unique method that creates wine very similar to an old-school Amarone.  Ironically, the method also allows the wine to retain a fresh quality, despite being harvested as raisins.

Available at Bacchus Selections

ABOUT APULIA (PUGLIA) and PRIMITIVO

Apulia’s exceptionally fertile plains make it one of Italy’s largest wine-producing regions, but until the 1970s most of its wines were seen as fit only for blending or for making Vermouth. Because of this, most Apulian producers chose to try to rid themselves of this lowly reputation, bringing about a radical transformation of their industry. A great number of very ordinary wines are still produced, but various changes have greatly improved the situation. Irrigation programs, the introduction of lower-yielding, higher-quality grape varieties (including many classic French ones), and a move away from the single-bush cultivation, known as alberello, to modern wire-trained systems, have led to both new wines gaining favor and some traditional ones showing renewed promise. The most important grape variety is now the Primitivo, which has been identified as the Zinfandel of California and is the earliest ripening grape grown in Italy.

Feudi di San Gregorio 2007 Companaro

Posted by Keith Wallace on Oct 17, 2012 in Wine Reviews | 1 comment

Since its origins in the ’80s, Feudi di San Gregorio has been one of the leaders in quality in southern Italy. Over the past few years, they have been ramping up quantity, and for the most part the wines haven’t suffered. It  does mean that the pricing has softened, thanks to the general wine glut and the depressed economy.

This is a lush style of white wine, like a big fat Chardonnay.  The aroma is smoked mineral and peaches, and it’s full bodied to the point it feels like honey and tastes like a ripe pear. It has the freshness to keep it interesting, though, and turns it’s richness to a tableau of sorts: a cornucopia of fresh fruit with a side of fruitcake.  There is an edge of earthiness and iron in the finish that makes this a very interesting white wine.

I wouldn’t serve this with dinner, but it’s a fantastic wine to be enjoyed by itself.

Castello di Fonterutoli “Ser Lapo” 2008 Chianti Classico Reserva

Posted by Keith Wallace on Oct 10, 2012 in Wine Reviews | 0 comments

The Mazzei family have a very long history in Chianti, and have expanded their winemaking operations considerably over the past few years, including forays into both Sicily and the Tuscan coast. However, no winery bears their name, which is very curious: in many ways, they created the Chianti we know and love.

Since the 15th century, the family has owned Castello di Fonterutoli. Their history goes even further back, to the 13th century when Ser Lapo Mazzei recorded the sale of his Chianti: the first known reference in history.  For that, Ser Lapo is consider the great-grandfather of Chianti.

If Ser Lapo is the great granddaddy, then his descendant Lapo Mazzei can be considered the father of modern Chianti.  By the 1950′s he well into his quest for creating a great wine. At the time, Chianti was an anemic red with an acrid soapy aftertaste with little fanfare, either at home or abroad. He began by modernizing vineyards and importing new vines from Bordeaux. He also introduced the use of  oak barriques instead of  chestnut.  These three changes are now the underpinning for most Chianti Classico produced for the past 25 years.

This wine holds true to that lineage: a depth of flavor that hones to both the past and future of Chianti. The oak is rich and dominant with sweet vanilla  pushing through salted mocha and caraway. The tannins are lean and grainy with black and red fruits under fresh leather and savory licorice. This is an excellent of modern Chianti Classico Reserva.