Italy Archives - Page 10 of 12 - Wojciech BońkowskiWojciech Bońkowski

Apenninic wine

Rúfina is a town east of Florence that produces, on just 750 ha of vineyards, a red wine from the Sangiovese grape that is labelled Chianti Rúfina. Like many Italian appellations it invites journalists to come and taste through the new vintages and so I’m in Florence to report for you on the 2007, 2008 and other trivia.

Rúfina is a zone with many assets. It is well located on the Western slopes of the Apennines, rather high by Tuscan standards (some vineyards up the 650m mark) on very good dolomitic soils. On paper, in a good sunny vintage with a prolonged autumn (Sangiovese’s favourite conditions) it should produce an exciting medium-bodied red wine with good structure, minerality and considerable ageing potential.

Yet it rarely does. The level of bad wines here – oxidised, reduced, vinegarish, dirty – is the same as everywhere else but there’s a surprisingly high proportion of average stuff: not downright bad but just devoid of any character. Or perhaps it’s not so surprising after all when you look at the figures: on 750 ha of vines there are just 23 bottlers operating (the similarly sized DOCG Barbaresco in Piedmont has 10 times that). Rúfina is dominated by large industrial players and there isn’t enough competition between the small estates to guarantee a steady increase in quality. Viticulture in many places is still primitive.

Rúfina has two world-known names: Frescobaldi and Selvapiana. The former are producing – besides an ocean of every conceivable Tuscan wine from Chianti to Ornellaia – two definitely engaging Rúfina bottlings, Nipozzano and Montesodi, which however are so much Bordeaux-styled that in a comparative tasting, anyone would pick them out of a bunch of Rúfina Sangioveses. The 1985 and 2007 Montesodis I’ve tasted over the last two days are very serious wines with considerable concentration and a fine design to the tannins but the blueberry register is so un-Tuscan. Selvapiana, on the other hand, remains a benchmark for its 1960s and 1970s Riservas – last year I’ve had a superlative tasting of the 1965, 1970, 1979 and 1982 that were second to no other Tuscan wine – but it seems to have changed its course considerably over the last years. In 2006 and 2007 the flagship bottling, Bucerchiale, is tasting puzzlingly modern and international with big extract and lavish oak notes; the finely poised structure of Rúfina is there but it remains to be seen whether it can rise to proficiency again from underneath the oak. Given Selvapiana’s track record I trust it will. The 2004 Bucerchiale is very good indeed, too.

On the side of uncompromised tradition there is really a single name: Cológnole, belonging to the same family that used to own the well-known Chianti brand of Spalletti. From an impressive estate of 700 ha in the highest crus of the appellation come structured, ungiving, mineral, majestic wines that need a long time in bottle, though the 2007 Riserva del Don is approachable now and, by a margin, my best Rúfina of this very good vintage.

There are some other dynamic estates including the modern-oriented Lavacchio and Castello del Trebbio, whose owner Stefano Casadei is doing some impressive work in the vineyards and whose Riserva Lastricato has been consistently good in 2006 and 2007, with fair weight, balanced oak and very good potential. I’ve also been happy with Fattoria di Grignano that is a bit more traditional-oriented, especially with its basic Chianti Rúfina that’s perhaps the most consistent of the bunch.

From the other 16 estates that I’ve tasted this year and last, the impressions are mixed but 2008 Chianti Rúfina from Frascole, Il Pozzo, Il Lago and Dreolino are recommended, as well as the 2007 Riservas from Travignoli, Fratelli Bellini and Il Capitano. These estates are still rather inconsistent in quality but they remain a good source of reasonably terroir-driven, continental-profiled, structured, mineral, ageworthy wine. In your diet of Chianti Classico, do make room for Rúfina from time to time. It’s well worth a detour.

In Praise of Water

I opened this bottle at a recent WINO Magazine panel tasting. It’s from the Adriatic region of the Marche in eastern Italy, made from a typical local grape called Verdicchio. Sartarelli is one of the very best producers there. Although Verdicchio has been increasingly catching the public’s attention of late, with its mineral expression of terroir and versatility with food, it remains a somewhat rustic white wine, and the appellation still has some way to go towards consistent quality and personality.

This Verdicchio dei Castelli di Jesi Classico 2008 weighs in at 12.5% and is delightful from the very first aroma that reaches the nose. It’s quite unfruity but has a wide mineralic panorama that’s really a delight to watch unfolding. A democratic mix of saline, peppery and crystalline notes, it vaguely reminds me of the granite-grown Muscadet wines of the Loire. I’ve long not encountered a more purely and directly mineral aroma in a wine – even in the recent bunch of Rieslings reviewed here.

On the palate, the impressions are equally positive. There is a light to medium body with fine balance and a hint of appley flavour, again offset by a distinctive, salty, mildly alkaline minerality. It’s a clean, consistent and engaging wine. It’s really very, very good but…

It’s obviously diluted. Thin. Watery. The flavour is rather light, and the finish is non-existing as the mild mineral flavour is washed away with dilution. This is initially quite puzzling. With a wine of such high quality of both grapes and vinification, it’s rare to see such a drastic lack of concentration. It tastes a little as if you added a part of water to four parts of wine in your glass.

The back label largely clarifies the mystery. The producer declares a yield of 120q (12 tonnes) per hectare, with a planting density of 2300 vines / ha. This translates into around 5kg of grapes per vine. That’s a lot! Fine wine is usually made with 1–1.5kg / vine, while a commercial white can climb to 2.5–3kg but I’ve never heard a vintner confessing 5kg. (Incidentally when I visited Sartarelli in 2001 the owner, amiable Mr Chiacchiarini declared they used a maximum of 80q/ha, as opposed to the outrageous appellation cap of 140q).

This wine had me reflecting on my (and our) attitude toward wine. Our perception is directly derived from our expectations. We have a range of pre-set criteria to assess the quality of a wine. For the unseasoned drinker, it might be soft tannins and intense sweet fruit (and so they pick a New World Merlot or Shiraz). Wine aficionados usually have a wide array of personal preferences that might go from strongly mineral Rieslings to lavishly perfumed Viogniers and iron-cast Tannats. However, we universally expect a wine to be concentrated. Dilution is almost always a vice (there are few exceptions: Portuguese vinho verde, French Muscadet, bottom-range German QbA Riesling might be forgiven for being ‘light’). We don’t so much like water in our wine. Even a Soave or a Beaujolais are expected to show, if not high concentration, at last ‘consistency’.

But there’s another side to the coin. Overconcentration is a serious problem in many wines around the world. Not least in the New World where climatic conditions contribute to increasingly thick wines. Palate density and lushness of texture work against what should be one of wine’s major assets (in my opinion): a sense of refreshment. I rarely, if ever, want to feed on a wine.

Thinking why Sartarelli would have decided to allow such a high yield for their Verdicchio, there’s one obvious explanation. Verdicchio might not be the most exacerbated example but it’s a grape that can reach quite some concentration of sugars. In some later harvested examples I tasted the alcohol exceeded 14.5 or even 15% (see Coroncino, for example, or the top bottling from Santa Barbara). We all complain about rising alcohol levels in wine. Among the proposed solutions are reverse osmosis or spinning cone column techniques to remove the alcohol from the solution (invasive and with an impact on flavour), harvesting earlier (for some, raising issues of ‘phenolically unripe’ flavours) or mixing a normal and earlier harvest (as above). It’s no secret many wineries in the New World and even some in Europe (where it’s strictly illegal) simply add water.

It’s easily forgotten that the least invasive and controversial way of bringing sugars (and consequently alcohol) down is to increase the yield. Less concentration in the grapes means you can easily bring the figure down by 1 or 1.5%. This Sartarelli Verdicchio has 12.5%. Sealed with a plastic cork, it’s meant to be drunk within a year or two (for something more ageworthy the same winery makes a single-vineyard Tralivio and an off-dry Balciana). And I really don’t so much mind a bit of water in my glass. At the price of a pizza (8€) this wine is a perfect solution, if you can forget your prejudice against dilution.

The wines of Tenute Folonari

The Polish wine magazine WINO where I’m one of the editors recently published a special edition on Chianti, summarising a four-day visit in situ (read about it here) and a number of tastings both in Italy and Poland. Soon afterwards I was contacted by fellow Italian writer Stefania Vinciguerra, now also Export & PR Manager for Tenute Ambrogio e Giovanni Folonari, who offered to send some wines for review to complete the latter series of articles. Who am I to turn down an offer to taste some good Sangiovese?

Ambrogio Folonari was manager for the large wine company of Ruffino where among others, he contributed to the creation of Cabreo, one of the early ‘supertuscans’. In 2000 he left Ruffino to create his own group of estates in several subregions of Tuscany. Here I look at four of these.

Toscana Cabreo Il Borgo 2006

This is a classic Tuscan label with a long record of enthusiastic reception since the mid-1980s, historically one of the early Sangiovese/Cabernet Sauvignon blends aged in small French oak. In 2000 the 46-hectare Cabreo estate in Greve remained with the Folonari family when they left Ruffino, and the bottling’s style was continued. While there’s no doubt this Franco-Italian Concorde can produce outstanding results (Querciabella’s Camartina is perhaps the top example), in recent years the concept has lost much of its appeal as its stylistic limitations became obvious. The best wines of Tuscany are Sangiovese wines that manage to combine perfume, elegance, minerality, freshness and longevity into a package full of allure. Ageing in much new oak and, especially, adding Cabernet Sauvignon with its imposing tannic presence and heavier texture inevitably compromises elegance and freshness. Increased structure and longevity is not, in my opinion and that of many Italian writers, worth the sacrifice. Sangiovese is a capricious and delicate grape and even 10% Cabernet can seriously inhibit the Tuscan grape’s personality.

This lengthy introduction is to explain my prejudice and, generally, the limited interest I have in such blends. That being said, Cabreo Il Borgo 2006 is obviously a good wine. Not such a very dark colour for 30% Cab, it is sweeter and pushier in style than the other wines here, with notes of blueberries and blackberries, but not over the top and in fact attractively perfumed with a flowery allure after airing. Quality of fruit is very good indeed and on a purely sensual level the blend works well, though it’s hardly very deep at this stage and suffers a bit from lower acidity. It’s in the mid-palate texture and on the mildly overextracted, rigidly tannic finish that the 18-month small oak regime (30% new barrels) is showing somewhat contradictory with the natural expression of Sangiovese. Yet this develops well with air and with the track record it has, I’m confident it’ll drink better in two or three years: it retains a certain evening-dress elegance of Sangiovese to be worth your (and my) while.

Tenuta di Nozzole Chianti Classico 2006

2006 is a ripe, round, wonderfully fruity vintage that I’ve greatly enjoyed in the Chianti normale (non-riserva) bottlings. This wine is consistent with the excellent vintage, and is honestly traditional in style. Showing a transparent medium ruby colour that’s typical of Sangiovese, the first impressions are good. Ripeness is fine and there’s already a mere hint of maturity (stewed plums; macerated cherries). Although this is only aged in traditional Tuscan large 3000-liter casks (botti) there’s a bit of roasted coffee in the background. A medium-bodied wine showing the ripeness and warmth of the vintage on palate. Flavours centering on Sangiovese red fruit. Good length, firm finish with some natural grapey tannins and freshness. By all means this is a serious wine, well-made and balanced if perhaps not so adventurous.

Fattoria di Gracciano Svetoni
Vino Nobile di Montepulciano Torcalvano 2001

It’s natural for a Tuscan collection of wine estates to include on in Montepulciano too, but the Fattoria di Gracciano Svetoni has been mildly underperfoming over the last few years compared to Nozzole or La Fuga. The style is similarly traditional: the Vino Nobile and the Riserva are both based on 100% Sangiovese (locally: Prugnolo Gentile) and aged in large oak. This 2001 is a good surprise. Clearly evolved and slowly maturing now, the nose shows reasonable complexity with an autumnal bouquet of dry leaves, mixed spices (anise?) and meat, plus an initial whiff of classic ageing Sangiovese almondiness. On the palate this is really rather classic in style, again mildly meaty, unfruity, herby and almondy. Acidity is subdued but balances the whole. All in all this is rather light in body now and showing a certain limitation of this bottling but I like the unforced, classic profile. This is à point now or even a year or two past prime, so drink up.

Tenuta La Fuga
Brunello di Montalcino 2001

La Fuga is located in the warmer parts of the Brunello DOCG, south-west of the town itself with a strong Mediterranean climatic influence. Unlike many of its neighbours in this sub-zone, however, the style of La Fuga has consistently been one of balance, integration and elegance rather than sheer power and record ripeness, and in recent vintages I have repeatedly placed their wine among my top 15 or 20 Brunellos. The basic Brunello sees 3 years of large oak and though tasted in the same vintage as the above Nobile, is considerably more youthful and tight, showing the ripeness advantage of Montalcino in a similarly restrained, ‘reformed traditional’ style. Ripe cherries and berries with a hint of aged Brunello herby tautness, ripe balanced tannins in a wine of good mouthfeel and structure. Can continue to age for another 5 years perhaps. This is really very convincing. With airing the restraint gives way to a bit more meaty, almost marmitey power. Really an excellent wine, and excellent value too at the 30–35€ it retails for in Italy.

Brunello di Montalcino Riserva Le Due Sorelle 2001

I don’t often get to taste this Riserva which sees no less than 5 years in cask. It’s the least obvious wine on this tasting. Initially, despite the denser and less evolved (though still transparent) colour than the Brunello normale above, I found it a little light and simple, if fruit-focused with some nice volume and weight. There was also a certain weakness from mid-palate on and a mildly diluted finish bringing no expected climax. Then with airing there’s substantial improvement with the whole gaining a proper riserva dimension while keeping a good traditional Sangiovese elegance here. It’s obviously a little (old-)woody and in a very classic Brunello style, with no aromatic fireworks. At 50–55€ it’s not so much competitive against the normale here but likely to improve with further ageing.

It has been a happy tasting. In the universe of Tuscan wine Folonari is a biggish brand, though one with a qualitative image, focusing as it does on single estates and ‘premium’ wines. What I found most comforting here was the unashamedly traditional style of the Chianti, Nobile and Brunellos. Respect for tradition, quality and fair pricing sound like a happy combination.

On the Etna (3)

Salvo Foti.

My last day on the Etna was a vineyard tour guided by Salvo Foti, a leading local viticulturalist and winemaker. Foti is consulting for some large wineries such as Benanti but is today dedicating himself chiefly to the I Vigneri project. Named after a ‘vintners’ guild’ founded in 1435, it’s an association of small estates from the Etna and some other zones in Sicily that are all cultivating bush vine (alberello) vineyards under the guidance of Foti.

We had a look at some of these vineyards in two of Etna’s distinctive vine-growing district: the eastern and northern slope. The former has a mild, maritime, fairly humid climate (precipitation is 1500–2000 mm annually, which is quite a bit), resulting in red wines that are a little lighter and fruitier; this is also the source for most of Etna’s distinctive, mineral, salt-scented white wine (mostly based on the local Carricante grape). We saw a vineyard of Mick Hucknall’s Il Cantante estate. Bush vines are planted very densely (10K vines / ha), trained on a single pole; most are terraced (few vineyards on the Etna are planted directly on slopes). Eastern Etna is a very green landscape, and if ‘biodiversity’ sounds nice to you, you’ll find plenty here: vines alternate with olive, citrus, peach, fig, hazelnut and almond trees, and lots of chestnuts (we saw a 1700-year-old example).

Palmento: step in to foot-tread the grapes here.

Il Cantante also have a nicely restored palmento, the typical winemaking structure of the 19th century when Etna was producing no less than 100m liters of wine (most of that period’s Barolo and Brunello was in fact blended with wines from the South, Etna included). Palmento is a ground floor vinification building with stone basins for foot treading, similar to the lagares of Portugal. By gravity, foot-trodden musts would pour into fermentation basins on the lower floor. Palmenti often have no cellar: the wine being shipped in the spring season following the harvest, there was never need to keep any in cask or bottle.

La Fruttiera vineyard in northern Etna, surrounded by lava outcrops.

It’s roughly a 45-minute drive on a scenic road, perched at 800m of altitude, to reach to northern slope of the Etna, where most vineyards are now concentrated in the towns of Castiglione, Linguaglossa and Randazzo. It’s quite a dramatic change in climate. Sheltered from Mediterranean influences by the Nebrodi mountain range to the north, these vineyards only see some 600mm of rain per year, and the temperature differences between day and night can reach 30C. The grape maturation period is extended, and with vineyards at 800–1100m above sea level, the harvest often takes place in late November – the latest of any Mediterranean region. Here, red wines reign supreme, with the Nerello Mascalese grape reaching qualitative heights. The wines have high acidity and fierce tannins and are apt for long ageing. Vineyards are also much older: we saw a 1-hectare parcel of 130-year-old vines, partly ungrafted: phylloxera cannot survive on the very active volcanic ash sand.

The landscape of northern Etna is very different from the flamboyant vegetation of the east. There are huge lavic outcrops everywhere, and most of the land is covered by scrub and cacti. We saw a spectacular vineyard east of Randazzo named La Fruttiera (belonging to the Tenute Romeo del Castello on which I reported yesterday) which was menaced by an Etna eruption in 1981. In the end, the lava deviated just meters from the vines, and can now be seen in the shape of a 3-meter-high wall of black stone. Scary.

The wines of Salvo Foti all share a distinctive style. They are fairly punchy with abrasive, somewhat overextracted tannins, which I felt were not supported by sufficient fruit. The yields of some bush vines we saw were surely looking excessive (typically a dozen bunches per vine, totalling an estimate of 3–3.5kg of grapes) but Foti said the vines are sturdy and can manage that. On the positive side, the wines show little or no oak and have the obvious mineral personality you expect from an Etna red. We tasted a red called Aitna from the Edomè estate: the 2005 is suffering from a bit of brett but is showing opulent fruit too; the 2006 is better, more floral on the nose, tannic and a little simple but characterful. Salvo Foti’s own label is called I Vigneri: the Etna Rosso 2005 is tonic, juicy and driven with not masses of body, the 2006 again a bit more convincing but the tannins are fiercely drying; this will need 3 or 4 years in the bottle. Then there are two special bottlings: Vinudilice 2008 is a curious rosé made from co-pressed red and white grapes from the 130-year-old vineyard at 1300m above sea level. Unsulphured with high malic acid and some 10g residual sugar, it’s wild stuff, with a touch of vegetal, foxy character to the nose and a rustic, mineral palate that I found a little raw – but many of my journo colleagues seemed to like it quite a bit. Vinupetra is Foti’s top label in red. Clearly the best wine we tasted on the day, the 2005 is floral and cherryish with some fruit sweetness on the nose, coupled with Etna’s distinctive spice. Lots of presence on the palate, still a little overtannic and rigid as per the Foti style but shows good natural concentration and expression of fruit. The 2006 is similar with perhaps a bit more harmony. Vinupetra is a good example of a mineral, unoaky Etna red with lots of potential.

On the Etna (2)

My second day on the Etna was at Vinimilo, a wine tasting event that’s been organised in Milo, a somewhat seedy town on the eastern slope of the volcano, for no less than 26 years. This edition is dedicated to the alberello – the bush vine that is the classic vineyard cultivation method around the Mediterranean. It doesn’t sound earth-shakingly interesting to the wine novice but some of the wines on show were very exciting. Bush vine cultivation requires a lot of manual work and so is usually embraced by high-end producers that often have an organic approach.

No wonder many wines were very individual. Some excessively so (the unsulphured Sardinians from the Pane Vino estate failed to thrill me), and some controversial (the Primitivos from La Morella have more than 15.5% alcohol and despite their expressive fruit, are inevitably very heady). But there were gems, too, such as the sweet Passito 2005 from the tiny island of Pantelleria made by Salvatore Ferrandes, bursting with candied orange and mineral freshness at the same time, or the serious, nocturnal, powerful Olevano Romano Cesanese Cirsium 2005 from micro-producer Damiano Ciolli south of Rome. I also liked the unsophisticated but distinctive and delicious duo of Rossese wines from Maixei, a mini-coop in Dolceacqua in western Liguria, near the French border. Rossese is an ancient grape that only grows on some 100 ha, all on high-perched terraces with bush vines. The viticulture here is so labour-intensive that Rossese as a whole is an endangered species; I just wish it can survive as its profile is really distinctive.

There were also some brilliant non-Mediterranean wines, such as the bush vine-trained Sangioveses from Fattoria Zerbina in Romagna (the 2006 Pietramora is a monster that will live at least two decades) and the amazingly mineral (and surprisingly unalcoholic) Vitovskas from eastern Friuli’s Vodopivec, including a clay amphora-macerated 2005 that is a masterpiece of balance.

In the end I tried to concentrate on Sicilian wines and especially those from Etna. (This included a tasting of local bottlings for the wider public that took place the following day). It’s not so obvious to find really good wine on the volcano. While the reds generally have the crisp, crunchingly tannic signature of the local grape – Nerello Mascalese – and terroir, there’s a lot of excessive yields and poor winemaking around, resulting in unbalanced, over-tannic wines that lack fruit. Stuff from Michele & Mario Grasso and Terre Grasso Salina is simply disastrous while Don Saro, Cantine del Regno, Maria Di Bella, Barone di Villagrande are generally uninspiring.

Good Etna wines come in a variety of styles: the red from Il Cantante (an estate belonging to the Simply Red frontman, Mick Hucknall) sees a lot of wood and a long ageing in bottle; the 2002 is rich, brooding, evolved but with plenty of power left, and an interesting wine. Fierce tannins are also the hallmark of Tenute Romeo del Castello whose Etna Rosso In Attesa d’Artista 2007 is overextracted but shows good minerality. Agostino Sangiorgi makes a few thousand bottles of a single wine, Granaccio, on the southern outskirts of the appellation; it’s a very pale wine (there are some white grapes in the blend) that is really elegant but also fiercely acidic, and will need time in the bottle too. I liked the unexaggerated fruit and distinctive spice of the Etna Rosso Valcerasa 2005 from Alice Bonaccorsi, though it’s hardly very complex. The red Etna DOC from Aítala is a bit heavy-handed but the IGT Nerello Mascalese 2007 is one of the more succulent interpretations of the Etna grape.

With top estates such as Tenuta delle Terre Nere and Passopisciaro missing, the memorable wines came from Ciro Biondi (as much the ambitious single-vineyard MI 2007 as the cheaper Outis 2006, a stylish wine with a sense of digestness and classicism that I would gladly drink anytime) and the ubiquitous Benanti, Etna’s major player, whose top bottlings both in white (Pietramarina 2005: very shy, deep, half-mineral, saline) and red (Serra della Contessa 2004: serious concentration, good minerality, calm, a little soft perhaps) I have enjoyed more in other circumstances but even here they showed obvious substance and dimension that put them above the bunch.

We tasted more Etna wines from a group of estates originated by Salvo Foti, a viticulturalist that is one of Etna’s major characters – more on these tomorrow.

On the Etna (1)

I’m on Etna in Sicily to participate in the Vinimilo event, where 26 producers from Italy, France and Spain will present wines made from bush vines (alberello). There are some great names on the roll of honour, and it promises to be an interesting tasting.

Yesterday I visited Frank Cornelissen, who is producing some of the most remarkable ‘natural’ wines anywhere. A Belgian who decided to find a terroir suitable for his ideas of making wine with no chemicals whatsoever (not only herbicides, yeast or enzymes as in organic viticulture, but also without any copper or sulphur, which is very unusual and really rather bold), Frank settled on Etna in late 2000. Since its first vintages, his flagship wine, called Magma, has attracted a lot of attention. Frank now works on 10 hectares of land in several plots on the northern slopes of Etna (where the very dry, disease-free climate makes it viable to grow vines without chemical interventions) and only produces around 15,000 bottles.

The viticulture and vinification are unusual (wines are fermented in clay amphorae on their skins, including the white Magma which stays on skins for three months!) but how the wines taste is even more remarkable. Very often, ‘natural’ wines are challenging, showing some rustic, at times unclean aromas and flavours which are often considered the price to pay for increased mineral expression and grape-generated ‘naturality’. With Cornelissen’s wines, we have none of that. After several vintages with bacterial deviations and high volatile acidity, the range of wines I tasted from 2007 and 2008 is incredibly clean and pure. The Munjebel Bianco 4 (all the wines are bottled as table wines which until this year, were not allowed to show the vintage on the label; this is from 2007) was one of the very best skin-contact whites I’ve ever tried. Partly because it shows no notes of skin contact! An amazingly expressive wine with intense notes of citrusy, tangeriney fruit, it has a powerful saline minerality but stays very clean: no lifted notes, no macerative aromas.

Frank’s inexpensive bottling Contadino 6 [2008] blends Etna’s leading grape variety Nerello Mascalese with some other grapes; it has a spicey, pomegrenatey nose typical of ‘natural’ reds with wonderful purity and natural freshness. The Munjebel Rosso 5 (a blend of 2007 and 2008) is even more engaging. It’s a 100% Nerello with a light colour and one of the most hauntingly pure fruity noses I’ve encountered: like biting into a freshly picked strawberry. Clean, mineral, refreshingly tannic (those crisp tannins reminded me of the Terre Nere 2007 I blogged on yesterday); the directness of fruit is really unique. The main wine here, Magma 6, is a 2007 single vineyard bottling from ~100-year-old vines. Much different in style, it introduces evolved, spicy, meaty notes into the bouquet, and is less direct than the other reds here. Lots of anise and coriander spice in this one, it is a complex wine that really needs some time in the glass to develop.

Cornelissen’s work is ground-breaking and shows nothing is impossible in the world of wine. The flavour of his wines is really unique. Though the production is small, the estate’s fame has started to spread, and the wines are available e.g. in the UK through Les Caves de Pyrène, and Denmark through Atomwine. If you’re interested in ‘natural’ wines you owe it to yourself to try these.

Stay tuned for more Etna reports tomorrow.

Tenuta delle Terre Nere Etna 2007

I’m off to Etna in a few minutes. I love volcanic wines, and the prospect of exploring the vineyards on Europe’s highest volcano is exciting. I’ll also be meeting with Frank Cornelissen, one of this planet’s craziest winemakers, which is even more exciting.

As per my habit of gauging my palate to the forthcoming bunch of wines I opened the Tenuta delle Terre Nere Etna Rosso 2007. Terre Nere is the Etna venture of Marc De Grazia, an influential importer of Italian wines into the US that has been one of the architects of Italian wine’s success on the American market. Interestingly, while much of De Grazia’s original catalogue represented some of the most modern trends in Italian wine (including some new French oak-aged Barolos and Barbarescos), the wines of Terre Nere show quite some respect for tradition. It’s evident by the light bricky colour of this red and also its bouquet: showing lots of finesse and a subdued minerality, it isn’t overly fruity or upfront. The red wines of Etna are often compared to burgundies (and the local grape, Nerello, is yet another ‘Pinot Noir of the Mediterranean’), and while it’s often an abused comparison, here it’s really right. The ripe, fleshy, gently spicy, hauntingly flowery aroma of this 2007 could well be that of a warm-vintage Volnay or Chambolle.

The flavour of this wine is really interesting. The balance is quite unique. Acidity is not very high but there is a mineral coolness and restraint at the core; the fruity notes echo the nose with fleshy cherries and ripe currants, and there is a perfumed flowery undertone. Surprisingly for a wine with such light body and flowery finesse, the tannins on the finish are quite sturdy. Finesse, minerality and tannins: these elements do not often go together in a red wine. This 2007, Terre Nere’s basic cuvée (they also make several single-vineyard bottlings), is really overdelivering for the price, developing very well in the glass. It’s boding well for my Etna excursion – read more about it soon on this blog.

New releases from Ampeleia

I took advantage of a spell of cooler weather to taste the new releases from the Ampeleia winery in coastal Tuscany. This interesting project operates since 2002 in, well, almost the middle of nowhere: it’s located a bit outside the zone of Morellino di Scansano, in ancient Etruscan territory. It’s really remote here, with the first town of any importance more than 20 km away. There are more wild boars and hare than humans; vines grow alongside olive trees (the local oil belongs, in my humble opinion, to the very best in Italy) on poor, rocky, volcanic soils.

The mind behind the project is Elisabetta Foradori, outstanding vigneronne from Trentino in northern Italy. So it’s no wonder the wines show a technical mastery, especially in their balanced extraction and deft use of oak. More importantly, however, the estate itself is really interesting. It consists of three blocks with an altitude ranging from 150 to 600 m. Combined with a fairly complex varietal composition – Sangiovese and Cabernet Franc dominate but there are bits of Mourvèdre, Grenache, Carignan, Marselan and Alicante (an ancient vine from the Maremma, usually associated with Grenache, and probably brought to these coasts during the Aragon rule of the western Mediterranean) – this allows for a balanced estate wine, avoiding the extremes of high-acid austerity (a danger in the higher-grown Sangioveses) and unstructured high-alcohol fruitiness (when Languedoc varieties are grown on low altitudes). It’s an example of reinterpreted (or man-made, if you prefer) terroir. Italians have a very good term: vino d’autore.

I’ve followed this project since inception, and have been impressed by how quickly it reached an excellent cruising speed. The third vintage of Ampeleia – 2004 – already is a brilliant wine, deep, mineral, brooding, fruity and structured at the same time, with plenty of interest. (It’s an excellent vintage to breech now). Here I’ve had a look at the Ampeleia 2005. Dominated by 50% Cabernet Franc and aged in 40% new oak, it’s currently going through a dumb phase (in fact it was more expressive a year ago upon release) but there’s no denying the excellent quality of fruit. Although Sangiovese makes up only 30% of the blend, it’s quite present with a bitter cherry profile, and good sustaining minerality. There’s also quite some richness and concentration, and a distinctive pink-flowery scent that I find Ampeleia’s true hallmark. Tannins are ripe and acidity is not very high, confirming the Mediterranean architecture of this. My bottles will remain in the cellar for a few more years while I finish the 2004s. At around 25€, Ampeleia is really affordable compared to some more famous labels from the Maremma.

I’ve also tasted the second vintage of Ampeleia’s new ‘second-label’ wine, Kepos 2007. Upon release, I didn’t quite like the 2006, finding it excessively rich, a little flabby and macerative. This vintage is considerably better. It’s medium-bodied with a lovely transparent colour and a blissful nose of tulips and peonies, followed by impeccably clean raspberries and a juicy, clean, vibrant palate. Very good length, too. It’s best slightly chilled and enjoyed straight after opening with no excessive airing. I’ve also opened a bottle of the 2006 vintage to see its evolution, which I must say is for the better. I’ve been a little harsh to this wine in its youth. It’s not all that overripe today, if less flowery, more peppery and alcoholic than the 2007, and also more tannic. It’s ripe but not overripe, oaky but not overoaked, fruity but not ridiculous, soft but not flabby, and another well-vinified wine with plenty of content and seriousness. Kepos is also reasonably priced at around 16€. Based on the five ‘Mediterranean’ varieties (with no Sangiovese or Cabernet Franc), I wonder how its introduction will influence the blend of the main Ampeleia label.

Anniversary wines

Sky is the limit

We’ve had an important anniversary in the family, and it was time to bring some really big guns from the cellar. I’ve poured some of the oldest wines in my collection. You don’t drink a bottle from 1938 every weekend.

It was the sort of event that takes weeks if not months of planning. Browsing internet wine shops, enquiring for offers, searching for tasting notes. Pondering a dinner menu, thinking of food & wine matches. Planning a proper ‘trajectory’ for the event. Alternative scenarios, ‘B’ plans (old bottles are often faulty). In the end I’m happy with how smoothly it went. With some helping hands in the kitchen I managed to serve 12 courses with matching wines to a party of 10, steering clear of major disasters. And it all took short of 9 hours.

I’ll spare you a description of the food – reading about bisques, soufflés and chocolates on a blog always sounds a little over-indulgent and of little usefulness – and share a few tasting notes.

Domaine Vacheron Sancerre 2006
This wasn’t served to guests – it was the cook’s aperitif. It’s quite ripe for a Loire Sauvignon, with subdued acidity but an obvious mineral character. A classy wine, though not a monster of expression. But I prefer Vacheron’s clean style in a less ripe vintage.

Pol Roger Cuvée Sir Winston Churchill 1993
A gift from the maison that I’ve cellared since 2003. 1993 was a structured vintage, but never great and now largely overshadowed by the likes of 1996. Yet top cuvées from 1993 are now in top shape – this Churchill surely is. Outstanding from the first to the last drop (not that it lasted long). Fresh, unevolved, poised and mineral. There is some underlying sweetness of dosage but also good vinosity and juiciness. The flavour is very fused, and it’s difficult to give a detailed analysis: perhaps a bit of raspberry atop the more usual notes of brioche and vanilla. Still very young – this can go on for another decade or two. Brilliant wine.
We’ve also had some other champagnes including a crisp, engaging Brut Réserve Rosée (two years since dégorgement) from Philipponnat, whom I find very much on the upswing of late.

Perrier-Jouët Blason de France 1959
I got this bottle from the Barolo–Brunello shop in Germany. The level was a little low and there was some heavy sediment so I knew the risk (and the very amiable owner Stefan Töpler made it clear). Such old bottles are always a hazard. Here, the cork was completely loose and the wine awfully oxidised with no bubbles. Oh well.

Domdechant Hochheimer Domdechaney
Riesling Spätlese 1983
I visited this estate on the Main near Frankfurt in April 2005, and we’ve had a great conversation with owner Dr. Franz Werner Michel. At lunch, this 1983 was served, and enhanced by Michel’s engaging stories, it tasted as good as any mature Riesling ever did. Upon saying our goodbyes we were offered a bottle each of the same wine. As usually with precious wines, it was waiting in my cellar for an ‘occasion’. A very mature wine, with some storage problems perhaps (cork was completely soaked) showing in a musty, unclean nose, though underneath there is some good Firne [aged Riesling] character. Sweeter than expected on the palate, but there is also a greenness to the sweetness and acidity. This bottle showed a bit unremarkable but was surely short of perfectly stored.

Jean-Marc Brocard
Chablis Grand Cru Bougros 1998
As expected from the youngest wine of the afternoon, no problems whatsoever with this bottle. It was part of a mixed case of older vintages I bought at the estate last October. It’s only 35€ – a bargain for a grand cru of any age, let alone a decade old. When tasted in Chablis, it showed very good saline minerality but also quite some oak sweetness. Yet served with food (a saffron-flavoured poule à la crème), the oak disappeared almost completely. It was a lesson in real-life food & wine matching. Crisp, linear, mineral, statuesque almost, showing power and reserve. An excellent wine. Dregs retasted the day after were less exciting, less poised, built around the butter and vanilla I remembered from October. Not bad at all on a hedonistic level though.

Domaine Huët
Vouvray Le Haut-Lieu demi-sec 1961
I got this bottle a couple of years ago from the excellent Bacchus Vinothek in Germany. The price seemed low (50€), and these Vouvrays are known for their ageing potential so I took the plunge. Looking at the intact label and the immaculate cork it’s clear this bottle was at best recorked (and likely refilled?), and at worst it’s not a 1961 at all. It’s an excellent aged Vouvray but it really tastes too young and dynamic to be 48 years old. The colour is also a bit suspect, with green tinges (unlikely in a wine of this age?) to a medium golden whole:

Aromatically it’s dominated by a taut, austere reductive character: not quite stinky but very herby and hayey, with a bit of richness that reminded me of an old Tokaj. On the palate it is very structured with mouth-puckering acidity effectively covering the sweetness, although the demi-sec character is quite pronounced for a wine of this alleged age. There’s also some alcohol (only 12% on the label). A big, structured wine that’s fairly immobile and could easily survive another decade. If you don’t need it to be a genuine 1961 it’s a very fine bottle for the money.

Thierry Allemand Cornas Chaillot 1996
A bin-end from Vienna’s Unger & Klein, sold at 32€ instead of the more usual 60€. Deepish colour especially at core, for the age. It starts fairly barnyardy and reduced on the nose but fortunately isn’t bretty, and with some proper airing this blows off, revealing a fairly engaging nose of crushed raspberries and good vinous depth. Some mild age on the palate but this is far from old. Palate on entry is also pleasant: vaguely varietal and peppery, but the progression is highly disappointing. Basically this just weakens and disappears on the palate. No structure whatsoever: modest acidity (though enough for freshness) and no tannins. There’s a beguiling purity about the whole thing and I can’t say it’s uninteresting but I wouldn’t pay the normal price for it. Perhaps the vintage’s lowly reputation in the northern Rhône is justified after all.

Cosimo Taurino Brindisi Riserva Patriglione 1975
This was another bin-end from a German shop, so obscure they didn’t even know how to price it. Eventually I got away with 35€. In its recent vintages it’s a southern Italian classic I very much enjoy, essentially a modified Salice Salentino (based on the Negroamaro grape) made with an amarone-like technique of drying the grapes to raisins. Fill level is quite and the cork is excellent (certainly recorked) but storage is an issue, as the wine is showing very aged. There’s a leathery, cooked-fruity, vinegary, almost maderised character that some of my diners disliked, though with a bit more experience in Apulian wines I find it fairly typical. This has aged on acidity (and some greenness) but lacks superior dimension or definition. On the other hand a Brindisi red at age 33 in this shape is surely not a bad achievement.

Giacomo Borgogno & Figli Barolo Riserva 1947
It’s another Barolo–Brunello bottle from Stefan Töpler. I paid 149€ for it and whenever I can justify the expense again, I’ll be sure to order some more – an outstanding bottle of wine.
I have had numerous older Barolos from the house of Borgogno, including a fantastically refined 1958, an impressive, brooding 1961 and a gentler 1967. But all came from the producer’s cellar, and were all opened and checked for faults, then refilled with the same wine, recorked and relabelled. Basically you get a Borgogno guarantee that the wine is in good shape. This makes the producer’s prices (the 1961 was 105€ a year ago) even more of a ridiculous bargain.

This bottle was different in that it came from a private cellar and was not refurbished. I can’t tell you much about the cork as at my first attempt to pull it out (with a 2-blade opener instead of a corkscrew) it smoothly dived inside the bottle. But the wine was in fine condition and I must congratulate Mr. Töpler for his sourcing. It’s rare to find wines in such pristine shape even from the 1960s. A moderate amount (i.e., little for the age) of fine-ish sediment. The colour is not bad, surely quite evolved but actually a fairly poetic complex hue ranging from clean ruby at core to amaranth-orange:

The one disappointing thing here is the nose. I usually enjoy Barolo as much for its fantastically floral, deep bouquet as for anything else, but here it’s a little lifeless, showing modest notes of raspberries, dominated by a green, briney, animal, damp-cellary, mildly over-the-hill character. But palate is very fresh and alive, with beguiling coffeed complexity. Very good length too. Perhaps not the ultimate Barolo experience (1961, with its remaining power, is more impressive) but very interesting for sure. Last sips at room temperature are really tannic (!), mineral, impressively long and so very much alive.

Kopke Porto Colheita 1938
A half-bottle that was distributed to journos who attended a presentation of old colheita ports from the Sogevinus companies (a holding that was established in 2006 and regroups some of the most prestigious port brands: Barros, Burmester, Cálem and Kopke). No bottling date but likely to have been 2007, shortly before the event. Colour is a transparent brown-amber. For volatility and a salty, marmitey character this is close to a madeira in style. A vestige of pink fruit, crystallised sugar, minor saltiness underneath; not really nutty (unlike most of these old colheitas). Moderate sweetness, high acidity, good (but not extraordinary) length, this is a good example of an aged colheita but frankly unexceptional. The flavour is a bit low and there’s only reasonable complexity; this tastes like a mid-1970s colheita could (and not a greatly structured one at that). Perhaps just an inferior vintage here, as the 1937 was one of the stars of the said tasting.

The wines of Giovanni Panizzi

Another box of samples. 9 bottles from the stellar estate of Giovanni Panizzi in San Gimignano, Tuscany. I’ve followed Panizzi’s progress since my first trips to Tuscany in 1999, and today place him at the very top of this interesting appellation.

The local speciality here is the white Vernaccia grape, made into a dry wine that’s classified as DOCG Vernaccia di San Gimignano. Vernaccia shares some characteristics with Orvieto (see here for a recent post): a structured white wine with good minerality and ageing potential, it has a bit more acidity and substance than Orvieto while usually avoiding the latter’s 14% alc. Vernaccia, especially when aged, can resemble a good Chablis, to the astonishment of the unprepared.

This series of recent releases showed Panizzi in excellent shape. The Vernaccia di San Gimignano 2007 is a model of its appellation with vibrant citrus over sea salt and limestone; a more mouth-watering and stomach-waking white I cannot imagine. The shortly oak-aged Vernaccia Vigna Santa Margherita 2008 is head and shoulders above past editions of this label (which I’d found a little clumsy): oak adding a half-layer of peach richness without obliterating the tense salinity of the straight Vernaccia. The Vernaccia Riserva 2003 is a very serious bottle indeed, though I discourage you from opening it too soon: wait for the Chablisian echoes of Jurassic oysters and clams to unravel in a decade’s time, when the honeyed-toasted bready barrique melts away. Good drinking pleasure but mixed thoughts about Il Bianco di Gianni 2004, a somewhat predictable Vernaccia-Chardonnay-oak blend that lacks originality and shows how substantially Panizzi’s handling of oak has improved in four years: where the Santa Margherita was allusive this is a bit too sewn-wood-drying.

Most interesting among the whites, in a way, was the Vernaccia Evoè 2006. Made in a historical style with a long two-month maceration of skins in oper wooden vat, this wine follows the modern ‘fashion’ of macerated whites without going over the top. The typical bouquet shows notes of ground pepper, apple skins, citrus with really good minerality (not an easy thing to obtain in this style), while the palate is broad, rich, bold, nicely fruity too (stone fruits), although the balance is a little controversial: acidity is low (again, a common characteristic of skin-contact whites) and there is what I identify as residual sugar. Alcohol is moderate (13.5%). A very engaging and not too expensive (16€) bottle that confirms Panizzi’s position at the forefront of Vernaccia today.

Panizzi also belongs to the premier producers of red wine in this predominantly white-wine district. In the past San Gimignano has limited itself to quaffable Sangiovese da tavola and made no claims to steal the show to its neighbour, Chianti (Colli Senesi in this case). In 2006 red wine pressure was acknowledged through the establishment of the DOC San Gimignano Rosso, even though many wines remain classified as IGT (as e.g. the very delicious Campore from the Casale Falchini estate). Panizzi has both: the Vertunno 2005 is a Sangiovese-driven DOC that’s full of rustic Tuscan charm, crying for a wild boar pappardelle. Rubente 2005 is a neat IGT Cabernet Sauvignon with very modern winemaking, exuding confidence in the cellar if in the end not different from all those warm-climate Cabernets around. The top red Folgóre 2003 mixes the two in a way: Cabernet and Merlot add lead-pencilly tannins and plushness while Sangiovese lends (some) freshness and Tuscan character; add lavish oak and five years of age and you get a kind of Pauillac-ised Brunello. Although it’s from a hot vintage that was notoriously difficult to balance in Tuscany, this bottle can easily age another 5 years. The style of the reds is modern and rich and while they lack the intellectual interest of the whites here, it’s really very solid winemaking.

For the pink-inclined there is also the well-made and serious Ceraso Rosa 2008.