Winemaker Notes
Ruby red wine color, tending toward garnet with age, this wine offers complex, penetrating aromas of wild berry fruit. On the palate, it is dry, firm, harmonious and delicate.
Great with roasts, grilled and spit-roasted meats, game, braised meats and aged cheeses.
Professional Ratings
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James Suckling
Lots of rich fruit here with baked blueberries, sliced oranges, spiced cherries, some toffee and lemon verbena. Full-bodied with firm, velvety tannins. Creamy and opulently spiced yet well-integrated and feels weightless. Delicious finish. Drink from 2024.
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Wine Enthusiast
The nose strikes an acrobatic balance between floral and leathery, with aromas of roses, tar, black cherries, cloves, bitter orange and earth. The nose is more fruit forward, with notes of cherry and currant, along with balancing undertones of licorice and dark chocolate. Dense, dusty tannins create a warm, lingering finish.
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Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
Proprietor Elisabetta Gnudi Angelini's signature is featured on the front label of the Caparzo 2018 Brunello di Montalcino. This wine is steady and firm with black fruit, spice, cured tobacco and grilled herb. You get nice concentration and plush tannins in this wine. In a nod to the winemaking team, it also shows a more relatable 13.5% alcohol content. This is good choice from your local restaurant wine list.
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Jeb Dunnuck
Leading with medicinal herbs, the 2018 Brunello Di Montalcino opens up to ripe cherry lozenge, menthol, and dried flowers. It is medium-bodied, with dusty tannins and notes of fresh red berries, tea leaf, and dried earth. A straightforward and clean red, it is a lot of value to drink over the next several years.
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Wine Spectator
As this red develops, aromas of black cherry, blackberry and wild thyme pick up tobacco and spice flavors. Tips to the dry side in the end, but food will take care of that. Best from 2024 through 2038.
Among Italy's elite red grape varieties, Sangiovese has the perfect intersection of bright red fruit and savory earthiness and is responsible for the best red wines of Tuscany. While it is best known as the chief component of Chianti, it is also the main grape in Vino Nobile di Montepulciano and reaches the height of its power and intensity in the complex, long-lived Brunello di Montalcino. Somm Secret—Sangiovese doubles under the alias, Nielluccio, on the French island of Corsica where it produces distinctly floral and refreshing reds and rosés.
Famous for its bold, layered and long-lived red, Brunello di Montalcino, the town of Montalcino is about 70 miles south of Florence, and has a warmer and drier climate than that of its neighbor, Chianti. The Sangiovese grape is king here, as it is in Chianti, but Montalcino has its own clone called Brunello.
The Brunello vineyards of Montalcino blanket the rolling hills surrounding the village and fan out at various elevations, creating the potential for Brunello wines expressing different styles. From the valleys, where deeper deposits of clay are found, come wines typically bolder, more concentrated and rich in opulent black fruit. The hillside vineyards produce wines more concentrated in red fruits and floral aromas; these sites reach up to over 1,600 feet and have shallow soils of rocks and shale.
Brunello di Montalcino by law must be aged a minimum of four years, including two years in barrel before realease and once released, typically needs more time in bottle for its drinking potential to be fully reached. The good news is that Montalcino makes a “baby brother” version. The wines called Rosso di Montalcino are often made from younger vines, aged for about a year before release, offer extraordinary values and are ready to drink young.