Winemaker Notes
Try pairing with roasts and split-roasted meats, grilled meats, game, braised meats, and aged cheeses.
Professional Ratings
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James Suckling
A delicious red with balance and finesse and so much complexity and beauty for the vintage. Full body, fine tannins and a chocolate, mineral and ripe-fruit aftertaste. Very refined. Drink or hold.
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Wine Enthusiast
This elegantly structured red opens with aromas of dark-skinned berry, sunbaked earth, new leather, thyme and a whiff of pipe tobacco. The balanced, polished palate offers wild cherry, strawberry, vanilla, coffee and star anise alongside integrated tannins. It's already accessible and will offer fine drinking over the next several years. Drink through 2021.
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Wine Spectator
Eucalyptus, wild herb, cherry, strawberry and mineral aromas and flavors are the hallmarks of this distinctive red. Elegant and supple, offering a firm structure and refined tannins. Very long on the detailed aftertaste, where a coffee accent lingers. Best from 2018 through 2030. 2,500 cases made.
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Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
The 2011 Brunello di Montalcino Vigna la Casa is more defined and sharply etched compared to the Brunello annata. Yet, it also shows some of those green, bramble-like aromas that I described in the base Brunello. The wine is tonic, crisp and delineated by forest berry, wild blueberry and black currant. Balsam herb and leather appear at the rear. The mouthfeel is compact and streamlined but it should flesh out further with a bit more time in the bottle. The wine is definitely too young to drink now.
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.