Winemaker Notes
The bouquet of this wine is intense, fruit-forward, spicy and floral with hints of red berry fruits enriched by delicate spicy notes. Warm, soft and very well balanced on the palate; structured with soft tannins and a long finish.
Professional Ratings
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James Suckling
A profound wine with vibrancy and complexity, exuding restrained cherries and raspberries, together with touches of ash and fresh orange peel. Leafiness and meaty minerality add an extra dimension. The attack is lush and ripe, with full body, velvety tannins, refreshing acidity and violet-soaked cherries to finish. Real precision here. Drinkable now, but best after 2025.
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Jeb Dunnuck
The 2020 Brunello Di Montalcino pours a medium red/garnet hue and has an open, inviting personality. The nose offers notes of sandalwood, smoky incense, ripe cherries, anise, and fresh earth. Medium to full-bodied, it’s supple and generous, with ripe tannins, balanced acidity, and salty accents that keep the finish savory and bright.
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Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
The Ciacci Piccolomini d'Aragona 2020 Brunello di Montalcino is a grippy, lifted wine with aromas of black fruit, crushed stone, grilled rosemary and lavender. The wine reveals a meaty and ripe texture with chewy fruit flavors in this hot vintage. The high 15% alcohol content makes for a less elegant drinking experience.
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Vinous
The 2020 Brunello di Montalcino is impossible to ignore, with a burst of crushed plums and black cherries accentuated by sweet herbs, hints of tobacco and wilted violets. It's round and supple with dark red fruits, autumnal spices that swirl throughout and a hint of cocoa that embellishes the close. Despite its depth and concentration, the 2020 maintains energy while coming across as wonderfully refined, leaves fine-grained tannins to resonate beneath an air of lavender and mocha.
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Wine Spectator
This red is supple in texture, evoking cherry, strawberry, floral and mineral flavors. There's also a distinctive salty taste and fine viscosity on the palate. This is balanced, with a judicious layer of tannins framing the finish. Best from 2027 through 2042. 5,566 cases made, 2,083 cases imported.
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Decanter
Overlooking the Orcia River, Ciacci Piccolomini boasts stupendous, unobstructed views of the Monte Amiata to the southeast, and the vineyards are well ventilated by breezes from the sea, just 30km away. Picked between 12-28 September, the 2020 estate Brunello harnesses the warm, luminous summer. Aromas suggest tamarind and strawberry blossom tinged with dry, dusty terrain. The palate is full and velvety, with fleshy ripe peach and persimmon gently swathed in soft, sandy tannins. Seductive and easy, it trails off with bitter orange peel. For drinking in the near-term.
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.