Winemaker Notes
Opaque ruby in color with garnet reflections, Don Luigi is a richly aromatic wine with layered notes of ripe wild berries, prunes, charcoal, cocoa, and licorice. On the palate, well-balanced tannins and a full-bodied mouthfeel make for an unforgettable wine experience.
Pair this wine with baked pasta dishes, salami sauces, farsumagru, and mint-herb-crusted lamb shank.
Professional Ratings
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Vinous
The 2017 Don Luigi Riserva smolders up with a darkly alluring mix of musky black currants, sweet sage and crushed ashen stones. This is full-bodied and nearly creamy in feel. Depths of ripe dark fruits and exotic spices swirl throughout. There isn’t a hard edge in sight, while the 2017 blends brisk acidity with lingering notes of red plum and cedar. Just a touch of grippy tannin lurks beneath the surface. The balance here is stunning, yet some cellaring may be required to unlock further aromatic depth. That said, this is a beautiful rendition of Don Luigi Riserva.
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James Suckling
Roasted hazelnuts, chocolate cherries, dark berries, bay leaves and walnuts on the nose. Full-bodied with a rich, ripe core of dark fruit, framed by firm and muscular tannins. Salty undertones. Big and delicious.
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Wine Enthusiast
Deeply chocolatey and meaty on the nose, like a long-developed molé with a quiet heat emerging at the back that gets louder on the palate, is joined by chili pepper and brick dust and then cherries and strawberries. A dark bitter-chocolate finish and sticky tannins hold it all together.
Montepulciano is the second most planted red variety in Italy after Sangiovese, though it is achieves its highest potential in the region of Abruzzo. Consistently enticing and enjoyable, Montepulciano enjoys great popularity throughout central and southern Italy as well. A tiny bit grows with success in California, Argentina and Australia. Somm Secret—Montepulciano is also the name of a village in Tuscany where, confusingly, they don’t grow the Montepulciano grape at all! Sangiovese shines in yet another Tuscan village, here making the reputable wine called Vino Nobile di Montepulciano.
This mountainous region south of Abruzzo comes in second after Valle d’Aosta as Italy’s smallest and least populated region. Wine production is largely reserved for cooperatives with the main varieties as Montepulciano d’Abruzzo and Trebbiano d’Abruzzo. Plantings of grape varieties from its neighboring region of Campania—whites Fiano and Greco di tufo and the red, Aglianico—have increased recently.