Winemaker Notes
Brilliant ruby red with a touch of garnet. Intense aromas of ripe cherry rounded by scents of citrus and spices, wild herbs, earthy hues. On the palate, the wine is soft and balanced with delicate tannins and vibrant acidity, long persistency.
This wine is a perfect match for roasted or grilled red meats, game, venison, stewed wild boar. Excellent with mature cheeses.
Professional Ratings
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Wine Enthusiast
The quiet, elegant nose features delicate aromas of cherries, strawberries and figs, along with weightier notes of earth and stone. The fruit elements turn more decadent and syrupy on the palate, but a subtle citrus bitterness bolsters that flinty, earthy undertone to maintain balance.
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James Suckling
This has an intense nose of incense, toasted walnuts, mocha, maraschino cherries and some menthol. Full-bodied yet remains agile with firm, gently chewy tannins and bright acidity. Try in 2025.
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Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
Packaged with its dark blue label, the 2018 Brunello di Montalcino displays a very specific character that I always recognize in this wine. The house style is a callout to local winemaking tradition in which there is a slightly wild side to the cherry fruit and forest floor aromas. The oak spice is smoothly integrated into the medium-weight texture, and there is earthy spice and root at the back. The wine closes with freshness, bitter plum and rusty metal.
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Wine Spectator
Though vibrant and packed with intense raspberry, cherry, hibiscus and earth flavors, this red is also solidly built, with dense tannins leaving a strong grip on the long, crisp finish. This has plenty to like; just be patient.
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.