Winemaker Notes
Intense ruby red color. Spicy aromas with earthy, mineral, tobacco and pleasant wild berry notes. On the palate, it has intense tannins needed for aging the high concentration of the regional components typical to Fèlsina and Poggio a Rancia.
Professional Ratings
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Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
I am a huge fan of Fèlsina's Chianti Classico Gran Selezione Colonia and would not be surprised if this wine soon outpaces the flagship Fontalloro. In the best vintages, it offers a profound sense of elegance. The 2011 Chianti Classico Gran Selezione Colonia opens to a dark brick color with ruby and garnet highlights. This is a dark and sophisticated wine with an impressive level of complexity. Earthy tones of crushed stone are followed by dark fruit, plum, leather, balsam herb, tobacco and pressed rose. The wine is introspective and careful in the way it dispenses of its intensity. All that power emerges in well-measured doses. That slow evolution makes it all the more intriguing and arousing.
Rating: 96+
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James Suckling
This has developed attractive aromas of dried cherry, prune, leather and cigar box. Walnut and dried orange zest, too. It’s medium-bodied with bright acidity and sleek, well integrated tannins. Lovely balance of dried fruit and more savory flavors on a long finish. Drink or hold.
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Wine Spectator
A dense, taut and rugged red whose burly tannins punctuate black cherry, plum, leather, cedar and tobacco flavors. This has character though, lingering with enough sweet fruit to close out the finish. Drink now through 2022.
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.
One of the first wine regions anywhere to be officially recognized and delimited, Chianti Classico is today what was originally defined simply as Chianti. Already identified by the early 18th century as a superior zone, the official name of Chianti was proclaimed upon the area surrounding the townships of Castellina, Radda and Gaiole, just north of Siena, by Cosimo III, Grand Duke of Tuscany in an official decree in 1716.
However, by the 1930s the Italian government had appended this historic zone with additonal land in order to capitalize on the Chianti name. It wasn’t until 1996 that Chianti Classico became autonomous once again when the government granted a separate DOCG (Denominazione di Origine Controllata e Garantita) to its borders. Ever since, Chianti Classico considers itself no longer a subzone of Chianti.
Many Classicos are today made of 100% Sangiovese but can include up to 20% of other approved varieties grown within the Classico borders. The best Classicos will have a bright acidity, supple tannins and be full-bodied with plenty of ripe fruit (plums, black cherry, blackberry). Also common among the best Classicos are expressive notes of cedar, dried herbs, fennel, balsamic or tobacco.