Winemaker Notes
Brilliant ruby red with garnet reflections, fragrant perfumes of maraschino cherry, cinnamon and nutmeg, vanilla and anise. The taste is full and balanced with sweet and soft tannins that confer a good aromatic persistence.
An excellent wine for drinking with the finest roasted red meats and poultry, braised in Aglianico.
Professional Ratings
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James Suckling
Elegant and refined expression of Taurasi aglianico with red and black berries, against a background of clay-like minerals and a touch of leather. A citrus note adds freshness both on the nose and palate. Full-bodied with firm, fruit-coated tannins that remain vivid rather than chewy. Long, fresh finish. Drink from 2023.
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Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
From a hot and dry vintage, the Feudi di San Gregorio 2017 Taurasi sources its fruit from a site with volcanic soils at a breezy 450 to 550 meters in elevation. As expected, the quality of fruit is slightly darker and baked with dried blackberry, plum and scorched earth. This full-bodied red offers volume and tight structure.
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Vinous
The 2017 Taurasi leads off with a mentholated herbal lift that evolves into a blend of musky black currants and suggestions of clove. This flows across the palate, sleek and with medium-bodied weight, as citrus-tinged plum and balsamic spice slowly saturate. It finishes long with a web of fine tannins that tug at the cheeks as tangerine and crunchy mineral tones gradually taper off. The tannin management is fantastic here, especially considering the warm and dry conditions of the vintage.
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Wine Enthusiast
Ripe black-skinned berry, underbrush and baking spice aromas lead the way. The firm palate offers mature black plum, clove and cinnamon alongside fine-grained tannins. Drink through 2027.
Making its home in the mountainous southern Italy, Aglianico is a bold red variety that is late to ripen and often spends until November on the vine. It thrives in Campania as the exclusive variety in the age-worthy red wine called Taurasi. Aglianico also has great success in the volcanic soils of Basilicata where it makes the robust, Aglianico del Vulture. Somm Secret—The name “Aglianico” bears striking resemblance to Ellenico, the Italian word for "Greek," but no evidence shows it has Greek ancestry. However, it first appeared in Italy around an ancient Greek colony located in present-day Avellino, Campania.
A winemaking renaissance is underfoot in Campania as more and more small, artisan and family-run wineries redefine their style with vineyard improvements and cellar upgrades. The region boasts a cool Mediterranean climate with extreme coastal, as well as high elevation mountain terroirs. It is cooler than one might expect in Campania; the region usually sees some of the last harvest dates in Italy.
Just south of Mount Vesuvio, the volcanic and sandy soils create aromatic and fresh reds based on Piedirosso and whites, made from Coda di Volpe and Falanghina. Both reds and whites go by the name, Lacryma Christi, meaning the "tears of Christ." South of Mount Vesuvio, along the Amalfi Coast, the white varieties of Falanghina and Biancolella make fresh, flirty, mineral-driven whites, and the red Piedirosso and Sciasinoso vines, which cling to steeply terraced coastlines, make snappy and ripe red wines.
Farther inland, as hills become mountains, the limestone soil of Irpinia supports the whites Fiano di Avellino, Falanghina and Greco di Tufo as well as the most-respected red of the south, Aglianico. Here the best and most age-worthy examples come from Taurasi.
Farther north and inland near the city of Benevento, the Taburno region also produces Aglianico of note—called Aglianico del Taburno—on alluvial soils. While not boasting the same heft as Taurasi, these are also reliable components of any cellar.