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 give 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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Tasting Panel
This juicy, gorgeous wine offers aromas of mocha, fig, twigs, and black cherry. On the palate, Luxardo cherries coated with Mediterranean scrub are addressed by keen acidity and tannins reminiscent of tart pomegranate and grainy persimmon. Notes of new leather, nutmeg, and blackstrap molasses are unleashed through the finish of dark chocolate-covered raspberry,
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James Suckling
A medium-bodied red with blackberry, wet-earth and graphite aromas and flavors. Fine tannins and a beautiful finish. This is a polished and fine Taurasi.
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Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
The 2018 Taurasi is velvety and darkly saturated with an extracted taste profile that puts black plum, blackberry preserves and tarry flavors front and center. The wine presents a veritable wall of those black fruit aromas, but it also softens with time, thanks to budding tertiary tones of spice, cured leather and earth. The leather aroma lingers longest, thanks to 18 months in oak. Some 100,000 bottles were released.
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Vinous
Dark as night, the 2018 Taurasi displays a deep red, nearly purple color as it smolders up from the glass with an earthy blend of flowery undergrowth, ashen stones and animal musk, giving way to black currants. This sweeps across the palate with textures of pure silk that usher in masses of mineral-drenched red and black fruits, all guided by brisk acidity. A salty flourish lingers under an air of violet florals as the 2018 finishes spicy, long and structured, leaving a note of tangerine that adds lovely contrast. Patience will be required yet also rewarded.
Rating: 92+ -
Wine Spectator
There's a savory, sanguine edge to the bright mix of ripe black raspberry, red currant, tobacco and tar flavors in this red, which is firm and tightly meshed, with dense, fine-grained tannins holding sway on the spiced finish. Best from 2027 through 2038. 1,500 cases imported.
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.