Winemaker Notes
Professional Ratings
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Decanter
The backbone of this Riserva comes from Gianni Brunelli's south-facing Vigna Olmo vineyard, located on the estate's Podernovone property in the southeast of Montalcino. It is their warmest site, and gives wine with plenty of structure. While not effusive at the moment, the nose hints at violets, rose and orange peel, while the palate takes a deeper tone showing iron, dark earth and black cherry. It's voluptuously textured with powerful, finessed tannins and lingering notes of stone and sweet herbs.
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Wine Enthusiast
Plum, blue flower, star anise, leather and eucalyptus aromas mingle together on this polished fragrant red. On the taut medium-bodied palate, elegant tannins and fresh acidity balance wild cherry, crushed raspberry, licorice and tobacco flavors. Loaded with finesse, it's already tempting but will develop even more complexity over the next decade.
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Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
The 2012 Brunello di Montalcino Riserva is a balanced wine that ultimately has succeeded in absorbing the excessive heat of the vintage with expert precision. The bouquet shows dark fruit aromas with candied cherry and syrupy crème de cassis. Those ripe aromas never get too heavy because the wine also exhibits polished mineral definition that adds sharpness and focus. Only 3,000 bottles were produced.
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James Suckling
Loads of red cherries to the nose here. There is a touch of jammy character and quite a herbal undertone, featuring underbrush and bracken. The palate’s honed in and manages to hold all the fruity elements within a tight tannin backbone and some driven acidity.
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.