Winemaker Notes
Brilliant straw-yellow color. Aromas of white flowers, with spicy notes and hints of just barely ripe fruit. On the palate, substantial yet fresh, with citrus hints and almondy notes.
Professional Ratings
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Wilfred Wong of Wine.com
COMMENTARY: The 2019 Rocca di Montemassi Calasole is a compelling and lovely white wine. TASTING NOTES: This wine offers attractive aromas and flavors of ripe apple and rustic spices. Try it with linguine and clams in a light garlic sauce. (Tasted: June 1, 2021, San Francisco, CA)
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Decanter
Savoury and restrained, possessing aromatic stone fruit, pineapple and ripe cantaloupe, with a tangy, bitter lemon and quinine twist.
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James Suckling
A focused white with sliced apples, pears and some peaches. It’s medium-bodied, crisp and clean. Drink now.
A fantastic, aromatic white grape that grows with great success in Sardinia, Tuscany and in lesser proportions on the island of Corsica. Somm Secret—Vermentino is thought to be genetically identical to Liguria’s Pigato grape and Peidmont’s Favorita. It comprises a large proportion of the whites in southern France where it is called Rolle.
One of the most iconic Italian regions for wine, scenery and history, Tuscany is the world’s most important outpost for the Sangiovese grape. Tuscan wine ranges in style from fruity and simple to complex and age-worthy, Sangiovese makes up a significant percentage of plantings here, with the white Trebbiano Toscano coming in second.
Within Tuscany, many esteemed wines have their own respective sub-zones, including Chianti, Brunello di Montalcino and Vino Nobile di Montepulciano. The climate is Mediterranean and the topography consists mostly of picturesque rolling hills, scattered with vineyards.
Sangiovese at its simplest produces straightforward pizza-friendly Tuscan wines with bright and juicy red fruit, but at its best it shows remarkable complexity and ageability. Top-quality Sangiovese-based wines can be expressive of a range of characteristics such as sour cherry, balsamic, dried herbs, leather, fresh earth, dried flowers, anise and tobacco. Brunello, an exceptionally bold Tuscan wine, expresses well the particularities of vintage variations and is thus popular among collectors. Chianti is associated with tangy and food-friendly dry wines at various price points. A more recent phenomenon as of the 1970s is the “Super Tuscan”—a red wine made from international grape varieties like Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot, Cabernet Franc and Syrah, with or without Sangiovese. These are common in Tuscany’s coastal regions like Bolgheri, Val di Cornia, Carmignano and the island of Elba.