Benvenuto Brunello 2015, the 2010 Vintage and the Best Tastings

by Luigi Salvo                                        
Benvenuto Brunello 2015, the wine event that brings together at the Montalcino Museum cloister, international wine critics for the year’s vintage tasting, Selection and Reserve wines. A challenging great event for a truthful global vision of the “state of art” of the Montalcino production.

Various tastings reveal that the 2010 vintage is a great year that will, through years, present wines of finesse and elegance. The evolution of the wines will be lengthly for the remarkable presence of tannins and acidity.  As for great vintages, there is no typical Brunello version, many with good balance while others may seem lean, but all of great interest.

Those acquainted with this micro-territory know that the different location of the vineyards imply a temporal distance of 25 days or more for the harvest and this is well evidenced in the glass.

                                       The tasting hall reserved for press

The 2010 vintage has had a regular weather trend, proper temperatures during the summer season with helpful rains in the hotter areas of Montalcino. Good production requesting quantity-sorting per plant, slow ripening without water stress has contributed great tannin quality and remarkable acidity at higher and fresher exposures.

                                            Brunello 2010 Vintage

The wines that mostly have entusiasted me were those from medium altitude areas probably for their hardness notes that anticipate great long aging potentials.

Great expectations also from the 2009 Reserve, a more uniform vintage, of good alcohol content ready and set. However tastings of great level.

Brunello 2010 Vintage  

Here the best wine tastings at the cloister but also at the Osticcio Winehouse, where Tullio kindly let me taste another fifteen wines not included at the official tasting.

Albatreti: rich nose, floral, fruity, chalk-like and mentholated. Palate freshness with fruity and mineral returns and flowing tannins.

Biondi Santi: a vintage to put aside in the cellar and enjoy thirty years from now. Nose: violets, rasberries, pepper, mentolated and tobacco notes, vibrant, long enhancing taste.

Casanova di Neri Tenuta Nuova: nose and mouth with fruit, balsam and spices, broad mouth for exuberant tannins, infinitive lenghth.

Col d’Orcia: deep nose, mouth fresh fruit, the fine tannins go along with the long sapid sip.

Fuligni: expressive nose, violet, lavander, blackberry jam, sage, anise, juicy sip with great tannin and freshness exposure.

Il Marroneto Madonna delle Grazie: penetrating violet bouquet layout, wild berries, blackberry, mint. The palate is incredibly variated by freshness, alluring tannins and great olfactory returns.

Le Ragnaie Vecchie Vigne: great fineness on nose, rose and balsamic notes, austere and deep in the mouth, breed champion.

Loacker Corte Pavone: very typical olfactorial profile, violets, dark fruit and balsamic notes, important palate with floral returns.

Mastrojanni Vigna Loreto: distinguishing nose with laurel, black cherry, officinal herbs, great fineness in the mouth, thin and delicate on final returns.

Piancornello: appealing nose with fruity sweetness, pepper, acorn and fern. Very pleasing sip, mouth-filling fresh with live tannins.

Pietroso: intensive and deep nose with violet and dark fruit, thriveful in the mouth for its composed freshness.

Poggio di Sotto: full and rich olfactory, same arrangement in the mouth, certainly enjoyable although less expressive than opulent vintages.

Salvioni: elegant olfactory of violet and rose, dark fruit, spices, mouth wonderfully fresh and lengthened.

Sesta di Sopra: pleasant nose of strawberries, rasberries, humus and underbrush. Ready palate of good duration.

Sesti: floral and sweet fruit on the nose, alluring in the mouth, full with tasty complex ending.

Stella di Campalto: fabulous olfactory, violet, rose, currant, bark, fungus, black pepper, extended and elegant on the palate, long final.

Tenute Silvio Nardi Vigna Manachiara: varied nose, floral, fruit and minerality, the taste is fresh, sapid, tannins of great elegance.

Uccelliera: complex nose, sour cherry, mint, liquorice and carob, fresh sip with prolongued live fruit, great perspectives.

Translation by: Maria Lina Bommarito