Meeting 367 -"Estates of Antinori"
Friday 11th October 2013 Neville Hall, Waltham St Lawrence
Quote: 'The Antinori family has dedicated its efforts to the
production of wine for over six centuries, ever since the year 1385 when Giovanni di Piero Antinori enrolled in the Arte
Fiorentina dei Vinattieri, the Wine Guild of the city of Florence
In all of this lengthy period, the family has always directly managed this activity with innovative
and often courageous choices, but always operating with an unaltered respect for tradition and for the territory from which it drew its roots.
As Marquis Piero Antinori likes to say: "deep roots play an important role in our operating
philosophy, but have never hindered our desire to innovate".'
While Antinori now has interests across the world, including N America,
and more recently Malta, Duncan confined himself to a good showing of the Antinori wines from the length and breadth of Italy.
Starting with a light, easy drinking fizz from Lombardia he followed with
a Chardonnay from the deep south in Puglia and a Vermentino from back up north in coastal Tuscany. Both were typical of the
grapes on the nose and had good fruit with a clean acidic finish. But the best of the whites was the Orvieto
from Umbria. Nettles and herbs on the nose, it showed a complex body with plenty of smooth balanced fruit.
It fully deserved the 8 points it received.
The reds started with a relatively straight forward Tomaresca, a
blend of Negroamaro, Primitivo (or should we now say Tribidrag!) and CS, and the Fiulot, a young wine from Barbara d'Asti.
An easy drinking pleasant wine not meant for keeping.
The rest of the reds demonstrated the characteristic quality of the Antinori range. The Villa Antinori
Rosso (they call it 'the house wine' - how many restaurants come near to having a house wine of this quality and price?).
The rich heavy fruit nose and body with a bit too much tannin suggested that this need a few years yet to be at it's best.
But with food it was eminently drinkable now. Originally Antinori's Chianti Classico, this wine melded into an IGT by reducing the
sangiovese proportion down to 55% and adding Cabernet and Merlot. But the Chianti Classico tradition was maintained in
the following Classico Riserva. 70% sangiovese, the rest Cabernet and 12 months in American oak, produced a full damson
fruit wine with balanced soft tannin and a very long finish. Still a long way to go. Before we got to the final
blockbuster, we tasted a Bordeaux look-alike, Il Bruciato, from Guado Al Tasso, part of the Bolgheri holdings in
S Tuscany. Generally very full fruit but lighter tannin, it didn't quite match up to the wines either side of it.
But we are talking about Antinori Reds so taking it out of this context maybe we would not be so critical!
And then we came to Tignanello. The wine currently on sale is the 2012 but this was the 2000 kindly given to the Branch by Ian Rushton.
Still young looking with a hint of purple in the colour, this wine was smooth, full heavy plum fruit with almost a hint of
sweetness on the palate. Fermented in wood and stored for 12 months in Hungarian Barriques, it's clear why this is called a Super Tuscan.
Charlotte came up with her usual range of excellent food.
As has now become traditional with our tasting of Italian wines, many dishes were served throughout the evening to
accompany the wines. Suffice it to say, it was all too much as usual but we did our best to get down most of it!
In no particular order, the dishes were:
Mixed olives
'Trevi black' celery soup dressed with Italian fennel sausage
Brushetta with toppings - green herb, cannellini bean and sundried tomato,
black olive tapenade, truffle, hot salami, vine tomatoes and caperberries
Slow roast shoulder of pork with fennel and garlic, Taiedda potato and vegetable bake
Castagnaccio - rich chestnut cake
Pecorino with peppercorns and chilli, apples, figs, dried figs and dates.
Morbidi almond biscuits
Altogether a very full, pleasant and informative evening.
PS My only disappointment was the unfortunate absence of
Luigi Fioretti (Antinori's Ambassador in the UK). I listened to him at a recent Antinori Dinner in Oxford.
He is a larger than life (literally!) Italian who is a superb and funny speaker. I think he and Duncan would have made
a brilliant double act that would have been informative as well as humorous. (JF)
| Aperitif: Montenisa, Franciacorta Brut NV | 19.27 | 6+ |
| White Wines (1) Tomarevca Chardonnay, Puglia |
7.51 | 7 |
| (2) Vermentino di Blgheri, Guado al Tasco | 13.97 | 7 |
| (3) San Giovanni Orvieto Classico Superiore, Castello della Sala, Umbria | 12.85 | 8 |
| Red Wines: (4) Tomesca NePriCa, (Negramaro, Primitivo, Cabernet) Puglia | 7.51 | 6+ |
| (5) Fiulot, Barbera d'Asti, Prunotto | 9.55 | 6 |
| (6) Villa Antinori Rosso, IGT Toscana | 13.50 | 7.5 |
| (7) Marchese Antinori Chianti Classico Riserva | 17.50 | 8 |
| (8) Il Bruciato, Buado Al Tasso | 17.34 | 7 |
| (9) Tignanello 2000 | 90.00** | 8+ |