Montalcino’s Brunello: A Taste of Tuscan Perfection

Perhaps sheep, goats and a cowbell-clad donkey don’t greet everyone heading down the dirt and gravel road to La Magia vineyard in Montalcino, but they should. Even as a particular long-horned goat unflinchingly stared into our car, my four wine-loving friends and I had to chuckle at the setting’s perfection: a Tuscan sun illuminating the verdant pastures and vineyards, a charming cowbell clinking in concert with the leaves that gently swished in the breeze, the smell of lavender and herbaceous air – how could fabulous wine NOT be produced in this environment?

And sure enough, as we made our way to the unassuming vineyard known as Fattoria La Magia, we were soon to learn just how great that wine could be. Winemaker and owner Fabian Schwarz greeted us and casually took us to a hillside overlooking his grapes with a breathtaking view that also included a distant Benedictine St. Antimo abbey that Charlemagne built so many centuries ago. While it is far from being the biggest vineyard in the world (approximately 52 hectares of which you can see all of it from this one vantage point), here is a winery that has flourished, exporting its wine around the world.

“Do you ever get sick of this view,” I said while transfixed by the gentle vineyards with the abbey beyond and a backdrop of the majestic Apennine Mountains.

Fabian chuckled and said, “No, but sometimes they look even better after I have been away traveling.”

The Brunello everybody loves

Most wine experts will say that Brunello is Tuscany’s greatest wine varietal; others say it is the best in all of Italy. Roughly translated as “nice dark one,” this is a red wine lover’s dream with its smooth tannins and robust dark fruit and leather flavors. Brunello di Montalcino was awarded with the first DOCG (Denominazione di Origine Controllata e Garantita) in 1980, which means it can only be grown and produced in Montalcino, that everything used to make the wine must also come from Montalcino and that it can only be made from 100 percent Brunello grapes, which are a perfected clone of the Sangiovese grape that dates back to the mid-19^th century. Fabian explained that Brunello must age at least two years in oak barrels and a minimum of four years overall as part of the DOCG rules. Riserva Brunello ages at least two and a half years in oak barrels and five years overall.

Like many of the local winemakers, Fabian and his wife offer tastings and tours by appointment, and depending on what you taste and whether you would like some charcuterie alongside your wines, the price ranges between 10 and 18 Euro ($14-25 US).  The tour starts in the vineyard, goes through the cellars and finishes outside under a shady tree, where the family dog is quick to nestle herself comfortably under the tables as well.

It’s this kind of environment that allows one to learn about the challenges a winemaker has and see the parts of winemaking that drive his passion. My friend’s simple question about Fabian’s wine label revealed that when he was just four years old, an artist had come to visit his father to design that year’s label for the Riserva wine. However, on that occasion the four-year-old created art that proved to be longer-lived, still adorning all of La Magia’s wine bottles rather than just one vintage like the work from the more experienced artist.

A satisfying tasting

So, La Magia, like most of the wineries in Montalcino has found the benefits of location and have clearly specialized in Brunello. Like most winemakers in this area, Fabian specializes with the three wines of Montalcino: Rosso, Brunello and Brunello Riserva. While winemakers save their best quality grapes for Riserva and lesser quality grapes for Rosso, a lot of the rules can change depending on a good or bad vintage. Many reviewers will note that in bad vintage years, these wines can prove to be exceptional values. As winemakers downgrade their best grapes, the Rosso’s quality improves. Asking Fabian about which years were good years for Rosso and good years for Riserva proved mind numbing. Compounding the confusing list of vintages was the fact that as we tasted his three wines, they all had impressive aroma, taste and color, despite ranging in price from 12 to 45 Euros/bottle.

Bad quality Rosso?  Not from this place was the conclusion we drew. Yes, the Rosso lacked some of that depth and tannins in which the Brunello and Riserva bathed your tongue, but it definitely held its own as a hearty, earthy, robust red wine. We bought two bottles of each wine for the rest of our Tuscan vacation. However, we couldn’t resist opening them in threesomes to continue comparing and contrasting.

My husband likes to say that the best wines are always best because of context – you’re having a good time, surrounded by friends or family, or the setting is just perfect. Well, for six traveling friends in Tuscany, we decided La Magia has some damn fine context.

– Ivy F. Kupec

 

@ugust Wine Club: Hot wines that can handle the heat

Making wine is like gourmet cooking. We start with the finest ingredients, grapes farmed by growers who put as much attention into their vines as I do into the wines.

– Robert Rex, Winemaker, @Arroba Winery

Since 1972, Robert Rex has been making wines, most famously at his own Deerfield Ranch winery, where he touts the virtues of wine blending to create the perfect wine. This seems utterly appropriate when one learns he is also a masterchef who can wax on about a stock made from 100 percent red wine, a whole lot of vegetables and lovingly roasted beef bones. Thankfully, his artistry, creativity and considered opinion are behind the relatively new wine label @Arroba, which promises Robert Rex quality wines @ a more affordable price. Continuing a traditional French winemaking style, Rex has helped to craft impeccable wines for @Arroba, including a chardonnay and cabernet that wine critics quickly note taste considerably above their price range.

The trendy, social-media centric tone to @Arroba wines, with ads that mimic iPhones and Twitter-esque marketing language, indicate these are iconic wines for today, even when temps are soaring. So, @Arroba puts the “inspiration” in the Hinsdale Inspired August Wine Club: a brilliant Chardonnay made for sipping on your terrace or screened-in porch and a Cabernet Sauvignon richly perfected to pair with your favorite barbecue fare.

@Arroba 2009 Santa Maria Chardonnay

Here is a Chardonnay whose oakiness doesn’t weigh one down in the summer heat. Demonstrating a fine balance of oak aging and buttery goodness, the @Arroba Chardonnay is refreshing, bringing the cool Pacific breezes of the central California coast seemingly right to your wine glass. The golden color and green hues introduce a nose of young harvest fruits and a bit of autumn spice. Swirl it in your glass, and you will be rewarded by the way this young wine opens up and provides lush fruit flavor and a perfect balance of acidity. Perfect for taking on a picnic with its screwtop seal, this wine demonstrates impressive craftsmanship that comes from 100% barrel fermentation and 11 months of aging in artisan coopered French oak.

@Arroba 2007 Sonoma County Cabernet Sauvignon

Get out your best steaks for this deep purple Cab that is tempered with 8% Merlot and 2% Cabernet Franc, making for a rich, velvety, berry-luscious wine. Aged in French and American Oak barrels for almost three years, this fruit-forward wine is full bodied with flavors of cherries and blackberries.  Again, Rex craftsmanship with a whole-berry fermentation process allows the wine to retain an opulent fruit flavor with hints of violets and cedar on the nose. Soft tannins and low acidity give the wine balanced structure, making this wine stand out with your favorite grilled foods.

 

Money, Markets and Mykonos: My Big, Fat Greek Vacation

Alexis Zorba: Damn it boss, I like you too much not to say it. You’ve got everything except one thing: madness! A man needs a little madness, or else…

Basil: Or else?

Alexis Zorba: …he never dares cut the rope and be free.

Basil: …Teach me to dance….

– From Zorba the Greek

One travels to Greece with a certain degree of expectation. Sparkling blue seas should catch the sun and blind you with Greece’s unstoppable beauty. The scents of garlicky, grilled souvlaki and the sounds of energetic lute music should follow you as you travel through quaint, narrow streets lined with quaint stucco buildings. And you should encounter mustached men gulping ouzo and freely dancing their own version of Zorba’s Sirtaki.

So, when my good, good friend and Cellar Door manager Alex Shamsuddin and I spent eight days in Athens and Mykonos, that was the movie playing in my head as we began our travels. While we failed to see Anthony Quinn or have anyone teach us the secret to life, we did hear firsthand experiences about Greece’s recent economic woes, discover Athens’ central market, and become mesmerized by Mykonos’ splendor.

A taste of reality

The first thing we experienced in Greece was a taste of economic despair—not ours, thankfully. Coming into Athens, our hotel was conveniently situated near Syntagma Square, just downwind from the Acropolis and central to everything, including a huge protest. Greece’s economic hardships were hard to avoid in conversations with the Greeks we met. I lost track of the number of people inquiring about jobs in the United States, asking how to emigrate and relaying their own personal financial woes. You would think in that case tourists would find bargains everywhere, but just the opposite was true. Starbucks would have looked like a bargain compared to our coffee, which was selling for 5 euros/cup (about $7). And if the “Best Bartender in Greece” was telling us the truth, he earned the equivalent of $35/day – that doesn’t buy too many cups of coffee!  So, with all this bad news and warnings of pickpockets everywhere, it was a little hard to get comfortable in Greece…at first. However, Greece is a bit of paradise. And if one believes Zorba the Greek, this is a resilient culture that will rise above. Despite its recent travails, Greece is undeniably full of history, culture, and color and still makes for a restful vacation.

Going to the meat market

Jet lag can drive a person crazy. Unable to sleep, Alex and I decided on our second day to explore Athens – cigars in hand – at its least crowded – 5 a.m. And at that time of day, The Agora or central market was where the action was. We found butchers grinding, carving and macerating every meat you could imagine. Fishmongers, too, were sorting and cleaning fish, and flower vendors and vegetable sellers also received their day’s delivery of fresh, colorful produce. The air there was thick and gamey but the sights spectacular. Peach-colored squash blossoms that are sometimes filled and sometimes just lightly batter-fried were nestled among a brilliant array of colors in the many vegetable and fruit kiosks. The next day and the day after we returned to gaze upon the trays of goat heads or cured pork legs hanging along walls – literally the place was a feast for the senses. We would munch on olives and cheeses as we simply enjoyed walking through the market, listening to the Greek banter. On our second trip there, we discovered the Agora had cafeteria-like restaurants where locals were consuming ouzo even in the morning. We joined in, selecting spiced meatballs that went perfectly with a big glass of Greek frosty beer.

Sure we made it to the historic and massive Acropolis that looms above Athens. And through all our exploring we happened upon the bartender who had been voted best in all of Greece and made the most alluring cocktails. But likely the most memorable part of Athens will be the time spent in the Agora.

Magical Mykonos

Mykonos is the kind of Greece that people dream of. It’s what we see in movies, and when one is there, it’s hard to believe that these narrow gray stone-paved walkways are what they refer to as streets. Whitewashed buildings contrast against the azure sky and matching azure-painted balcony rails, window shutters, and doors. At night, the streets fill up with those who have spent their days sunbathing. Unlike the majority of other men traveling in pairs in Mykonos, we were not wearing skin-tight white t-shirts, hanging inside or outside of the discotheques whose house music radiated down the street, drawing in male European tourists like a Pied Piper.

No, Alex and I instead reveled in the pastoral side of Mykonos. It was back to nature for us with the gorgeous blue water, the blinding white sand, and, oh, the nakedness. No, we weren’t naked, but many around us were—even those guys who would later be sweating on a dance floor rather than lingering in a nice restaurant like we would. Yes, food in Mykonos was lovely, and surprisingly not always seafood. At Namma Barbecue, we had an assortment of grilled meats that went perfectly with an ice-cold glass of crisp, slightly salty Muscadet. However, one of my best meals was at Mouragio where you ordered an appetizer and selected your specific fresh fish from a case that they grilled simply with salt, pepper and olive oil. It was flaky, light and so fresh—one of the best fish dinners I have ever had. I’ve tried to replicate the process at home, but honestly, maybe I need the Greek sun and sand to do so.

After five days in Mykonos, I felt sated, re-energized and ready to return to my own hot Hinsdale sun. It had been a relaxing week, but I couldn’t help thinking of Zorba’s words again: “No more fooling around, not in this place. We’ll pull our pants up and make a pile of money.”

– Sean Chaudhry

 

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