Sono Montenidoli "Il Garrulo" Tuscany, Italy 2021

FROM POLANER SELECTIONS:

THE WINE: Sangiovese, Canaiolo , Trebbiano, Malvasia. Harvested by hand. Certified organic. Ferments in stainless steel with a short time on the lees before bottling. Short time in stainless steel followed by a few months in the bottle before release.

THE PRODUCER: Elisabetta Fagiuoli is pivotal figure when talking about the last 50 years of Tuscan winemaking. In fact, 2020 marked her 50th vintage produced! Many people think of Vernaccia di San Gimignano as a simple white wine meant to be consumed fresh and young, though the whites of Montenidoli prove that does not have to be the case. While the wines show well on release, they greatly improve both with extended aeration in the glass or decanter as well as with bottle age.

Elisabetta Fagiuoli travelled a great deal in her youth, from Europe to southeast Asia and Japan. It was not until 1965 that she came to Tuscany and fell in love with the Montenidoli estate which she was able to purchase with the help of some money from her grandmother. When she found the estate, both the vineyards and olive groves were in total disrepair. As in many parts of Tuscany, many of the peasants who had previously lived on and worked the land had moved to the cities to follow jobs. This left many of the historic estates of Tuscany abandoned and in disrepair. Luckily, there were still some old vines in good health. From then on, she began working towards restoring the property to its former glory.

The vineyards at Montenidoli are relatively high, between 400 and 700 meters, with soils and microclimate that are actually suited to both white and red grapes. The vineyards for her Sangiovese are planted at the highest elevations, with iron-rich soils and a base of limestone. Interestingly, in many of the vineyards, there are marine fossils strewn throughout, much like you find in Chablis, as well as huge blocks of white limestone that have been excavated from the vineyards. In fact, it is this marine sediment & limestone that ultimately led her to realize the potential of the property for white wine, as in the beginning, Montenidoli produced only red.