Another early start as we had a lot to do. Heading in the same direction as Tuesday, we skirted around Grosseto and arrived at Le Mortelle winery in the Maremma Toscana DOC.
Le Mortelle is owned by Antinori, who bought the property in 1999 when it was mainly growing fruit trees. Piero Antinori saw the potential for wine and embarked on a major project to build an incredible winery and plant many hectares of vines. The estate now has 200 hectares of vines of which they use 100 ha for their own protection, whist the rest of the fruit is used elsewhere. They have created a beautiful villa with restaurant, shop and wonderful outdoor entertaining space.
Barbara hosted our visit once again with her usual charm and she took us into the state of the art cellar built into the hillside, Gravity fed, with multiple levels, suspended stainless steel tanks and 860 wooden barrels – it was a joy to behold. In the same building they also have the most stunning tasting room with glorious views out onto the property. As you might expect – top class wines were duly tasted culminating in their SuperTuscan Ampio – a mere €205 per bottle!
From Le Mortelle we headed east towards Montalcino and the huge and important estate of Castello Banfi. This 13th Century castle and estate was acquired by the Mariani brothers from the USA who had an import business called Banfi. They were looking for Brunello to import and loved the area so much they decided to buy the 3,000 ha estate. By their own admission they caused a bit of consternation amongst the local populus as they reshaped hills, planted vines, dug up vines and generally shook up the usual way of life. Nearly 40 years on The Banfi estate has become one of the biggest and most important producers of Brunello di Montalcino, have created restaurants and visitor experiences, make Balsamic vinegar, prunes, olive oil and honey. It is extremely impressive and on our arrival we headed straight in for lunch. And what a lunch. Four delicious courses of beef carpaccio, wild boar pici pasta, pork neck and a honey biscotti mousse – all washed down with a great selection of the Banfi wines including two vintages of the Brunello di Montalcino Poggio Alla Mura.
From lunch we took a concise tour of their amazing cellar. Making 12% of all Brunello production requires a large facility! We were expertly hosted by Nadia who had all the answers to some excellent technical questions from the group.
Another great day!