Vigna Paganelli, Tenuta Il Poggione, Brunello di Montalcino Riserva 2015

€54.28, exclusively represented by Farsonsdirect

Il Poggione Vigna Paganelli Riserva 2015 is pipe tobacco, cocoa nibs, ripe strawberries and geranium flowers on the nose. The sweet entry is wild visciole cherries and red currants with a mid-bodied fleshiness ending in a flinty fragrant finish. Upon breathing, more intense gravel floral notes accompanied by a larger secondary profile of animal hide, hazelnuts, prunes, bittersweet herbs, grasses, coffee grind and liquorice oil, signs of deep roots and upper slope intensity. Warm scents, brilliant fruit and balsamic ethers speak of the chalky but clayey ripe but racy stellar vintage. The schists underlie the floral and dusty minerality, while a bodied tautness typical of the gallestro clays add their generous dose of dry underbrush, wet undergrowth and even white poultry game in good time. As such this is drinking splendidly even at this early stage for a broadshouldered vintage that can spend decades in the bottle at ease. The precision is there in droves marking off the south westerly fleshier wines of Sant Angelo in Colle in contrast to the northern purist refinement of Gaia or the serene Colombini and rather having more in common with the Sant Antimo star Santa Caterina holding of Ciaci Piccolomini a bit further east known for its fragrantly lush and subtly effervescent concentration.

Part of the secret to this candid complexity and high critic and popular ratings lies in the venerably old vines lying in good terroir; another part can be attributed to the probably legendary 2015 vintage where a wet and cold winter ushered in a temperamental spring which was just what the doctor ordered before a dry piping hot summer would bring all the ripeness one could wish for without losing the essential raciness bestowed by the cold nights on elevated fields. August provided a welcome reprieve not without its fair share of hail resulting in a small yield of powerfully structured and flexibly big tannins racy ripe wines. A wonderful rendition of the fabulous year.

Supplier details: Farsonsdirect has a vast selection of Brunello and Italian wines. Farsonsdirect, The Brewery, Mdina Road, B’Kara. Tel 00356 2381 4444. Web farsonsdirect.com