Brunello di Montalcino is the highest-priced, most famous vino rosso in Tuscany – and these are the finest of its highly liquid 2003 vintage.

By: Anthony Giglio, Chris R. Morgan
June/July 2008

Sangiovese grapes are essential to the making of the wines we know as chianti. And since Tuscans began blending their grapes to make chianti some 600 years ago, they've discovered that the finest ones thrive near the hilltop town of Montalcino. In fact, so passionate are the Montalcini about the superiority of their sangiovese -- which they call brunello -- they got the Italian government to allow them to call their wine "Brunello di Montalcino" instead of chianti, thus creating a "Super Tuscan" wine long before the famed cabernet- and merlot-blended chiantis started using that name in the 1970s to set their wines apart from, well, great brunellos. Make sense?

No?

Yeah, it's confusing. Indeed, the only effective way to clear things up is to taste a brunello alongside a chianti and behold the former's superior quality and unique expression. The Montalcino grapes simply acquire a fullness and intensity rarely seen in the north; the wines, as a result, age exquisitely. Sounds like a great commodity to trade? It was -- some 20 years ago, before collectors began buying them with vigor. Since then, the number of vines has doubled, as has the amount of brunello bottled. So, too, have the prices. In 1990 there were just 87 producers of brunello; today there are 200. That's a lot of brunello. To help you broker this highly liquid market, we offer the finest of the 2003 vintage.

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