Montepulciano d'Abruzzo 2015

The wine in this vintage

Warm and steady across much of Italy, 2015 also gave the hills of Loreto Aprutino healthy, well-ripened grapes, ideal for a structured red such as Montepulciano. Valentini's Montepulciano d'Abruzzo 2015, made in a year judged worthy of the estate, is a wine of great fullness: black cherry, blackberry, ripe plum, violet, liquorice, tobacco and an undertone of forest floor and spice alternate in a deep, ever-changing bouquet. The palate is broad and juicy, with abundant yet ripe tannins, a freshness that supports the wine and remarkable persistence. This is a wine that needs to breathe at length in the glass; it is satisfying to drink today, yet it can still be cellared with confidence, gaining complexity over the years.

The producer · Valentini

In Loreto Aprutino, on the hills of the Pescara province between the Gran Sasso massif and the Adriatic, the Valentini estate has been a legend of Italian wine for decades. The architect of that fame was Edoardo Valentini, who died in 2006: a cultured, reserved man who devoted his life to proving the potential of Abruzzo's native grapes, until then thought capable only of simple wines. Today his son Francesco Paolo carries on his work with the same discretion. The philosophy is radical: respectful farming, low yields and extremely strict selection, so that only a small share of the grapes ends up bottled under the family name, with spontaneous fermentations and long ageing in large oak casks. The result is a Trebbiano d'Abruzzo regarded as one of Italy's greatest whites, a deep, long-lived Montepulciano d'Abruzzo made only in years judged worthy, and a cult Cerasuolo. Rare, hard-to-find wines of extraordinary ageing capacity.

Technical details

Producer

Valentini

Region

Abruzzo

Country

Italia

Type

Rosso

Vintage

2015

When to drink

Hold, still evolving

Sizes

75 cl, Magnum 150 cl, Case of 6 × 75 cl

eWibe code

0980215