Wine Profile
Tasting Notes
Our 2008 La Castellana is an elegant, complex wine, with good depth, volume and balanced with very velvety tannins providing length and a smooth, lingering texture.is a purple-tinged wine with concentrated black fruit aromas. The flavors are dense, with plum, sweet cherries, black currants and earth and spice in the mouth. Feminine, with sweet, focused red plum notes and hints of cranberry from the Sangiovese mingle with the expansive, spicy black pepper and black cherry of the Bordeaux varietals.
Ratings
90 pts, Robert Parker ♦ 93 pts, Wine Enthusiast Magazine, Steve Heimoff - “Made from Cabernet Sauvignon and Merlot, with a splash of Sangiovese, this super Tuscan-style blend is powerful in every respect. It shows massively concen¬trated blackberry and crème de cassis flavors, with notes of dark chocolate and spices. The oak is rich and toasty, the tannins thick but as soft as silk, and the acid¬ity lively enough to give all this richness a racy hit. Best enjoyed now and over the next 2–3 years for sheer Napa exuberance.”
Awards
Gold Medal - 2013 American Fine Wine Competition
Winemaker Notes
The 2008 La Castellana is a purple-tinged wine with concentrated black fruit aromas - blackberry, black raspberry, and black cherry, with a creamy, rich, toasty oak bouquet. The rich structure and flavor of the wine is complemented by a lively acidity for excellent food pairing, and worthy of cellaring for up to 8-10 years.
Food Pairing Notes
This elegant "Super Tuscan" wine goes well with lamb, sausage, grilled steak, Venison or a great pasta dish such as Pappardelle with wild boar (Dario's favorite).
Other Notes
Beginning as early as the late 1960s, a few winemakers in Tuscany attempted to make more complex red wines by planting the classic Bordeaux red grape varieties. While they experimented with these wines as separate varietal blends excluding the regional variety, Sangiovese, they also tried omitting the small amount of the white variety “Malvasia bianca” traditionally added to Sangiovese to produce “Chianti Classico” in lieu of a blend with Bordeaux varietals (namely, Cabernet Sauvignon and Merlot) The term "Super Tuscan" describes a red wine made in this new style.