Cerbaiona, Rosso Montalcino

Cerbaiona, Rosso MontalcinoI've been having a hard time keeping up with samples from Cerbaiona. The management prefers to release the wines a bit later and shies away from the classic en primeur or critics' tasting events. Indeed, most years I just end up buying the bottles that I review, when I can find new vintages in retail. It's a true pleasure to return to a simple, honest, fresh and pretty wine such as the 2015 Rosso di Montalcino. It offers enormous purity and finesse,

dark fruit flavors and soaring floral character

This has a distinctive elderflower and citrus character that really does identify the wine as English

The Garden Series is designed to highlight Shiraz from a diversity of appellations (or GIs as they are known in Australia)

This is very firmly constituted and a wine that should really not be touched for at least a decade

but then my sentiments cooling off with each encounter

this is much more deeply pitched on the nose with game

The wine feels like Port on your palate

Intense and vibrant

aged in 50% wood but only a “small” percentage is new)

full bodied

Touches of honeysuckle

and indeed Rivetti notes that pHs are generally higher in his 2006 Barbarescos than in the 2007s