(TEL) The SuperTuscan Hobby Project That Turned Into One of the Best Investment Wines in History

[AKR]

The SuperTuscan Hobby Project That Turned Into One of the Best Investment Wines in History
2021-03-31 10:24:24.721 GMT


By Victoria Moore, Wine correspondent

(Telegraph) -- Sassicaia – the original SuperTuscan – celebrates a 50th
birthday of sorts this spring, with the release of the superb 2018 vintage, a
blend of (mostly) cabernet sauvignon and cabernet franc. Named after the stony
ground of its vineyard in coastal Tuscany, Sassicaia was first commercialised
in the 1968 vintage, although it was made for years before that for family and
friends.

Back then, the notion of making a wine from Bordeaux varieties in the kingdom
of sangiovese was practically heresy. Now SuperTuscans are investment wines
and the Bolgheri DOC, which looks out across the Tyrrhenian Sea, is renowned
across the world for its reds made largely from international varieties,
including cabernet sauvignon, cabernet franc and merlot.

“My grandfather was a great lover of French wines and when he was studying in
Pisa at the university he used to drink some cabernet sauvignons with the
Salviati family, who made them,” said Priscilla Incisa della Rochetta at the
UK launch of the new vintage of Sassicaia and its sibling wines, Tenuta San
Guido Guidalberto and Tenuta San Guido Le Difese. “After he moved to Bolgheri
with my grandmother he asked them for some plants and began to experiment with
cabernet sauvignon and cabernet franc so Sassicaia was really born in those
years around the Second World War.”

Wine was a hobby project: the main business of the estate was rearing
thoroughbred horses while also cultivating traditional crops, and making olive
oil. But years later Priscilla’s father, Nicolò, had the idea of making
something more of it and together with his cousin, Pier Antinori (of the big
wine family that makes Meghan Markle’s favourite wine, Tignanello),
transformed the family wine into a more serious proposition.

One of the great appeals of Bolgheri reds lies in the way they marry the
structure and aromatics of cabernets sauvignon and franc with a sensibility
that is utterly Italian.

Sassicaia 2018, which is imported by Armit, is a beautiful wine, in a cooler
and therefore more elegant mould, with concentration but also great finesse.
It’s one for the cellar right now – this is a wine I would like to see in ten
more years. Buy it and store it, and for drinking now, try the most junior of
the Tenuta San Guido wines, Le Difese 2019 IGT Toscana which is made from 55%
cabernet sauvignon and 45% sangiovese and is gorgeously aromatic, all dried
herbs and black olives.

Another Bolgheri red that I heartily recommend – completely unrelated to the
Sassicaia wines – is Grattamacco Bolgheri Rosso 2019 Italy (Majestic, £24.99;
Berry Bros & Rudd, £26.95). These are wonderful wines for Easter lamb.

Sassicaia 2018 (around £1,050 per case of six, in bond, see wine-searcher.com
for details)

Tenuta San Guido Le Difese 2019 IGT Toscana (£90 per case of six, Armit)