2015: Brunello’s Fairy-Tale Vintage

The 2015 vintage is a historical year for Brunello di Montalcino that nobody should miss. The wines show impressive precision of vivid fruit, fine tannins and freshness in acidity despite their ripeness and richness which makes them some of the most exciting in years.

Winemakers in Montalcino were never better prepared to produce outstanding wines in a year like 2015 with their exactness in their vineyards and cellars from fine-tuned canopy management and crop thinning to optical sorting and soft fermentations. So many wine producers in Montalcino made excellent wines in 2015.

My son Jack and I have tasted 187 2015 Brunellos so far this year and the quality is terrific. We rated about half 95 points or more – classic quality. The wines will be officially available in the market beginning in January 2020. But we wanted to give you a preview of the best Brunellos from the vintage, with some already available on a pre-arrival basis from wine merchants.

“The words for the 2015 vintage are density, tannins and freshness,” says Roberto Guerrini, whose family owns Eredi Fuligni. He made the wine of his lifetime in 2015. We rated it 100 points. “The wines are rich, yet they are fresh at the same time. It is a great year.”

‘Depth of fruit and endless length’

As I wrote last month in a blog following a trip to Montalcino this summer, so many of the wines we tasted showed a beautiful depth of fruit and endless length. They are dense and rich wines with great structure of tannins yet they remain finely textured and comprehensive in the mouth. The seamless tannins seem to melt into the wine – a characteristic I have never seen in my 36 years visiting the area as a wine critic and journalist.

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By: James Suckling | JamesSuckling.com