Intense marroon with a sliver of garnet at the clear rim. Meaty, almost Vitamin-B bottle-funk blows off readily, exposing crisp, grainy texture of fruit solidified with copious acid. Sharp and nasal-clearing of bouquet, wet-concrete barnyard lies well with distinct vegetal along mellow berry lines. It smells SOOOO Italian: savory dank brilliance juxtaposed against modern blackberry and verve.
Blisteringly infantile and acridically thin in the mouth, dark layers only hinted at beneath all the acid and rash youth. This wine will never make the droves addicted to Paso and Napa pancake syrup smile–only true lovers of structured European wines need apply here. It is unforgiving and brittle: it cloaks its fruit beneath piles of brash structure and gritty angst. Decanted rigorously it s l o w l y starts expressing beauty easy to miss in early draughts. Marinara, onion and garlic spring to mind–bread to sop up the spilled sauce–the finish so shrill as to cut ANY richness of food reduction. An unforgettable wine: buy a case–drink one a year. The ripeness is there; the backbone is there; the overall balance is there for a decade-plus of reward.
2019 I VERONI ‘Quona’ Reserva Sangiovese Chianti Rufina DOCG Toscano Italy 14.0
Stephen McConnell 