2016 Brunello di Montalcino

Alessandro Mori of Il Marroneto has gone from strength to strength from vintage to vintage. Not only did 2016 and 2019 reach great heights, but Mori was able to cull magic from the difficult 2017 and 2018 vintages. The 2021 Rosso di Montalcino Ignaccio is a racy and refined wine that provides both immediate satisfaction and balance for the cellar. The 2021 Rosso di Montalcino Selezione Iacopo, a selection made by Mori’s son from his Brunello barrels, is once again a gorgeous interpretation of house style and place. This is a wolf in sheep's clothing, boasting the Rosso name while overdelivering in every way. As for the 2019 Brunello, the most difficult thing will be to keep our hands off of it long enough to give it the time it needs to mature. Very much in Il Marroneto style, this wine is already showing beautifully with vividly ripe fruits and sweet spices, all on a framework of pure elegance. For all of its upfront appeal, waiting is absolutely recommended. The 2019 Madonna delle Grazie remains a wine of meditation, yet with an energy about it that is seldom seen. I’ve tasted this from cask multiple times and bottle in Italy and the United States. The last bottle was left open for two days and only got better. The only thing that surpassed it was the 2016 that I revisited recently, a wine that flirts with perfection.

“Always traditional, but different hands, different wines.” This quote from Alessandro Mori stuck with me while tasting through the new releases of Il Marroneto. It was a comment Mori made as he expressed the respect that he has for many of his famous neighbors, all on the north side of the Montalcino hill. For Mori, a producer who is traditional in every way, his theory is to allow the vineyard to fully express itself from vintage to vintage, but that the imprint of the winemaker is paramount. In the case of Il Marroneto, this is a gentle and fully natural approach, but it is certainly not hands-off.

Through the late 1980s and into the 1990s, Mori watched the entire way of thinking in Montalcino change to appeal to the consumers and wine writers of the time. While other producers sought to create wines of power with darker colors, riper fruit and a sheen of oak, he decided to go in a completely opposite direction. This was how the Il Marroneto Madonna delle Grazie came into being. It’s a wine that unapologetically struts its Northern Montalcino terroir, produced from a selection made within its namesake vineyard, and through much slower processes within the winery. While Mori looks for the beauty of Sangiovese within his Brunello, his Madonna delle Grazie is about its complexity. It’s funny to think that when it was first produced, Madonna delle Grazie wasn’t met with high acclaim; yet today, it’s one of the top wines vintage after vintage - as it is again in 2016.

The good news is that you don’t need to buy up to the Madonna delle Grazie to understand the spellbinding and whimsical styles of this house because the Brunello di Montalcino alone is a wine that communicates its importance and longevity but also a purity of fruit and sheer drinkability, which is enthralling.