Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
zone; Chianti delle Colline Pisane is light and soft in style; and Chianti Rùfina comes
from the hills east of Florence.
Super Tuscans
One result of Chianti's 'cheap wine for the masses' reputation in the 1970s was the real-
isation by some Tuscans - including the Antinoris, Tuscany's most famous wine-produ-
cing family - that wines with a rich, complex, internationally acceptable taste following
the New World tradition of blending mixes could be sold for a lot more than local wines.
Thus, innovative, exciting wines were developed and cleverly marketed to appeal to buy-
ers both in New York and in Florence. And when an English- speaking scribe dubbed the
end product 'Super Tuscans', the name stuck. (Although Italian winemakers prefer the
term IGT - Indicazione Geografica Tipica.) Sassacaia, Solaia, Bolgheri, Tignanello and
Luce are all superhot Super Tuscans.
More and more international wine producers are turning to Tuscan soil to blend Super
Tuscans and other modern wines. American-owned Castello Banfi, in the Tuscan biz for
over three decades, scooped the prestigious Vinitaly wine prize in 2011, quietly under-
scoring the demise of wine-making as the exclusive domain of old, blue-blooded Tuscan
wine-making families. These days, in this ancient land first cultivated by the Etruscans,
Tuscany's oldest craft is open to anyone with wine-wizardry nous.
Celebrity Wine
With the birth of Super Tuscans a gaggle of celebrity-backed wine was born: Sting owns
an estate near Figline Valdarno in Chianti, where he produces a Chianti Colli Aretini
known as Il Serrestori (after the silk-weaving family who once owned his pad). It is sold
under his own private label, limited and signed.
Sinatra Family Estates (yes, Frank) owns a three-hectare vineyard in the Fiesole hills
near Florence where grapes are grown to make La Voce (literally 'the Voice'), a limited-
edition Super Tuscan blend of Colorino and Sangiovese grapes.
Other celebrity wines to look out for are the Super Tuscan reds produced by the son of
Florentine designer Roberto Cavalli, at Tenuta degli Dei outside Panzano in Chianti (top-
of-the-range bottles are packaged in a typical Cavalli, flashy leopard-print box); and those
produced southeast of Pisa on the family estate of opera singer Andrea Bocelli, sold at
Cantina Bocelli in La Sterza.
