Tenuta dell'Ornellaia Masseto Toscana IGT 2023

Seven hectares of blue Pliocene clay above Bolgheri. On this soil, which everyone in the early 1980s considered far too heavy, Lodovico Antinori planted Merlot. The first separately bottled vintage, 1986, turned a single plot into a legend. 2023 asked a great deal of the team around cellar master Gaia Cinnirella: a hot summer, then rain at the end of August and cool September nights that brought aromatics and balance back. Deep ruby in the glass, blackberry, ripe cherry, black pepper and graphite on the nose. The palate is assured and elegant, the young tannin already finely polished, the fruit deep and vibrant. A Masseto whose great years are still ahead of it. Our allocation from the Place de Bordeaux is small.