Ansonica – the vine rooted into the Tuscan Coast
- 1 day ago
- 18 min read
This is the unedited, original version previously published on www.JancisRobinson.com.
Inzolia, with over 7,000ha one of Sicily’s most planted varieties, never struck me as especially remarkable, because the majority of wines it is turned into is made in a squeaky-clean, cold-ferment-stainless-steel-tropical-fruit-basket style.
I just turned my back on it, but had a rude awakening about a year ago when I came across Le Formiche’s Ansonica (one of Inzolia’s synonyms), a complex version originating from two windswept vineyards on a narrow strip called Costa dell’Argentario, in the south of the Maremma.
Le Formiche’s two Ansonicas, one fermented on the skins, the other without, took me completely by surprise with their stunning saline, iodine perfume and purity. Ansonica has been cultivated along the Tuscan coast for centuries, but the variety never received the respect it deserved, it being a staple of daily life and often made in a coarse and careless way. Le Formiche shows a whole different and more truthful side of Ansonica, showing it is the perfect canvas on which to paint the coastal Argentario terroir, which they do with aplomb.
‘Years of dinners and blind tasting together with impossible wines and lots of laughter,’ is how Dylan Warren described Formiche, the outfit he and his friends Simone Salamone, Luigi Scarano and Simone Zemella run parttime next to jobs all four hold down at other estates in Tuscany.
Simone Salamone (left) and Dylan Warren of Formiche
Dylan explained why the four are passionate about Ansonica. ‘It is a non-aromatic variety considered to be minor, but in actual fact has a great potential. It combines a fullness on the palate with a long, savoury and marine finish. It has been present on the Tuscan coast for millennia and a true vehicle of terroir, but it has fallen victim to extirpation in the last decade.’
A sense of urgency as well as the conviction that Ansonica can produce complex whites drove the four to found Formiche. ‘We began by looking for the right soil, to produce an elegant Ansonica, from light soils with little clay, and old vines near the sea.’ They found it on the shore of the Costa dell’Argentario.
The Costa dell’Argentario is a mountain-like promontory jutting into the turquoise Tyrrhenian sea, where in summer Italy’s jeunesse dorée converge on the beautiful Porto Ercole harbour. Its fame is partially based on its incredible natural beauty, partially as the preferred holiday destination for the Dutch Royal family (until they had their Villa Elefante Felice demolished) and partially as the location of one of Italy’s poshest hotels, il Pellicano, which used to do the housekeeping and anything else for the aforementioned royals.
But just a couple miles away from the coast, the landscape becomes wilder with a narrow plain separating the coast from the hills rising to the east with the focal point of Capalbio, a medieval town perched on a hill top.
This part of Maremma, so close to Lazio it doesn’t feel like Tuscany anymore, is the preferred spot of a variety that is susceptible to downy mildew, which is kept at bay by ventilation provided by the saline breezes coming from the coast. Ansonica is drought resistant, while the iron rich clay soils keep the vines hydrated throughout the long, hot summers.
Although only 60 hectares of Ansonica are planted here, it was enough to start a small revolution in an area, which seems to have set all its commercial hope on Vermentino. Vermentino is Tuscany’s answer to an increased market demand for white wine, but in terms of complexity and depth it pales in comparison with Ansonica. Vermentino may be a potential cash cow, but local pride and much needed diversification demanded by the international markets with a penchant for anything indigenous, is now playing in Ansonica’s favour.
It got additional help from Emilio Leuti, a self-confessed Ansonica nerd, and the organiser of Sfumature d’Ansonica, or ‘Shades of Ansonica. The event, now in its second year, corrals Tuscan producers of Ansonica together in Orbetello, the gateway to the Argentario peninsula, each year. Last October, the event gave me a unique opportunity to taste around 50 Ansonica wines from all over the south of Tuscany.
But terroir, at least for the moment, is not what stylistically determines most of the wines I tasted, especially when fermented in temperature-controlled stainless steel tanks with selected yeast. These wines are less characterful and miss the salty twang of the best examples from the coast. To get an idea of the ‘real’ Ansonica’ Dylan recommended I’d go and visit the visionary who helped rescue Ansonica here, Corrina Vicenzi at her Il Cerchio estate.
Long before there were any signs of an Ansonica revival, Vicenzi struck out from Milan to the Argentario coast at the end of then1980s, leaving the business of urban architecture in her husband’s hands. She moved into a small podere, or farm, in the middle of the coastal Argentario strip with wide blue skies and gentle breezes at all time of the day. ‘There were lots of olive trees and 0.8 ha of vines,’ Vicenzi told me last October when I visited her. Until then, an old farm hand had done the work in the olive grove and vineyard.
Perhaps a good dose of naivety was needed for what was to follow. The farm hand warned Vicenzi, who had no agricultural experience of any kind, she was to do the olive harvest all by herself as he had to take care of his own. ‘But he taught me how to work with the tractor and how to prune the vines.’ In 1991 after four years of going back and forward between Milan and Capalbio , she moved permanently to the Argentario. ‘At the time we still lived upstairs in the farm house, because downstairs was still stables.
The tiny vineyard Vicenzi began to take care of herself was half planted with Ansonica and half with the local red Ciliegiolo plus some Vermentino vines. Unimaginable now, but at that time the EU handed out subsidies to stimulate the planting of new vineyards. Vincenzi took advantage of the EU scheme and planted some more Ansonica. ‘I very much liked Ansonica,’ is how she explained this choice, ‘and I wanted to work with a local variety and not Chardonnay. I was convinced that every area has its own local varieties and Italy is full of them. And I wanted something typical. Ansonica is really very different from other white wines.’
While she was trying to make wine with the old Ansonica vines, she soon realised that even with her limited resources and knowledge hers was better than the one of the local co-op. The co-op’s quality was so dire, it tarnished Ansonica’s reputation for years, but it was Vicenzi, together with her son Beniamino Podestà after he joined his mother on the farm in 1991, who was the first to produce Ansonica commercially apart from the co-op.
Attilio Pagli, now a high-profile agronomist and oenologist consultant, gave her a helping hand, and vinified the wines at the nearby Moris Farm, while Vicenzi began building a small cellar. Under Pagli, Vicenzi’s interest for local varieties and working organically began to take on speed.
‘At first our white was a blend of 70% Vermentino and 30% Ansonica, but Vermentino failed to convince us entirely,’ Beniamino told me, while leaning on a stack of crates with shrivelled, sundried Ansonica bunches, and destined for their complex sweet wine. ‘Slowly the Vermentino wine became better and we reduced the Ansonica part more and more until it was 100% Vermentino.’ It was Ansonica who taught them how to make a Vermentino of real interest as it had to match the complexity of Il Cerchio’s Ansonica for its existence to be justified..
Ansonica is also a very timely variety under the conditions of climate change. ‘It is relatively resistant to global warming because of its tolerance of drought, provided the vines have grown deep roots,’ Beniamino pointed out. ‘Here [in Argentario] there has always been a dry and torrid macroclimate to which Ansonica is perfectly adapted.’
In 1995, with the muscle of the local co-op, Ansonica got its own DOC, Ansonica Costa dell’Argentario. Almost as a rule in Italy, it was watered down from the start by including large swathes of hillsides deep into the inland of the Maremma, where Ansonica had never been cultivated.
Equally guilty to diluting Ansonica’s quality was the commercial availability of just one clone from the huge Rauscedo nursery in Friuli. In the same year the DOC Ansonica Costa dell’Argentario was created, 1995, Giancarlo Scalabrelli, Professor of viticulture at the department of agricultural science of the University of Pisa knocked on the Denci family door to ask if they were interested in let him plant an experimental vineyard on their land with a range of Ansonica clones he had discovered on the Isola di Giglio and on the Argentario coast.
30 years down the line, now Stefano Denci is the current custodian of the experimental vineyard, after he took over from his father. Denci told me he likes to forage wild mushrooms on the Argentario coast and on these expeditions he still stumbles on wild Ansonica vines, an indication that the variety has been around here for hundreds of years.
Scalabrelli grafted a wide range of his wild cuttings and planted 14 rows with each 100 vines. Come harvest he would come down from Pisa with a group of students and harvest around 50 kg of each supposed clone, and microvinified them back in Pisa. At the end, Scalabrelli was able to identify 25 different clones of Ansonica. The best, Settefinestre, Scalabrelli called after the area where he had found it, near the remains of an ancient Roman villa.
Today, the vineyard’s productivity is slowly declining, but Denci doesn’t dream of extirpating what is Argentario’s historic Ansonica memory. ‘Once there were 200ha of Ansonica in the area,’ Denci pointed out, ‘and the local co-op had more than 500 associated grape growers. ‘It was the largest co-op in central Italy and my father was working there. In the 1950s he used to buy in Ansonica for the co-op on the island of Giglio, which farmers sold by the crates. At that time Giglio produced such large volume of Ansonica, my father had to hire a private ferry to get all the grapes to the mainland.’
Denci and his wife Yasmina adhere to a strict organic protocol while tending their vines. From a lifelong interest in wine, that began when Denci still was working as a policeman in Florence before returning to his land, he had connected with Piero Palmucci then then owner of Poggio di Sotto in Montalcino and his oenologist Federico Staderini. ‘They made certified organic wines but did not put that on the label. They also fermented spontaneously and they gave me lots of advice,’ Denci recalled.
In between his career as a policeman in Florence and feeling the pull of Ansonica, Denci travelled to Cuba and Africa as a percussionist in a band. ‘Then I came home and started to bottle our wine in 2019. I am now convinced of what I am doing. If I had done this earlier [making wine] instead of travelling I would have made banal wines.’
Proof of his and Yasmine’s total dedication to Ansonica they bottle, cork and label the 200 bottles all by hand, which takes them 15 days. Their 2022 Ansonica, the result of all this hard work, is one of the most complex whites I have tasted recently, not just of Argentario but arguably the whole of Italy.
The Wines
7 October 2024
Il Cerchio 2023 Ansonica Costa dell’Argentario 17 Drink 2024-28
Capalbio. Beniamino Podestà told me that in 2023 they didn’t do any skin maceration because the vintage was plagued by problems, but mostly oidium at the end of the growing cycle. Certified organic by ICEA. Coppery straw yellow. A nose loaded with spicy pear, apple, thyme and hints of acacia honey. Saline lemon fruit with hints of bitter almon and quince. Long and distinct and finely textured. (WS) 13.5%
Il Cerchio, L’Indigena Ansonica 2020 IGT Toscana 17 Drink 2024-32
Capalbio. 100% Ansonica fermented on the skin, part in stainless steel and part in open barriques. Certified organic by ICEA. Golden orange. Deep, subtle apricot, camomile and exotic spice nose. A layered palate with a fine acidic nerve and gorgeous tannic grip. Just at the beginning of its evolution. Tannic and distinct. (WS) 13%
Stefano Denci, Ansonica 2022 IGT Toscana 17.5 Drink 2024-30
Capalbio. Skin fermented. Certified organic by Bioagricert. Orangey straw yellow. Deep, alluring apricot, iron and honeycomb nose with hints of capers and salty sea wind! Poised yet deep but slow to open up on the palate and with a fine tannic grip that supports the fruit. Long and intriguing. (WS) 12.5%
Stefano Denci, Ansonica 2021 IGT Toscana 17 Drink 2025-32
Capalbio. Certified organic by Bioagricert. Pale amber. A little richer than 2022! This was a turning point in which the harvest was pulled forward in the following years. Viscous and weighty on the palate. Layered and complex, if subdued and still needs to open up further. (WS)
Le Formiche, 2023 Ansonica Costa dell’ Argentario 17++ 2024-30
100% Ansonica fermented in oak barrel. Deep golden yellow, the optic of a sweet wine. Rich, complex nose of rosemary, thyme, bruised apple and with hints of vermouth and capers. Garden herbs steeped in lemon. Finely textured, long and deep and still crisp. Finely balanced. (WS) 12.5%
Formiche, Ansonica 2023 IGT Costa dell’Argentario 17 Drink 2025-30
Capalbio. Until bottling the wine was never racked and no lees stirring was done. One fourth was aged in used barriques.
Golden straw yellow. Gorgeous nose of apricot, honeycomb, capers, thyme and a hint of bread. A suggestion of white pepper. Super fine texture on the palate and with waxy yellow fruit notes. Great depth and minerality. Closes up on the finish and in need of more time. Great balance. (WS) 12.5%
Formiche, Ansonica Integrale 2023 IGT Costa Toscana 17++ Drink 2025-32
Capalbio. Fermented on the skins. Golden honey yellow. Like the straight Ansonica but amplified and more perfumed. Thyme, rosemary orange blossom and acacia honey and hints of brackish seawater. Peach and apricot fruit palate with superfine gravelly tannins pushing the fruit on the finish. Only at the beginning of its evolution. (WS) 12.5%
Bibi Graetz, Colore 2023 IGT Toscana Isola del Giglio 17++ Drink 2024-30
Partially skin fermented in oak cask. Copper tinged straw yellow. Complex multi-layered apricot, hioney comb thyme and candied orange nose with hints of vanilla that still need to integrate. White vermouth candied lemon and honeyed apricot. Long and dramatic and finely-balanced with a superfine powdery texture and salty notes on the finish. (WS) 13.5%
Bibi Graetz, Testamatta 2023 IGT Toscana 17 Drink 2025-30
Isola del Giglio. Pale coppery orange. Gorgeous nose of thyme, orange, hay and just a pinch of oak and salty liquorice. Fluid salted orange and quince palate with a fine tannic tail on a finish with a full spread. (WS) 13%
La Parrina, Ansonica 2023 Costa dell’Argentario 16 Drink 2024-27
La Parrina/Capalbio. Certified organic by Bioagricert. Deep straw yellow. Full quince and pear nose with hints of mace and lees. Viscous lemon and grapefruit on the palate with a zippy lemony finish, while having plenty of concentration. (WS) 13%
Cantina I Vini di Maremma, Tramonto di Maremma Ansonica 2023 IGT Toscana 14 Drink 2024-25
Grosseto. A co-op also known as ‘Christo.’ Brilliant straw yellow with a green tinge. A little stalky and reductive and not entirely pure on the nose. A little dilute on the palate with just a shimmer of Ansonica’s personality. Tart and a little hollow on the finish, but it does show Ansonica’s viscosity. (WS) 12.5%
Poggio Brigante, L’Oro di Giacomo Ansonica 2023 IGT Toscana 15 Drink 2024-26
Magliano. Certified organic by QC. Deep straw yellow. Brooding quince and apple nose with a hint of bread rind and thyme. Becomes more aromatic with aeration. Fresh lemon fruit that lacks in proper depth. Looks lighter than its stated 13%. Simple. (WS) 13%
CalpalBIO [sic], Filari di Luna Ansonica 2023 Maremma Toscana 15 Drink 2024-26
Capalbio. Certified organic by ICEA. Deep straw yellow. Wild herbs and waxy quince with hints of tropical fruit. Much less expressive on the palate, with tart lemon fruit on the finish.
(WS) 12.5%
CapalBio Fattoria, Ombra d’Ansonica 2021 IGT Costa dell’Argentario [sic!!]16 Drink 2024-27
Oak fermented. Certified organic. Golden, orange-tinged yellow. Dark, brooding, intense acacia honeyed yellow fruit with nutty hints and oatmeal. Less dramatic on the palate and light of touch yet long with spicy apricot fruit and super fine tannins structure making themselves felt on the finish. (WS) 13.5%
Allori, Lacona Ansonica 2023 Elba 15 Drink 2024-25
Elba. Brilliant deep straw. Candied lemon, and lemon curd fruit with notes of bread crumbs on the nose. A rather tart and neutral palate that becomes more mellow on the finish. Ends on a persistent bitter almond note. (WS) 12.5%
Caelestina Fè, Ragià Ansonica 2023 IGT Toscana 15.5 Drink 2024-26
Magliano. Certified organic by Bioagricert. Pale lemon yellow. Rich pineapple, wax and lemon peel nose with a salty hint and the merest suggestion of petrol. The palate is more muted and less profound. Ends a little neutral yet salty. From a very testing year and not without interest, though. (WS) 12.5%
Vigneti Giole, ‘24’ Ansonica 2023 IGT Toscana 15.5 Drink 2024-26
Manciano. Straw yellow. Lifted and concentrated nose of garden herbs with iodine notes and preserved Lebanese lemon fruit with a tiny hole in the middle on the palate. Salty notes also on the finish but could do with a little more fruit. finely textured, though. (WS) 12.5%
Vigneti Giole, 1 Ansonica Traditionale 2022 IGT Toscana 15.5 Drink2024-26
Manciano. Pale orange yellow with sediment floating through the wine. Brooding richness on the nose with salty apricot and honeyed creamy hints and brioche. Lemon, apricot and white vermouth with quite a bit of dry tannins, but the fruit comes out on the finish. A bit rustic.
(WS) 14%
Fontuccia, Caperrosso Senti Oh! Ansonica 2023 IGT Costa Toscana 17 Drink 2026-32
Isola del Giglio. Ansonica from a vineyard planted in 1930. The grapes were destalked and juice and skin left for 72 hours to macerate, after which they were pressed and the most fermented spontaneously. Aged on the lees for six months, followed by six months in bottle. Certified organic by Suolo & Salute.
Pale amber, so seems to indicate skin contact. Candied lemon peel and hints of apricot, wet sea salt, fresh dough, candied orange and hints of thyme. Deep and dramatic. Viscous deep palate with finely woven gravelly tannins and long apricot and candied lemon notes. Quite gorgeous but needs food and, especially, more time in the bottle. (WS) 14%
Fattoria di Magliano, Brissaia Ansonica 2023 Maremma Toscana 15.5 Drink 2024-26
Magliano. Certified organic by Valoritalia. Brilliant bright straw yellow. Lifted quince paste nose with hints of white vermouth and a suggestion of ginger. Lots of tart lemon fruit with on the finish hints of quince paste. Ends a tiny bit hollow. (WS) 12.5%
Cantina Parasole, Strulli 2022 IGT Toscana 16.5 Drink 2024-30
Isola del Giglio. Pale orange amber. Impressive nose of spicy candied orange with hints of cinnamon bark and salted capers and exotic spice. Finely textured tannins on a layer of orange and quince paste fruit and ripe lemony acidity. Firm, tactile, tannic impact on the finish so may not be everyone. Can age. (WS) 13%
Cantina Parasole, Strulli 2023 IGT Toscana 16 Drink 2024-30
Isola del Giglio. Golden pale orange. More closed and less profusive on the nose than 2022. Quince, garden herbs and capers with a suggestion of cinnamon bark and iodine notes. Less viscous but also more elegant on the palate even in spite of its slightly dry tannic spine. The tannins cling on but the fruit manages to keep up. (WS) 12.5%
Hortuli Hosiana, Ansonica 2023 IGT Costa Toscana 15 Drink 2025-28
Isola del Giglio. Brilliant straw yellow. A tiny bit stalky with very ripe white fruit underneath and hints of rosemary. Mellow round candied orange palate that ends on quite a bit of bitter almond. (WS) 13.5%
Cantina Vignaioli Scansano Ansonica 2023 Maremma Toscana 15.5 Drink 2024-26
Scansano. Half of the must was kept on the skins for 12 hours before the alcoholic fermentation. Deep straw with a coppery tinge. Pine apple, quince and bruised apple with a hint of thyme and bread rind. Tropical fruit hints over quince on the palate. Ends a tiny bit sour, but doesn’t lack in stuffing. (WS) 13.5%
Altura Vigneto, Ansonaco [sic] 2022 IGT Toscana 17 Drink 2024-30
Isola del Giglio. Triple ‘A’ member. Mid amber. Enticing, concentrated nose of acacia honey, orange blossom, baked orange and salty liquorice drop. Fine gravelly tannins layered with bruised apple and apricot fruit with grapefruit acidity. Long and animating and viscous and long. (WS) 13%
Fattoria di Magliano, Brissi Ansonica 2023 Maremma Toscana 15.5 Drink 2024-28
Magliano. Certified organic by Valoritalia. Deep golden straw. Savoury-salty rather than fruity and with exotic spice notes. Strikingly different on the palate with sour lemon fruit yet superfine textured tannins. Something for a warm summer day. (WS) 12.5%
Tua Rita, Keir Ansonica 2023 IGT Toscana 15 Drink
Suvereto. Apparently fermented in amphora, but without skin contact. Brilliant straw yellow. A little stalky and reductive on the nose and not showing a whole lot of fruit right now. A little neutral on the palate with just a shimmer of quince on the finish. Ends a little hollow.
(WS) 12%
Campi Nuovo Ansonica 2023 Maremma Toscana 17 Drink 2024-29
Cinigiano (Grosseto). Certified organic by CODEX. Pale golden orange. Beautiful fresh dough, caramelised salted almonds and rosemary and acacia honey nose. Fluid palate with finely ground long-lasting tannins and savoury orange that is more textural than fruit driven. Very long and complex. (WS)
Castellari, Calzo della Vigna 2020 IGT Toscana 15.5 Drink 2023-27
Isola del Giglio. Brilliant straw yellow. Vanilla, oak and lemon fruit on the nose with hints of herbs. I can see the affinity Ansonica has with oak, but this seems a little too much. Tropical fruit, lemony acidity and oak notes. It does strike a balance, but just. (WS) 12.5%
Santa Lucia, Per Lapo - Metodo Classico 2021 Maremma Ansonica Spumante Metodo Classico 16 Drink 2024-28
Magliano. 100% Ansonica. 24 months on the lees. Deep straw yellow. Lees with hints of lemon curd, apple and a hint of rosemary. Quite a firm nose. Linear lemony fruit on the palate and very fine long lasting co2. Almost a little tart, but certainly appetising.
(WS) 12%
Santa Lucia, Eroica Ansonica 2020 Costa dell’Argentario 15 drink 2024-27
Magliano. Bottle 1410 of 1490. Barrique aged. Deep brilliant straw with a orange coppery tinge. Apricots steeped in alcohol and notes of caramelised apple and rum. Less demanding on the palate with orange and quince fruit and ends on hints of rum. Less oak would hae definitely been more. (WS) 14%
Il Ponte Capalbio, T-Lex Ansonica 2023 Costa dell’Argentario 15 Drink 2024-26
Capalbio. Ansonica fermented in stainless steel. Straw yellow. Not entirely pure and a little sour on the nose. With aeration more focus and with hints of rosemary and lemon. Slightly neutral on the palate, yet viscous and a little weighty. (WS) 13%
Il Poderone, Tramaglio Ansonica 2023 Maremma Toscana 15.5 Drink 2024-26
Magliano. Ansonica fermented in stainless steel. Intense straw yellow. Lemon curd, apple and macchia on the nose. Lots of acidity and green apple notes and a little tart on the finish. Thirst quenching. (WS) 13.5%
Moris farms, Amor Ansonica 2023 Maremma Toscana 15.5 Drink 2024-26
Massa Marittima. Ansonica fermented in stainless steel. Deep straw yellow with a coppery tinge. Lemon with hints of tropical fruit and garden hers and camomile. Bitter almond and white fruit on the palate. Viscous and with lemon peel notes on the finish, but ends a little too bitter to my taste. (WS) 13.5%
Poggio Cagnano, Tacabanda Ansonica 2022 IGT Toscana 16 Drink 2024-27
Manciano. Skin fermented Ansonica from a vineyard on 450m asl in Manciano. Certified organic. Bottle 1435 of 2800. Certified organic by CCPB. Deep straw yellow with a coppery tinge. Bread crumbs with notes of white vermouth and apricot and wet sea salt. Lemon, orange and apricot wit fine, tannic grip and a lemony twist on the finish. (WS) 13%
Fattoria Le Spighe, Gira Gira Ansonica 2022 IGT Toscana 15 Drink 2024-26
Orbetello – Manciano. Skin fermented. Golden coppery yellow. Honeyed apricot and with hints of caramelised apple and bread rind. Light lemony fruit that is a tad oxidative. Just mid length. (WS) 13%
Provveditore, La Madda Ansonica 2023 Maremma Toscana 15 Drink 2024-26
Scansano - Salaiolo. 100% Ansonica skin fermented. Just straw yellow and probably only partially skin fermented. Lifted, peppery nose of apricot and hints of Benedictine and mace. Light palate of lemony fruit. A little simple, but with a fine tannic spurt on the finish. (WS) 13.5%
Stefano & Andrea Ricci, Donna Ilia Ansonica 2023 IGT Toscana 15.5 Drink 2024-26
Orbetello - Fonteblanda. Skin fermented. coppery straw yellow. Distinct nose of apple, apricot with hints of acacia honey underneath. Light lemon fruit with very soft texture, so probably not 100% skin ferment. The palate is a little simple compared with the nose. (WS) 12.5%
Poggio Argentiera, Ansonica 2023 IGT Toscana 16 Drink 2024-27
Grosseto - Banditella di Alberese. Fermented in amphora. Pale straw yellow. Slumbering tropical fruit and apricot fruit and bread rind. Sappy white fruit with hints of white vermouth (so some oxidation has happened) and almost fully integrated acidity, and with bread crumbs on the finish. finely textured. Modernist but the Ansonica character comes through clearly. (WS) 12.5%
Arrighi, Valerius Ansonica 2022 IGT Toscana 15.5 Drink 2024-26
Elba. ‘Vinum in Amphora.’ Skin fermented in amphora. The vineyard is located on Elba. Certified organic by QC. Deep straw yellow. Lifted concentrated candied lemon and orange blossom honey and hints of herb liqueur. Brisk lemon fruit, like this was harvested really early and subsiding on the finish. very fine bitter-sweet tannins. Ends a little neutral. (WS) 13.5%
Tenuta Casade, Ansonaco Le Anfore 2021 IGT Toscana 16.5 Drink 2024-27
Suvereto. Skin fermented in amphora. Bottle 1706 of 2100. Certified organic CCPB. Unfiltered. Lemony acidity cutting through honeyed apricot. Pale orange straw yellow. Firm savoury apricot peel nose with iodine notes, walnut and lees. Linear and focused and brisk and with a fine tannic texture. Seems lighter than its stated 14%.(WS) 14%
Fattoria, Mantellassi, Vegoia 2023 Maremma Toscana 16 Drink 2024-27
Magliano. 100% Ansonica. 50% skin fermented in oak, the rest in stainless steel. Coppery, straw yellow with a golden tinge. Apricot and hay and notes of orange blossom honey and with a suggestion of oak. Light and with tropical fruit notes and not immediately reminding of skin ferment on the palate except for a fine trail of tannins on the finish. Light style and refreshing. (WS) 13%
Ansonica Passito
Campinuovi, Sorié Ansonica Vendemmia Tardiva 2019 IGT Costa Toscana 17+ Drink 2022-32
Pale amber. Almost a little explosive on the nose with notes of wild herbs, honeyed apricot and Asian spice, saffron and mustard. Layered, complex and enigmatic, making a sweet impression but ends much dryer. There is RS though. Expressive tannic tail on the finish. (WS) 15%
Il Cerchio, Dolce A. [sic] Ansonica Passito 2021IGT Toscana 17+ Drink 2024-32
Capalbio. Ansonica dried on racks in the sun. Fermented in stainless steel. Certified organic by ICEA. 500ml. Brilliant pale amber. Saline, salty walnut, soy sauce and apricot on the nose. Luscious honeyed fruit contrasted by soft gripping, long tannins. Great balance and has bags of personality. (WS) 12.5%
Fontuccia, Nantropò Ansonica Passito 2023 IGT Costa Toscana 16+ Drink 2024-30
100% Ansonica of 80 years old vines. Certified organic. Pale amber. Deep, dramatic honey and apricot nose with savoury breadrind notes and a hint of mustard powder. Viscous and honeyed and sweet and a tiny bit massive but the gravelly tannins pull it up on the finish. Still highly original. (WS) 12.5%
Other wines
Il Cerchio, L’Altro Vermentino 2022 IGT Toscana 16.5 Drink 2024-27
Capalbio. Certified organic by ICEA. Fermented in stainless steel and used barriques. Straw yellow with a coppery tinge. Brooding and takes it time to open up to pear. Salty top notes. Salty shy pear fruit with a lingering lemony note. Reveals itself fully only at the very end of the finish. Intriguing and deserves. (WS) 14%
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