Are Super Tuscans still cool?

WINE TALK
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I’ve heard that Super Tuscans had their moment in the spotlight a while ago. I also know that “cool” wines these days are supposed to be made from native grape varieties. So, where does this leave Super Tuscans? Are they as trendy as they used to be? Is this a good time to buy them?

I have little experience in this area, however I have become interested in Super Tuscans as a potential Bordeaux alternative. In your mind, how do wines from these two regions compare in terms of taste profile? What about value for dollar?

Also, some Super Tuscans are very Tuscan in their makeup by containing lots of Sangiovese. Others are pure Bordeaux blends. Is there an easy way to tell them apart? What do you prefer? What specific ones would you recommend?

These are lots of vague questions, I know. Just generally curious what you all think and prefer when it comes to these wines.

Thanks for indulging me!

Noah

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No, they are not still cool. But I don’t think they ever were in the first place, at least not if you love traditional Italian wines. I always saw them as Tuscany’s crisis of confidence, trying to reshape itself as California. That crisis seems to have passed. Just my opinion, of course.

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This is definitely a category that you have to do your own exploration in. I wouldn’t worry too much about whether they are “cool” or not. Find what you like. I’m a sucker for everything from traditional brunello and Chianti to really “international” style wines.

Just had 2001 Tignanello at about $150 after tax/shipping from auction and it was incredible. Still juicy, lush, but perfectly balanced and really complex and classy wine. Would put it up against anything.

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If it’s from Tuscany I’ll try it, but I’ve never really been all that cool. Actually just bought 3 bottles of Tignanello, but that’s at the very high end of what I spend on wine.

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This. The topic confused me - I didn’t know they were ever cool. More like Chilean Cabs / blockbuster wines, but from Europe.

That is not to say there weren’t any great Super-Tuscans.

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They are not cool. Except in the minds of the owners, when nearly every Tuscan worth his salt would have to have a me-too ‘…aia’ wine.

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Carter Pelham wrote:
Just had 2001 Tignanello at about $150 after tax/shipping from auction and it was incredible. Still juicy, lush, but perfectly balanced and really complex and classy wine. Would put it up against anything.

We had a similar experience with the 2007 Tignanello last month. Glad to have a few left!

Regarding the question of whether or not they are cool or not, I agree with Carter. Find what you like. We enjoy Tignanello, even though the price has risen a lot, as well as Galatrona and Saffredi. I don’t know if they are in the “Super Tuscan” category, but they are in the category of Italian wines we enjoy.

Cheers,
Ed

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What is a super Tuscan? What is cool?

Easy to throw shade on non-indigenous Italian wines due to the incredibly richness of the Italian ampelographical landscape, but I would caution jumping on that bus too fervently. What is a Tuscan producer to do with that bit of vineyard that is heavy with clay? Merlot works so well there why not plant it?

I’m not saying that there are tons of great Tuscan Bordeaux varieties, just that there are some. Too many so-called super Tuscans are what I like to refer to as wines of texture, smooth, rich, seamless, and supple. Boring for my palate though I know plenty of people who love them.

As an alternative for Bordeaux? Too much affordable Bordeaux to warrant searching elsewhere, and besides the best taglio Bordolese doesn’t come from Tuscany. It’s San Leonardo from Trentino, and very much worth checking out as well as a few other northern Italian examples wines like Gemola from Vignalta, or Inama’s Bradisismo. All probably more akin spiritual to Chinon than Bordeaux at this point, but sort of besides the point.

Having said all that, the super Tuscan big guns are perhaps too expensive, but have earned their reputations for the most part. Many of the less expensive examples are pretty anonymous but fill some sort of role.

On a penultimate note, Fiorano Rosso, moreso the original but also the reincarnation, are terrific wines that are worth trying, even if I can’t recommend them as substations for Bordeaux, in the modern understanding of what that means.

And finally, Pergole Torte, Percarlo, Il Carbonaione, and I Sodi di S Niccolo are top sangiovese based wines that fell under the super Tuscan moniker, but are a distinct subgroup of the genre. Better to my palate than most of the rest of the group, and definitely worth trying as they represent the top of the Sangiovese pyramid for me.

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I will always have a soft spot for the Super Tuscan. The entire idea behind it was to spit in the face of an archaic law that was shackling the quality of tuscan wine. For that- I commend the Super Tuscan and their lowly Red Table Wine designation.

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Gregory,

Excellent response as always. I recall your interview on Levi Dalton’s podcast in which you spoke of 1985-2005 in Tuscany as sort of a messy period of doubt and confusion in which Tuscans turned away from both indigenous grapes and centuries old production techniques in favor of French/Californian “enlightenment.” And that, of course, is the period that birthed all the STs (I am paraphrasing). For me, the “incredibly richness of the Italian ampelographical landscape” is really the entire point of enjoying and celebrating wines from Italy. I really would not look to France for a good substitution for Chianti, so…

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I’m pretty sure that there were plenty of other factors motivating that movement beyond just rebelling against wine laws. And numerous famous Tuscan producers made excellent wines under those archaic laws through 1960s-1980s, and continue to do so using the same techniques, which suggests that there were other reasons behind the poor quality of lots of Tuscan wines.

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Yes, throwing off the traditional shackles may have been necessary in some ways, but it also brought us oaky Barolo and inky Chianti that tasted like cabernet.

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To you’re original question, I’d say:

  1. Super-Tuscans don’t have the cachet they once did among wine geeks, and certainly not among Berserkers. Many are marketed, essentially, as luxury items, and the branding aspect is a turn-off to many wine geeks. They certainly don’t conform to the currently cool categories of wines made from indigenous grapes with some nod to traditions.

  2. That said, just look at the prices! Obviously, they still sell well, and remain cool to another universe of wine drinkers.

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GDP nailed it.

I don’t get the “they were never cool” comments. Like them or not, they were the hot thing/flavor of the month there for a while when they were on WS covers and featured pours at seemingly every other restaurant around (mid-1990s?). Of course, they came in many flavors, including those who wanted nothing to do with cab or merlot, but wanted to stop using white grapes in their CCR (for example), but also including those who wanted to make 100% merlot, or sangiovese with cab or merlot, etc. - even syrah.

Certainly the flavor of the month crowd has long ago moved on, but just as certainly many of the best Super Tuscans (some no longer bottled as such but back in the DOCG fold after rule changes) were great wines then, and great wines now. Ornellaia, Sassicaia, and Solaia long ago left my price range for the stratosphere, but I’m still drinking the last of my mature bottles, and they are great. And the sangiovese based wines can be great as well (I would add Fontalloro to GDP’s list). Of course, many were then (and I assume now but haven’t tasted recently) more in the ripe/smooth/oaky/rich style that isn’t to my taste, so one has to be selective.
Sometimes the Super Tuscan gets more oak than its DOCG stablemates and sometimes less.

Felsina, for example, uses all new French oak on its top two DOCG wines, Rancia and Colonia, while the Super Tuscan Fontalloro sees a mix of new and once-used French oak barrels, and the non-vineyard-designate CCR sees a mix of older Slavonian and French oak barrels.

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They’re certainly not what the “cool kid” somms in coastal cities are drinking… if that matters to you.

But many super tuscans are undeniably great wines. They would have to be to earn any cachet despite not following traditional/legal paths to recognition.

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I think you sort of made my point. I said, I don’t think they were ever cool even if other people thought they were. If you define cool as fashionable, yes. The trend-mongers and label-chasers loved them. They were the pop stars of the wine world. But I didn’t think designer jeans or 80’s techno-pop was cool either. If you define cool as something of enduring charm and appeal that transcends trends and brief periods, I don’t think they were ever cool. At least my wine geek buddys and I in the 1990s had no interest in them other than as a passing curio. That other people liked and still like them is all to their benefit.

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Yes, that is how I took the question. In that sense, they were “cool” at one point, but those folks are probably mostly chasing rare bourbon or whatever these days.

I also agree with all comments that this is a less relevant question than whether they were (and are) a pleasure to drink, but it was the question so I tried to answer it.

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I think the cool kidz moved to an extra dimension. neener

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Yeah? Yeah! [tease.gif]

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It’s useful to remember that “Super Tuscans” is just a catch-all for any wine from Tuscany that doesn’t fall into, or would fall into but voluntarily chooses not to accept, one of the regulatory category labels.

Some of them are wines like Flaccianello and Ceparello which are 100% Sangiovese and could (now) be labeled as Chianti, but choose not to. Their wine may be more “traditional” than many Chianti, which often have international varieties and white wine grapes blended into them, both in spirit and in what the wine tastes like in the glass.

Also, many Super Tuscans are one-off bottlings made by producers who otherwise make traditional wines, and it gives the producer an interesting outlet to be creative in making something that might be really good. Castello de Paneretta, for example, is a 400+ year old traditional producer in Chianti, and they make a wine called the Quattrocentenario which I think is 100% sangiovese and really good, better than their Chianti wines. Uccelliera is a top winery in Montalcino which makes an interesting merlot blend called Rapace as one small bottling in their portfolio, and it’s reasonably priced and quite good in its own right.

I also find the idea of “native varieties” interesting. Merlot, for example, has been planted in Italy since at least the 19th century, maybe the 18th century, and it appears at least as a blending grape in many regions around Italy, including Chianti. Yes, making all-merlot wines like Galatrona and Masseto (both of which are excellent) in Tuscany is a newer phenomenon, but Merlot has been a player in Italian wine culture for a long time.

But even more than how long some varieties have been around, I like the idea of winemakers experimenting and discovering places where different varieties might produce good wines, and not being hung up on only planting what and where things have been done in the past. Sure, I don’t want Piedmont all planted over to Cabernet or something, but I like the idea of producers experimenting and learning. That’s probably how many of the “traditional” plantings ended up where they were in the first place.

I find it quite interesting the way in which varieties like merlot, cab and syrah can still have (most of the time if not always) a distinctive Tuscan character to them, how the terrior transcends variety to some significant degree. On Tuesday, I had a 1994 Castello di Ama Vigna l’Apparita, which is 100% merlot. I had it served blind, and it showed a strong Tuscan character, bright red fruit, high acids, excellent wine overall. It tasted more of Italy than of the variety, for sure.

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