The medal-winning Banfi wines from the Spring Tasting

One of the leading lights of Italian wine, Banfi has always been a high-scoring brand in our Global Masters competitions. Here, we go into detail about the Banfi wines that won medals in our recent Spring Tasting.

OVER THE years, Banfi has consistently been the source of top-scoring wines in the Global Masters. And, in our most recent competition, The Spring Tasting, it took home some of the highest accolades on offer. Be it white or reds from native grapes and international varieties, Banfi excelled in our first blind tasting of 2021, which was designed to rate the newest releases to the market. We bring you the results, and the comments on this set of brilliant bottles from this benchmark Italian wine producer.

LA PETTEGOLA 2020

La Pettegola is Italian slang for a gossiping woman – inspired by the sound made by the bird of the same name – so it’s apt that this wine has plenty to say, bursting with flavour, ranging from ripe peach and pink grapefruit, to bitter almond. It’s also quite a full-bodied white, despite featuring a fresh acidity and a saline edge, which makes for an attractive textural and mouth-cleansing combination.

Producer: Banfi
Country: Italy
Region: Tuscany
Grape variety: Vermentino
ABV: 13%
Vintage: 2020
UK retail price: £15-£20
Medal: Silver

ASKA 2017

If you love Cabernet and Italian reds, then Aska – meaning ‘container’ in Etruscan – fits the bill. That’s because it features some of the black fruit associated with this French grape, but also the bright, dry, tannic structure that’s typically Tuscan. It’s a delicious union, complemented by notes of cigar box, tobacco, tar and liquorice, as well as fresh plums, and Morello cherries.

Producer: Banfi
Country: Italy
Region: Tuscany
Grape varieties: Cabernet Sauvignon 90%, Cabernet Franc 10%
ABV: 14%
Vintage: 2017
UK retail price: £30
Medal: Gold

LA LUS 2017

Here’s something for the Italian wine lover who thought they’d tried everything from the Piedmont: a wine made from Albarossa – a red grape made by crossing Barbera with a southern French variety called Chatus. It’s a serious rarity, and a lovely wine, with notes of sweet balsamic, black cherry and prunes, and a palate with similar characters, along with some baked plum, cedar and chunky tannins, providing plenty of dry refreshment.

Producer: Banfi
Country: Italy
Region: Piedmont
Grape varieties: Albarossa
ABV: 13.5%
Vintage: 2017
UK retail price: £25
Medal: Silver

CASTELLO BANFI BRUNELLO DI MONTALCINO, 2016

Looking for textbook Brunello? Then there are few better bottles than this: Castello Banfi. It’s a reliable, beautifully-made expression of this brilliant region, with its aromas of plum, fleshy red berries and cedar. Then there’s the sensation in the mouth, which mixes freshness with fleshiness so wonderfully, with its Morello cherry richness, sweet balsamic softness, and then dry tobacco, some stone-cherry bitterness, and finally a lovely sensation from sandy-textured tannins. A benchmark at this price.

Producer: Banfi
Country: Italy
Region: Tuscany
Grape variety: Sangiovese 100%
ABV: 14%
Vintage: 2016
UK retail price: £40
Medal: Gold

POGGIO ALLE MURA BRUNELLO DI MONTALCINO, 2016

Sourced from the vineyards beneath the walled hilltop – or Poggio alle Mura – that houses the medieval Castello Banfi, this is the producer’s top expression of Brunello, and it’s certainly a taste of Sangiovese at its best. Layers of flavour can be enjoyed in this delicate, but intense red, with its red cherry sweetness, and ripe orange refreshment, along with dry, lingering notes of cigar box and plum, bordered by mouth-coating, fine-textured tannin. It’s a wine with pure fruit, plenty of flavour, and a delicate side that makes one want to sip it again and again. This is a first-rate wine from a first-rate vintage.

Producer: Banfi
Country: Italy
Region: Tuscany
Grape varieties: Sangiovese (from a combination of estate selected clones, from the estate research started in 1982)
ABV: 15%
Vintage: 2016
UK retail price: £60
Medal: Master

SUMMUS, 2017

Here, at the top, or summus of Banfi’s Super-Tuscan offering is a Cabernet Sauvignon, Sangiovese and Syrah blend. It’s a fascinating and delicious wine, with the hallmarks of great Tuscan reds – and that means it has plenty of freshness and a fine tannic structure – combined with the characters of the French grapes in the blend, which provide the dark fruit and a deep colour. There’s also plenty of spice, fleshy cherry and ripe blackcurrant, along with a touch of balsamic, and a lovely, lingering cedar wood character on the finish. In short, it’s a great wine that’s delicious now, but with the strength to age and develop greater complexity over many years to come.

Producer: Banfi
Country: Italy
Region: Tuscany
Grape varieties: Cabernet Sauvignon 45%, Sangiovese 35%, Syrah 20%
ABV: 15.5%
Vintage: 2017
UK retail price: £50
Medal: Gold

About Banfi

In 1978, brothers Harry and John Mariani bought 1,820 hectares of land south of Montalcino and established Castello Banfi, one of the leading lights in the Tuscan region.

Having grown the estate to 2,830ha, today a third of the land is under vine in a constellation of single vineyards, with the remainder occupied by olive groves, wheat fields and plum trees.

Over the past 40 years, the four key pillars of Banfi’s ethos have been: research; innovation; sustainability and its pioneering spirit, embodied by John and Harry Mariani.

In the past decade, Banfi has prioritised sustainability and making wine in an eco-friendly manner in order to safeguard its land for future generations of the family.

The Banfi portfolio takes in wines from Montalcino, the Maremma, Bolgheri, Piedmont and Chianti Classico, which are exported to 85 countries around the world. Contact: lorella.carresi@banfi.it