Article: 2021 Fattoria Le Pupille Poggio Valente
2021 Fattoria Le Pupille Poggio Valente
“Fabulous…I love its total class”
Today, I invite you to accept the embarrassment of riches flowing from Italy’s 2021 season. It’s an absolutely phenomenal vintage in Tuscany and I advise DO NOT be shy about stocking up. With absolute certainty that the weather will change and future vintages will not be so generous. You’ll thank me later.
With regards to the 2021 Poggio Valente , I have been anxiously awaiting its release and am happy to offer what is the lowest price in the US; nearly 20% less than our closest competitor - or your mattress is free!! Just kidding, but we’re dead serious about our pricing, so let us know if we’re not the lowest price by far.
With the 2021 vintage, producers are making hay, offering their best wines ever. The warm growing season has allowed the grapes to reach full maturity, which translates to Sangiovese bursting with intensity and dimension.
It's easy to see why this 94 point powerhouse has developed such a following – and why we sell so much - it’s easily one of the best values in all of Italy. Wines that sell for twice the pricepoint should be embarrassed!
The 2021 Poggio Valente offers great concentration, excellent mouth feel, outstanding balance and length, in the same way you’d describe a $100 bottle. Many of you told me how great last year’s vintage was drinking, but with this vintage you’ll experience the true potential of this wine. Just keep your hands off it for 3-5 years. If you don’t, I won’t fault you because it currently drinks so well. My suggestion: buy 2 cases, drink one - forget the other in your cellar. You will look like a genius a few years from now.
The 2021 Poggio Valente is fabulous. I can't remember tasting a Poggio Valente with this much finesse. Rose petal, spice and red cherry fruit open in an effusive bouquet that is immediately appealing. Silky, medium in body and gracious, with finesse to burn, the 2021 shows what is possible within the appellation. I love its total class.
- Antonio Galloni, 94
STORY
Fattoria Il Pupille calls itself “a modern and entrepreneurial viticultural reality,” “a heterogenous reality,” and a “mosaic property,” resembling the varied hues of Tuscan vineyards in autumn.
While we’re all contemplating what “heterogenous reality” means, we can speak to one of the pieces in the “mosaic property” of winegrower Elisabetta Geppetti, which is Poggio Valenti; a single vineyard of about 35 acres, near the Maremma coast, close to the village of Pereta.
Elisabetta and her daughter orchestrate aesthetics and quality in a grand Tuscan style, but with no adversity to modern technology. For example, they have embraced optical selection, which is an advanced optical sorting machine with cameras picking grapes based on programmed properties like size, color, ripeness, etc. Nothing but perfect grapes are allowed!
Poggio Valenti’s soils appear totally sandy, but a subterranean mix of sandstone with clay help conserve moisture for those arid summers.
“With Poggio Valenti we started a kind of revolution starting with the 2012 vintage,” Elisabetta says. This meant eliminating the Super Tuscan Merlot in the blend, although the wine remains an IGT Toscana. “We decided to completely change the style of this wine, making the decision to focus on 100% Sangiovese while also experimenting with the wine’s maturation in wood, adjusting the size of the casks.” They used mostly French oak, settling on “big tonneaux” of 500 and 600 litres, about 50% new.
Elisabetta thinks of verticality, elegance, and freshness when making her wine, carefully monitoring the maceration of about a month’s length, all in stainless steel.
Considering its painstaking production, this wine represents an amazing value.
