Wine Reviews

Pouring forth from a heavy glass bottle, the Tenuta Sette Ponti 2019 Valdarno di Sopra Vigna dell’Impero is 100% Sangiovese aged in large oak barrels for 24 months before going into bottle for 12 months. Fruit comes from a three-hectare vineyard that is entirely terraced by hand and surrounded by forests. The wine shows medium-dark concentration with aromas of dark cherry, dried herb and earth. You also get toasted spice, and ultimately, this vintage is ready to drink now (and for not that much longer) with an open-knit, immediate personality.

This trebbiano shows pretty dried pears and apples with some white pepper and salt. Chamomile. Full and layered with some phenolics and dried earth. Lots going on. Also a drop of malvasia.

Vibrant, with cherry, plum, earth, tobacco and wild herb aromas and flavors, this red also reveals a smoky note. Firms up nicely, all the while remaining fresh and complex, with a lingering aftertaste of fruit, earth and herbs. Sangiovese. Drink now through 2033.

The 2018 Vigna dell’Impero, Sette Ponti’s best Sangiovese, is gorgeous. It offers up an exciting mélange of crushed red berry fruit, sweet pipe tobacco, mint, anise and rose petal in a style that marries the transparency of Sangiovese with the textural richness these wines have always shown. That’s a pretty appealing combination in my book.

A new white from this estate and shows lots of orange-peel, apricot and floral character. Medium-bodied white with fresh acidity and a minerally finish. Hints of stone. Dried fruit at the end.