Tenuta San Guido Sassicaia, Bolgheri DOC 2000

Description

Sassicaia, produced by Tenuta San Guido in the Bolgheri DOC. It is considered to be one of the very first, and a classic, “Super-Tuscan” wine, a Bordeaux style blend.

Tenuta San Guido was established by Marchese Mario Incisa della Rocchetta. The Marchese, inspired by wines Italian wines that he had tasted as a student in Pisa which reminded him of older Bordeaux. He settled with this wife at Tenuta San Guido on the Tyrrhenian coast in the 1940s and experimented with growing French grape varieties. Throughout the 1940s until the late 1960s his Cabernet-based wines remained a private affair but in 1971 the first commerical vintage of Sassicaia, the 1968, was released. In 1994 Sassicaia was granted its own DOC (Bolgheri Sassicaia DOC), the only wine from a single estate in Italy to enjoy this privilege. Today the estate consists of 75 hectares of vineyards over several plots in Bolgheri which are planted with  85% Cabernet Sauvignon and 15% Cabernet Franc.

The vineyards at Tenuta San Guido are planted on plots of land with different and composite morphological characteristics, as well as with a strong presence of limestone. These areas are also rich in rocks and rather rich in clay and are located at an altitude between 100 and 300 meters above sea level, facing West – South/West. The grapes for the Sassicaia are a blend of 85 % Cabernet Sauvignon 15 % Cabernet Franc. Primary fermentation took place in temperature controlled stainless steel vats at a temperature of 30° – 31° C. The maceration of the skins lasted 15 days for both the Cabernet Sauvignon and the Cabernet Franc, with a combination of pumping over and
délestage. The malolactic or secondary fermentation also took place in the steel vats. The wine began its aging process at the beginning of November. For 22 months, it remained in French barriques (1/3 of which were new). The wine was then bottled in October 2002.

Tenuta San Guido is member of the Primum Familiae Vini.