A Touch of Tuscany : Track Record of Excellence Bodes Well for Antinori’s Napa Product

PIERO ANTINORI, whose Florentine family has made fine wines in Tuscany, Italy, for more than 600 years, has branched out to California.

He is a partner in Atlas Peak Vineyard, a 600-acre Napa Valley joint venture with the Whitbread brewery of England and Bollinger Champagne of France.

“We made our first wine in 1987,” Antinori said during a brief but breathtaking trip to California last month. “Just a few barrels: some Cabernet, and, of course, for me, some Sangiovese.”

The company’s wines, crafted by Antinori, have yet to be released. Yet, if the future reflects the past, the new wines will be worthy of considerable attention. After all, Antinori has won a number of awards, including that of Wine Maker of the Year in 1986, an international honor.

His run of success started when Antinori rebelled against the Chianti Classico wine-making practices that generations of Italians had accepted without question for centuries and produced a Riserva 1970. Chianti, he knew, could be better--less bitter, more rounded with fruit--if it were aged in newer casks. The well-received Riserva was mainly from Sangiovese grapes, unlike the usual Chianti blend of Sangiovese, Trebbiano and Canaiolo grapes.

With the harvest of 1971, Antinori named the wine Tignanello, after the vineyards that are known for their excellent Sangiovese grapes. And working with his enologist, Giacomo Tachis, Antinori blended Tignanello with 20% Cabernet Sauvignon grapes grown on his home estate, Santa Cristina. Beginning in 1975, subsequent vintages of Tignanello, with its full-bodied grace, became the most admired, prized and imitated red wines of Italy.

The current edition, Tignanello 1983 ($39), intensely jewel-garnet-red, has suggestions of chestnuts and spice in taste. With ripe fruit flavors, it is well-structured in balance. But it could use time to reach its full maturity.

Another red wine from Santa Cristina is Antinori Solaia, a blend of 85% Cabernet Sauvignon and 15% Sangiovese. The Solaia 1982, in current local release ($60), has profound depths of berries, plums and roses, with smoky edges.

As for white wines, Antinori doesn’t disappoint either. The Antinori 1988 Galestro ($7.50) is a silvery-bright, fresh, clean blend of 80% Trebbiano with 20% Chardonnay and Sauvignon Blanc, the latter two giving added body and depth. Cool-fermented in stainless steel, it is light and lively.

His newest wine, Antinori Cervaro della Sala 1986 Castello della Sala ($22), comes from the more southerly, neighboring region of Umbria, where the family owns a medieval castle crowning a vineyard-ribbed hill. This golden wine made its debut with the 1985 vintage. The current release is the wine’s second worldwide appearance.

“It’s only 80% Chardonnay,” Antinori said. “The rest is Grechetto, which, you know, is the dominant grape of Orvieto,” a popular Italian white wine. The wine, he continues, is “barrel-fermented, with some malolactic fermentation, making it more rich and soft. It has an Italian personality of its own.” True. No other winery in California adds Grechetto to Chardonnay. Here are tongue-wrapping tastes hinting of walnuts, apples and almonds--as smooth as can be--another Antinori winner.