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Sagrantino di Montefalco: From Umbria Comes The Best Red Wine You Never Tasted!

by Loren Sonkin
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The region of Umbria sits landlocked in the center of Italy. With Tuscany to the Northwest, the Marches to the East and Latium with Rome to the South West, it is a beautiful region that sometimes gets lost in the conversations about Italy. Umbria has one wine that gets some international recognition; their famous white wine Orvieto. In fact, many agri-tourismo wineries surround the quaint medieval town of Orvieto which has become something of a destination for a few relaxing days while touring Italy. But, there is also a red, Sagrantino di Montefalco, which also hails from Umbria that is worth putting on your radar.

Sagrantino is grape varietal that grows only around the hilltop town of Montefalco. In fact, it is grown nowhere else in the world (although lately there have been some experiments with it in Tuscany). Its origins are mysterious. Whether the grape is indigenous to the area or not is up for debate. Some theorize that it was brought to Umbria by the Greeks, while others say it was brought by the Franciscan (French) friars. Another theory has St. Francis of Assisi bringing it from the Middle East to be used as a sacramental wine. Among the wine cognoscenti though, it is now Umbrian at its soul.

What makes this wine so special? Well to start with, the geography. The vineyards sit in a bowl surrounded by the Apennine Mountains. The soil is mostly clay with limestone and sand. The climate gets very hot in the summer (and cold in winter), but the clay soils keep the roots cool as they search for water deep in the ground. The mountains provide cooling breezes especially at night. During the hot days a drying breeze called the Tramontano comes from the north limiting rot. The growing season, like much of Italy, is lengthened by the Mediterranean. This climate results in a grape that has lots of tannins yet also sweet dark fruit. 

Sagrantino has a long history in Italy. The first official mention of Sagrantino was by the Ampelographic Commission of the district of Foligno in 1879. There are recordings of vineyards in Montefalco going back to the 11th century. Pliny the elder mentions wines grown from Montefalco. There is no way to know if these were Sagrantino though. The grape fell into obscurity by the end of the 20th century and was well on its way to extinction. Only a few growers still cultivated the grape, most notably perhaps Fratelli Adanti. Then in 1971, with the founding of the Caprai winery, a renewed interest was found in Sagrantino. It has only been in the last 30 years that the combination of scientific research, care in the vineyards as well as the winery, and finding a vigneron to champion the grapes has resulted in wines of such grandeur.

In 1979, Montefalco was granted DOC status. This area is located south of Perugia and comprises the towns of Montefalco and Bevagna. The main wine produced, however, is Montefalco Rosso, primarily a blend with 60 to 70 percent Sangiovese (the grape made famous in Tuscany with Chianti and Brunello), 10 to 15 percent Sagrantino and the remainder other red varietals. Interestingly, Sangiovese is still the most planted red varietal in Umbria. Used for making Torgiano Rosso, which has traditionally been the “luxury” red of Umbria.

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Comments

Bravo,
Finally, someone recognizes our wonderful region of Umbria and the indigenous grape varietal of Sagrantino. Please visit our website and join us for a wine excursion on La Strada del Sagrantino, taste some great wines and experience the wonderful Umbrian culture.

SagrantinoExcursions.com
Salute,
Doreen Aiello
International Promotions

Loren,

Thanks for this very informative article and for highlighting one of Italy's many great but undervalued varietals. If you ever make it across to Umbria I would love to show you around (as long as you promise to concentrate on wine and not law though -I am a lawyer too)!

Justen

Comment from Love-Umbria

A fascinating Sagrantino 101 course!! In vino veritas!!!
While on a two year Umbrian sojourn, I was very lucky to have been introduced to this outstanding red wine. I visited the Bea winery ( thanks to Doreen who wrote the above comment) and fell in love, with the wine!
However, Sagrantino is not available and almost not heard of in Montreal, Canada. A recent Italian Wine Tasting held in Montreal gave me the only opportunity to taste Sagrantino in Canadian soil. How I wish some wine buyers or brokers from Quebec who tasted some Sagrantino during that event would read this article and bring this delightful vino rosso to la belle province!!!
Cin cin,
Bernadette R.
Montreal, Quebec

I had the opportunity to taste these wines at the same event and I was not overly impressed with the balance of any of the wines poured. They were simply unapproachable and much too tannic. In many cases, the high alcohol levels overpowered the wonderful fruit.
To sum up, the tannin levels are distractingly rough, the alcohol levels burning, and the acid lacking to hold it all together.

However, I did enjoy the Paolo Bea's version of Sagrantino, which was not part of this particular tasting, but served with the italian dish, crostata, at a colleagues home several years ago.

Anthony

Last week I had the pleasure of opening a bottle of 1995 ARQUATA Sangrantino di Montefalco from Adanti (alc content 13.5%). Absolutely magnificent, the cork was in great condition and the wine was also still youthful and robust mouth-filling, soft and smooth going down and long. I only wish I had more of this vintage. What is more, an Italian was with me when we consumed the bottle and is still raving about it. It seems that age is the best friend of these wines and all those upfront characteristics, tanin, etc are all worth having if you have the patience.

Bonjour Bernadette
Nous aurons le plaisr d'offrir deux produits de cépage Sangrantino à l'Expo Vins & Gastronomie du Monde à Moncton (NB) en Novembre 2010. Il s'agit du Sagrantino di Montefalco de la Cantina Tudernum ainsi que le Rojano, un assemblage Sangiovese/Merlot/Sagrantino. Je sais que Moncton peux sembler un peu loin, mais ce Festival présente environ 350 vins toujours très bien coté et qui mérite d'être mieux connu. En espérant avoir le plaisir de te voir au festival.
Cordialement,
Jean-Louis Fortier
Sélections Defori

Buongiorno!

I have been visiting Umbria and Assisi/Petrignano several times during the last years. One of the most impressive thing has been finding Sagrantino wines. First introduced by the locals (they also appreciated Sagrantino), then trying to find nice examples to be exported to home Finland. Enjoying a bottle of this wine is always a special case!

Thank you for the excellent wine!

Ilkka K
Espoo, Finland

The change in the face of wine making in Umbria has been the challenging shift from excellent small quantity family wine makers to that of producing commercial quantities of the same excellent qualities.
The wines in Umbria have madeit hard to leave - we have been here for 20 years and have seen the 4 or 5 larger producers develop into now over 70 major excellent wine makers.
All since the award to Caprai for Italy's best red wine in 1998. The face of Montefalco has changed - for the better we think for the local populace as well as for us wine lovers.
Carol Searle
www.livingitaly.com

When my wife and I visited the Montefalco region in 2006 we discovered one of the most exciting wines I ever tasted at a Sagrantino wine festivale.
Having a botque winery of our own (Nello Olivo Wines) when we returned home to the Serria Navada foothills in California I contacted the enology departmen at UC Davis to find out what it would take to have the Sagrantino vines brought into the US.
Sadly, it was explained that it would take a year to get the vine here and 5 years of study and clear it of any desese at a cost of between 25 and 30 thousand dollars.
I figured it would be 10 years before I had any in a bottle and I would be an old man in a wheelchair so I just put the idea on a shelf and went about doing the best I could with what we already had.
Two weeks later I received a call from the contact I had at UC Davis saying that he had some good news for me.
He explained that their department had been studying two grape plants for the past 5-6 years that they thought to be Sangiovese but did a DNA on them and found them to be the Sagrantino de Montefalco I was looking for WOW.
Because we grafted the buds of that Sagrantino onto some of our 7yr. old Merlot vines, we will be harvesting our first croup this 2010 season.
The vine and leef is so different then any of the other that we have ( Primitivo, Cabernet, Petite Sarah, Sangiovese, Barbera, Merlot and Viognier), it has a leathery leaf and the clusters are tight like a Petite Sarah with small berries similar to the Cabernet.
The taste of the berry leaves you with a heavy tanic taste with big fruit flavor.
Needless to say we are excited to have this berry in our mix.
Its a big wine and it will add to the complexity of our vineyard and wines.
As far as I can determain we are one of the very few or maybe the only to grow and produce a Sagrantino wine in California or the US.
Nello

I just found out about this site but based on the quality of this article and the comments of the readers it looks like I will be returning here often. For what it is worth, I started exploring wine two years ago and I am on a quest to taste 100 varietals (including blends)... 87 done, 13 more to go and Sagrantino is the highest ranked on my list rigtht now. Thanks!

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