Tasting Report: All 2010 Brunello di Montalcino Riservas Reviewed

The 2010 Brunello di Montalcino Riservas are the encore to Montalcino’s greatest vintage ever. It’s exciting to have a “second offering” of Brunello each vintage with the riservas and some single-vineyard designated reds arriving in the market a year after the first release of a particular vintage.

I tasted and reported on about 70 2010 riservas last October. I tasted the rest in early February. The wines arrived in the market in January. Click here to see my first report from October 2015 on 2010 Brunello di Montalcino Riservas.

The riservas that I tasted showed the greatness of the 2010 vintage with wines exhibiting fantastic aromas, rich and ripe fruit character and fabulous freshness and linear definition. They are wines of a lifetime for many producers. And they are wines that all of us who love Brunello want to have in our cellars and, more importantly, drink!

In total, I tasted close to 130 different 2010 Brunello di Montalcino Riservas and special single-vineyard wines. Only a handful received less than 90 points, or outstanding ratings. I rated six wines 100 points, two 99 points and eight 98 points. Some of the wines such as the Casanova di Neri Brunello di Montalcino Cerretalto are extremely expensive costing as much as $400 a bottle, but most of the wines are between $40 and $80 a bottle, making them some of the best value great wines currently on the market.

As I wrote before, I had my doubts about the 2010 riservas before the blind tasting. In the past, I found many riservas either the same quality level or worse than the regular bottlings. Some seemed to be the same wines but just aged another year in bottle before their release.

But this was not the case for a large part of the riservas that I tasted. Most are more structured and more tannic than the regular bottlings, underlining that the wines are indeed reserve wines of their respective wineries. Many are also produced from specific vineyards.

However, I am not sure that the higher prices for riservas are wholly justified, particularly when regular bottles are so good quality.

Brunello producers that I speak to continue to say that 2010 is their best vintage ever. “It reminds me of the 1990, but better. It’s the best I ever made,” said Paola Gloder, the owner of Poggio Antico.

Yet Paola and others also are extremely excited of their future vintages such as 2012, 2013 and 2015. And their 2011s are equally delicious. Click here to read my report on 2011 Brunellos. Stay tuned for more reports this summer.

Below are all my notes for 2010 Brunello di Montalcino Riservas and late-released single vineyard Brunellos. You need to be a subscriber to read them. I must admit that I enjoy drinking now 2010 Brunellos – regular or riservas – but many will be so much better in three or four years as the exceptional concentration of fruit, tannin and acid come into balance. So try to be patient.

Photos from top to bottom: Marchesi Antinori Brunello di Montalcino Vignaferrovia Riserva 2010 and Capanna Brunello di Montalcino Riserva 2010; and a bottle of Collina Dei Lecci Brunello di Montalcino Riserva 2010

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