So nearly a year after my first wine festival in the centre of Florence, we discover that Greve has its very own wine festival and it's held every September. So I must have just missed it last year as we didn't arrive until November. It is actually only the 12th edition, so it must have only started in 1990.
It's a weekend festival starting on the Friday evening and going on to the Sunday. There are lots of things going on and we come down to the square on the Friday evening, where they have set up two huge booths, with the bottles all numbered. We pick up 2 glasses a ticket which allows us to have 8 tastes and a small booklet where all the wines are listed. I have no idea what I'm looking for! But with about 120 wines on offer we're only going to get an idea of what's on offer.
To be honest they are all pretty impressive. I'm tending to go for the 'Riserva' wines as they are usually made from the estates best grapes, aged for 1 year to 18 months in huge Slavonic Oak barrels and then aged for
an extra year in the bottle. The riservas are a little fuller bodied than the base Chianti Classicos with some more interesting scents. There are wines called 'Super Tuscans' here too, sometimes made with Cabernet Sauvignon grapes instead of the usual 'Sangiovese' which is the local grape variety here. I'm still getting my head around all this new information...
My top 7 wines at the festival are:
1. Chianti Classico Riserva 1998 - San Andrea
2. Chianti Classico Riserva 1998 - Carpineto
3. Chianti Classico Cetinale Riserva 1999 - Tracolle
4. Chianti Classico Riserva 1998 - Buonasera
5. Chianti Classico Riserva 1998 - Castello di Meleto
6. Chianti Classico Doccio a Matteo Riserva 1999 Carpasa
7. Farnito Cabernet Sauvignon 1999 - Carpineto
We have a few tastes left on our ticket and return on the Sunday only to find that they've almost run out! Thank goodness we came on Friday! However if this happens every year then it's a date that I will have to put in my diary!
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