As this newsletter lands in your inbox, we are bottling an exciting new/old wine that we look forward to sharing with you. Please bear with all of the acronyms (welcome to the world of wine and welcome to Italy). The wine is under the denomination AVG or Alta Valle della Greve, which is an IGT, meaning it represents its geographical origin. Within Tuscany alone, there are 58 protected quality classifications, 41 of which are DOC, 11 are DOCG and just six are IGT. All of these classifications are approved by a specific decree of the Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Forestry and there are very few area-specific IGTs in Tuscany. The Alta Valle della Greve joins the Costa Toscana, Colli della Toscana Centrale and Val di Magra, for example. So why have the uplands of Greve been singled out for this denomination?
It’s all to do with the land. This is an area that falls just south of the Apennines with east-facing slopes as well as some southern exposures on the Greve-Pesa watershed ridges. The soils are typically arenaceous with abundant clayey deposits, frequently described as caotici or chaotic. This is met by a quite different soil composition on the continuous strip from Mercatale Val di Pesa to Greve in Chianti, where more gravel and pebbles are found in the sandy soils. The ‘Alta Valle’ is unique for its layering of marly limestone and complex clay, which finds expression in the wines.
Montecalvi produced an AVG in the past (the last vintage year was 1996) and we decided that it was only right to reintroduce this denomination now in celebration of our specific terroir. Our new interpretation of the AVG is a blend in equal measures of Sangiovese and Cabernet Sauvignon. The first release will be from the classic 2016 vintage and we have made just 2,000 bottles. We are offering our wine club members a 15% discount for orders between now and the end of June 2022. Please click here if you would like to order.
