Le Macchiole
Paleo
Bolgheri
2016

The producer

Founded in the beginning of the 1980s by Eugenio Campolmi and wife Cinzia Merli. Eugenio grew up in his parent’s restaurant, ‘Le Macchiole’, which was located near the town of Bolgheri in coastal western Toscana. But Eugenio wanted to make wine and bought his first 4 ha in 1983. After experimenting with local and international varieties, he found that Cabernet Sauvignon, Cabernet Franc and Merlot worked particularly well in the area.

This approach then led to a range of internationally acclaimed single variety wines, including Scrio from 100% Syrah, Messorio from 100% Merlot (2004 vintage received 100 points from Wine Spectator) and Paleo Rosso from 100% Cabernet Franc. All of the aforementioned are produced under the Toscana IGT, whereas the estate wine ‘Le Macchiole’, which is Bolgheri Rosso DOC, is a blend of all four varieties. Today the estate has 27 ha of vineyards located in various prime locations of the Bolgheri appellation and carefully selected over the years. The estate is run by Cinzia and sons, Elisa and Mattia (Eugenio passed away in 2002).

The wine

Paleo Rosso was first produced in 1989, from a blend of classic Bordeaux varietals; in 2001 it became a Cabernet Franc monovarietal and remains thus today. The name ‘paleo’ refers to a wild herb found on the Tuscan coast. Fermentation and maceration take place in concrete tanks and are followed by ageing for 20 months in new oak barrels. Paleo Rosso is powerful and complex with incredibly dense fruit concentration and texture, balanced by a focused structure and length.

We choose our wines based on a range of criteria (see how we choose our wines) of which critic scores is just one. Rather than simply highlight the best score to promote a wine, our average critic score is calculated from the scores provided by several respected wine critics, who we follow for specific regions. They do not represent all critic scores and, wherever possible, we try and give more weight to more recent reviews. Where appropriate we consider market-based scores like Global Wine Score or Wine Searcher Average scores.

As a rule, we look to offer wines that achieve a 92/100 average critic score or better and frankly a lot of very good wines simply don’t make the cut. As a high-end provider we want to reflect that positioning in the quality of wines we offer. Such wines are only a tiny fraction of those generally on offer in the market. We believe that an average score is a more conservative and representative approach, but it is still subjective and only offered as a guide to our customers, who will (and should) do their own research. We will add individual critic scores to our website in the future.