Valdicava
Madonna del Piano Riserva
Brunello di Montalcino
2010

The producer

The 19 ha of beautifully-tended vineyards on the Valdicava estate are located in the northern end of the Montalcino area on the slopes of the Montosoli hill at altitudes of 300 metres and are today farmed organically. They produce low yields of exquisite grapes of great concentration, resulting in wines which are amongst the richest and most concentrated in the region. Owner Vincenzo Abbruzzesse took over the running of the estate, which was founded by his grandfather, in 1987.

The wine

Valdicava is the name of the valley in which the single vineyard ‘Madonna del Piano’ sits along with the Valdicava estate. Derived from the oldest vineyards of Valdicava, planted in 1970, Madonna del Piano is a powerful and densely concentrated Brunello, richly textured and opulent. The 2001 vintage received a 100-point score by James Suckling and the estate produces less than 5,000 cases per year.

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.