San Gimignano: La Cittá delle Belle Torri

Perched on a hill with its towers thrown into sharp relief by the deep green mountains behind it, San Gimignano looks like a town plucked from a fairy tale and set into the Tuscan countryside.

Of course, it's not. Nor has it always been the sleepy little town it is today: In the late middle ages it was one of Central Tuscany's most important trading centers, strategically perched astride the intersection between the main highway from Rome to the Alpine passes, and the road connecting the Tuscan heartland to the maritime republic of Pisa and the coast.

Though the town is Etruscan in origin, its rise to prominence began towards the end of the 9th century, when the Bishop of Volterra gave it permission to hold a weekly market. In 949 it was incorporated as a city, and by 998 the residents had built their first set of walls.

The protection offered by the walls attracted both country folk and feudal nobility; and the town grew rapidly in importance notwithstanding the bitter power struggles that pitted the Bishop of Volterra, who represented the power of the Church to govern on earth, against the feudal nobility and later against the town Council (both of whom sided with the Holy Roman Emperor, who thought that the Church should confine itself to spiritual matters). The Bishop finally prevailed, and the town Council swore fealty to him in 1199. A second ring of walls was completed two years later, and the bishop revealed himself to be a shrewd administrator by offering substantial tax incentives to those who built within castrum nostrum [our walls].

Merchants hastened to take advantage of the opportunity, also because San Gimignano was the major Italian producer of saffron, which was grown on the flanks of the Val D'Elsa, the valley below the town; they exported it as far as Holland and got rich. Their wealth drew people in from the surrounding countryside, and the mendicant friars who came to care for the indigent began building the convent of San Francesco (it was completed in 1247). By 1227 San Gimignano boasted 7000 inhabitants, about the number it has today. Commerce flourished and the merchants gave generously to public works projects, building fountains, paving squares, and erecting churches.

They also built homes; space was at a premium within the city walls and they followed the common medieval practice of living above their shops. They were a proud lot; since the town Council had decreed that buildings were to be no more than 17 yards wide and 24 deep, they turned to architects to distinguish themselves from their neighbors. As a result, San Gimignano is a fascinating mix of styles, and medieval Sienese Gothic, with its elegant brickwork and pointed windows, mingles with more robust striped Pisan Romanesque and Florentine early Renaissance.

There's no getting around it, a three story Sienese Gothic building is still a three-story building. A white stone tower thrusting up into the sky is much more impressive, and those who could afford to build one did. Since the same edicts that limited the size of the lots also forbade anyone's building a tower taller than La Rognosa, the 165-foot-high tower of the town hall, the really wealthy, like the Ardinghelli, bought adjacent lots and built twin towers (theirs are in Piazza della Cisterna -- not to be outdone, the Salvucci, San Gimignano's other major family, built their twin towers in Via San Matteo, just off Piazza del Duomo).

The thirteenth century wasn't peaceful, and San Gimignano changed hands repeatedly (in 1250 the Florentines tore down the walls to make the town less attractive to the Pisans -- the Sienese rebuilt them in 1261), though this doesn't seem to have done any harm to trade: in 1262 there were 9 hospitalores for visiting merchants who wished to be entertained in style (poorer travelers generally stayed in monasteries), while work on new towers proceeded at a feverish pace. Construction of a new town hall began in 1288, and about the same time the town Council passed a decree prohibiting the destruction of houses, "except to build better ones."

The completion of the tower of the new town hall in 1298 (it's the only tower in town taller than La Rognosa, and the view on a clear day is spectacular) represents, in many ways, San Gimignano's swan song. To be sure, several monasteries were completed in the early 1300s; but as the century progressed the rivalries between the town's noble families became bitterer, while the economy gradually soured. The great plague of 1348 killed close to 75% of San Gimignano's 13,000 inhabitants and the town collapsed; left without any other options the town Council begged to enter under Florence's wing.

The Florentines accepted the offer the following year and San Gimignano's long decline began. Several panels of the Old Testament fresco cycle painted in the cathedral in 1361 show Job stoically watching his house collapse on his sons while the Devil kills his flocks; they undoubtedly reflect the unhappiness of the people with their lot. Not much had changed by 1391, when Taddeo di Bartolo painted a Last Judgment in which the horrifying torments of the sinners in hell contrast oddly with a subdued, joyless vision of paradise. Except for the frescoing of the apse of St. Agostino by Benozzo Gozzoli in 1465 and the addition of St. Fina's chapel to the cathedral in the 1470's (Ghirlandaio's frescoes are gems), San Gimignano was essentially ignored (Cosimo I De'Medici did order fortifications to be built in 1553, destroying the Franciscan monastery in the process, but had them torn down again five years later, after Siena surrendered to Florence).

Towers collapsed unmourned, and the only resurgence of pride occurred in 1674, when the Podestà, or governor, ordered the owners of the remaining towers to restore them "for the grandeur of the Earth." Of the 72 standing when San Gimignano was at its apex, 14 remained.

By the time the economic renewal that has made Italy one of the world's major economic powers began, the roads had shifted down into the valleys, and San Gimignano watched from splendid isolation as towns and industries sprang up along the rail lines far below. Ironically, this has been its salvation: Faced with the choice of going to work in the dingy industrial towns along the valley floors or enjoying the sun and fresh air of their hill top, San Gimignano's residents have opted for the latter with a single minded dedication that would make their merchant forbearers proud.

San Gimignano's location has also come to its aid, just as it did when the town sat astride the main road to the Alps. It's just an hour from either Siena or Florence (or a two-hour bus ride), and the countryside, fields and forests draped over the hills, with towns, castles, and churches scattered here and there, looks lifted from a fourteenth century painting.

San Gimignano can easily be seen in a day. If you take the bus, it will let you off in Piazzale dei Martiri di Monte Maggio, where Niccoló Macchiavelli once drilled the town militia (the cannon in the War monument came from an Austrian submarine). Enter through Porta San Giovanni, built by the Sienese in 1261, and follow Via San Giovanni past the Pisan Romanesque black and white striped façade of San Francesco, the monastery Cosimo the First suppressed in 1553 (it's now a wine cellar with a spectacular view of the countryside), through the Arco dei Becci, one of the gates of the original city walls, and into Piazza della Cisterna, the social heart of town, where markets, tourneys, and plays were held.

San Gimignano was governed from the neighboring Piazza del Duomo. You will most likely wish to begin with the cathedral, with its spectacular fresco cycles of the Old and new Testaments and its Last Judgment. Don't miss St. Fina's Chapel (to the right -- the admission charge will also get you into the other three municipal museums, and the custodian will give you a nice town map). The town's two art museums are both off Piazza del Duomo, one in the cloister of the cathedral, and the other in the Palazzo del Popolo, the new town hall that was completed in 1298.

The former, the Museo d'Arte Sacra, hosts the treasures of the Church and a variety of Etruscan pots and urns found in the surrounding countryside over the centuries (if you take a walk in the fields you will still find Etruscan pot shards today). The latter, which is the town art gallery, has two nice 12th century crucifixes, several Gothic altarpieces, including one showing scenes from the life of Saint Gimignano, the Madonna with Saints Gregory and Benedict by Pinturicchio, and some amusing frescoes of family life, with a couple taking a bath in a tub and going to bed. The Museo Comunale also has the Torre Grande, which takes some effort to climb but offers a stunning view.

Next you will probably want to see Sant'Agostino, the finest of the surviving monasteries (San Domenico looks more imposing from the outside, but has been transformed into a prison). Leave Piazza del Duomo along Via San Matteo, and turn right just before the gate, onto Via Cellolese.

Sant'Agostino was one of the last churches completed in San Gimignano, and is one of the few examples of Renaissance architecture in the town. You enter from a side door; to the left there is a nice marble altar dedicated to St. Bartolo, whose bones are in the urn, done by Benedetto da Maiano in 1494. There are also the frescoes of the life of Saint Augustine in the apse behind the main altar, painted by Benozzo Gozzoli in 1465, which give a good idea of what life was like for the wealthy in 15th century Italy. Benozzo had a keen eye for detail, and managed to include it in ways that suggest people were doing better than they had the century before (and that a modern viewer might find out of place), for example the two naked boys playing with a puppy in the background while Santa Monica lies on her deathbed.

At this point you will have seen everything that closes for lunch, except the Kriminal Museum, a grisly private collection of medieval torture instruments just off Piazza della Cisterna (admission 8,000 Lire), and the museum of the history of handicrafts, a sizable collection of tools and implements with everything from a 17th century doctor's office to a 1920's Fordson tractor (outside Porta San Giovanni; admission 5,000 Lire). For that matter, it will probably be close to lunch time; you can either eat at a restaurant (Le Vecchie Mura, Da Nisio and Ristorante il Pino -- Via San Matteo 102 -- are all good) or buy the fixings for a picnic lunch and a bottle of wine, and go up to the fortress (behind the cathedral; follow the road that parallels the right wall), where there are benches overlooking the countryside.

The fortress itself is typical of the strongholds to which the population of a town could withdraw as a last resort, and the view from the bastions is quite pleasant. During the summer it also doubles as an open air theater. After eating, you can, if you like, wander down to the wool-washer's fountain outside the Porta dei Fonti, an impressive series of tubs under Romanesque and Gothic vaults, or explore San Gimignano's charming side streets. Or, if you have a car, you can visit Cellole, a pretty Romanesque church about two miles away (follow the signs), which offers a beautiful and completely unexpected view of the town.

Beautiful as San Gimignano is, there's more than just art and countryside. Hundreds of years ago the residents grew crocuses and exported saffron throughout the known world; the ancient art is now being revived by Brunello Bertelli, who painstakingly hand-fertilizes the flowers and later collects the precious stigmas. In the meantime, saffron's place in San Gimignano's economy has been taken by Vernaccia, a white wine whose origins are shrouded in the mists of time: Some even suggest that the grapes used to make it were brought by the Etruscans. In any case, over the centuries the vines adapted superbly to the soil, and by the Renaissance Vernaccia was considered Italy's finest white wine, fit to fire the imaginations of poets, artists and Popes. Because of its historical renown, it was the first Italian wine to be awarded DOC status, in 1966.

This recognition proved a mixed blessing -- As Riccardo Falchini points out, in the centuries after the Renaissance warfare and turmoil swept away most of the region's enological traditions. Thus, most of the modern (as of 1966) white wines of San Gimignano bore little resemblance to their ancestor; in short order Vernaccia acquired a reputation of being light and spritzy that has still not been dispelled today, despite tremendous improvements in quality, especially on the part of the leading vintners. Part of the problem is that Vernaccia grape is not noble, and therefore requires careful cultivation to low yields and superb technique to give good results; even today there are considerable differences in quality and much is still spritzy. Why do vintners persevere with it rather than plant Chardonnay? Because it's distinctive and unique, and the best is excellent: Powerful and full-bodied, with a rich, heady bouquet and a crisp clean taste that lingers long on the palate, a golden-hued wine that both warms and inspires. As Montenidoli's Elisabetta Fagiuoli observes, "it is really a red wine made from white grapes."

The best producers? Well, that's up to individual taste. My personal favorites are Montenidoli and Casale Falchini, but I also recently tasted and liked Ponte a Rondolino and Fattoria di Cusona.

In 994 the land that is now the Fattoria di Cusona belonged to the Lords of Bibbiena; its strategic location on the pilgrimage route to Rome made it extremely important and it changed hands repeatedly over the years, and belonged to the Bardi family in the 1400s. When Costanza Bardi married Girolamo Guicciardini in 1524 she brought the villa and the surrounding farms as part of her dowry. Girolamo spent 190 Ducats to plant a beautiful new vineyard, and over the years other Guicciardinis have continued to invest in the land. In 1850 they added several levels of delightfully shadowy cellars, and in the early 1900s Francesco Guicciardini, who was also Minister of Agriculture and Foreign Minister, thoroughly modernized the estate and used it as his command post when he led the battle against the phyloxera bug. Visitors are welcome, though only small groups, only by appointment, and only to the winery -- the villa is also the Guicciardini Strozzi family's summer home. Before you set out, call on +39 577 950028, and when you reach Poggibonsi (coming from Florence or Siena) follow the signs for San Gimignano, and turn right for Cusona about a mile after the super market. The Fattoria is up a dirt road to the left after about 3 miles.

The Wines:

• Guicciardini Strozzi Vernaccia di San Gimignano 1997 -- Pale yellow with pinkish highlights, has a delicate floral bouquet with faint bitter overtones and heather that's typical of Vernaccia. No wood. On the palate it's relatively thin, surprisingly acidic, and has a tart citrus finish; because of the acidity it would go well with fish, meat or pasta in cream sauces.
  
  
• Guicciardini Strozzi San Biagio 1997 -- A single-vineyard Vernaccia, again fermented in steel. It's a pale straw yellow, with crisp floral notes and the faint bitter almond overtones typical of Vernaccia on the nose. On the palate it's clean, and much milder than the plain Vernaccia 1997, with a nice balance of fruit, floral notes, heather, and a summer afternoon. Clean, persistent finish with slight bitterness and citrus notes overlain by the aroma of a Tuscan hillside on a hot summer day (sorry, but that's what it smells like). A nice wine that would go well as a lightly chilled aperitif, with pasta with cream sauces, with fish, or with mildly seasoned white meats. Would be overwhelmed by large amounts of tomatoes.
  
  
• Guicciardini Strozzi Vernaccia di San Gimignano Riserva 1995 -- Partially fermented in steel, then completes fermentation and ages several months in wood. It's a charged golden color and has a rich bouquet, with a nice balance of floral notes and wood, together with dried fruit. On the palate it's full, with a sweet fruity attack that gives way to butterscotch, and a clean, slightly tart finish with lasting vanilla and spice. This is definitely a "modern" wine, made in the international style, and will go well as an aperitif, chilled, or with antipasti, crustaceans, fish, or white meats. Because of its structure, it will keep for several years.
  
  
• Guicciardini Strozzi Perlato 1996 -- Another barriques wine, though the wood isn't as apparent as it is in the Vernaccia Riserva. It's a pretty pale yellow, and has an elegant bouquet, with nice floral notes and tropical fruit underpinned by vanilla. On the palate it's full, with melon in the fruit, and has a pleasingly tart citrus finish. The characteristic bitter almond elements of Vernaccia are less evident than they are in the San Biagio, in part because of the wood, and in part (I suspect) because there's also some Chardonnay in the wine -- blending up to 15% is perfectly legal, and can flesh out a wine, producing a sum that's more than the parts. This will go quite nicely with fish, greens, cream sauces, and delicate pasta dishes. It will also be pleasant to sip on a summer afternoon.

It's hard to imagine a greater contrast than that between Fattoria di Cusona and Ponte a Rondolino, the winery Enrico Teruzzi and Carmen Puthod bought in 1974, after a friend pointed out a "property for sale" add in the paper. When they arrived with their son Angelo there was a hectare of vineyards on the land and a farmhouse; they now have about 75 hectares under vine and are struggling to get the necessary authorization from the Comune of San Gimignano to build a winery. Where do they make their wines? In a forest of tanks behind the one building they've been authorized to put up. Given their setup, they're really not equipped for visitors. But their being forced to make their wines out in the open hasn't been completely negative: Enrico Teruzzi loves technology, and has the patience to devise tremendously effective solutions to his problems. The tanks are all temperature controlled (with heating and refrigeration units), and every phase of production is carefully monitored. Not that he has many unexpected problems; the musts are carefully filtered to insure that they in perfect condition before fermentation begins.

Perhaps because of his background (his father produced electrical equipment after the war, and he worked for the company before giving it up in favor of horse riding (as a jockey), teaching skiing, and running charter sailboat cruises), Enrico Teruzzi's views of the wine industry differ considerably from what one normally hears from producers. First, he thinks high production is important. Not high yields, but lots of bottles: Producing quality wines is an expensive proposition, and the only way to keep the cost of an individual bottle reasonable is to practice economies of scale. He also makes an important distinction between stars and companies, observing that some producers have endured for generations, while others fade following the retirement of the great vintner who put them on the map. While he respects the latter, it's quite obvious that Ponte a Rondolino is headed in the direction of the former -- nothing is left to chance, nor are there flights of inspirational fancy. Just careful study, and superb application of the latest technology.

Not that Enrico, Carmen and Angelo are hidebound -- anything but. Indeed, when they were struggling to get the winery off the ground Carmen, who had previously been a prima ballerina at La Scala, started up a restaurant with the thought that customers who liked the wines would buy them; the ploy worked and the restaurant became a tremendous success in its own right before problems with its lease forced closure. At least we can enjoy the wines, which as a group, are quite modern in style:

• Teruzzi & Puthod Galestro 1997 -- Galestro is the wine born to provide an outlet for all the Trebbiano in the vineyards after changes to the Chianti Disciplinare removed it from Tuscany's great red wine; it's one of the few wines with a maximum allowed alcohol percentage, and is supposed to be a light quaffing wine. This doesn't mean it can't be good; Ponte a Rondolino's is a pale white, with a crisp bouquet with the bitter notes typical of Vernaccia nicely balanced by floral notes of Trebbiano. On the palate it's clean, with nice fruit, and a very faint sparkle adds a pleasant touch. A refreshing summer wine, which will be nice as an aperitif, or with antipasti, fish, or delicately sauced pasta.
  
  
• Teruzzi & Puthod Vernaccia di San Gimignano 1997 -- A pale yellow with golden highlights, the wine has a rich bouquet with nice floral notes and good complexity, underpinned by the bitter almond typical of Vernaccia. No wood. On the palate it has a pleasing liquidity (this seems to be a characteristic of Ponte a Rondolino) and is light bodied and crisp, with a mild acidity and a somewhat citric, fairly persistent finish. A nicely done simple wine, which will be quite good with vegetarian cooking, delicate fish dishes, and white meats.
  
  
• Teruzzi & Puthod Vigna Rondolino Vernaccia di San Gimignano 1996 -- A pale papery white with yellow highlights, the wine has a crisp bouquet with heather, the nettles and grasses of a field on a hot summer afternoon, and nice floral notes complementing the bitter almonds of Vernaccia. Again, no wood. On the palate, it's very clean and medium bodied with nice fruit, and a clean citrus finish. Quite pleasant, and will work nicely as an aperitif, or with antipasti, fish, pasta in cream sauces, white meats, or carpaccio.
  
  
• Teruzzi & Puthod Terre di Tufi 1995 -- This was a Vernaccia until this vintage, but has been reclassified as an IGT table wine, because it also contains Vermentino and Malvasia. It's a pale papery white, and has a delicate bouquet with floral notes nicely balanced by wood, and the mixture of Vermentino and Vernaccia aromatics is pleasing. On the palate it's fairly full bodied, again with a nice balance between wood and fruit, and quite crisp. A firmly international wine, which will be a nice aperitif and also work well with antipasti or fish.
  
  
• Teruzzi & Puthod Carmen 1996 -- While many sparkling wines are blancs de noirs, whites made from red grapes, this is the only Tuscan so made that I know of: in addition to Trebbiano, Vermentino, Vernaccia and Malvasia it contains Sangiovese. Following controlled temperature fermentation the wine spends several months in barriques, emerging a pale yellow, with an elegant bouquet with nicely balanced wood, floral notes, and tropical fruit. On the palate it's full and mellow, with nice fruit and a pleasingly tart citrus finish. It would be nice as an aperitif, but also has the body to work well with complex fish dishes, cream sauce, white meats, and mild cheeses. Quite nice.

Back in the 1960s Riccardo Falchini enjoyed driving out into the country to buy wines (he operated a business in Prato, not far from Florence), but realized what the farmers were selling wasn't their best. So in 1964 he decided, much against the advice of the rest of his family, to purchase a farm outside San Gimignano, which had once been monastic. It's hard to fault his relatives; because of the political situation landlord-tenant relationships were extremely tense, and most people who had land were trying to get rid of it. Moreover, the tenants who lived on this particular farm were herdsmen from the Maremma whose primary interest was their 22 cows. "It was desolate," he recalls, adding that the neglect of the herdsmen was only the final insult: During the unrest of the 1800s farmers living in the area had planted things that required little supervision, since they never knew when they would have to hide from an invading army. In terms of vineyards, this meant Sangiovese, which is resistant and long-lived, but not necessarily noble, and Trebbiano, which gave large volumes and thus provided much needed calories for the winter (wine was seen primarily as a food), but again, not quality. The enological culture of the Renaissance was gone, and when the new Vernaccia DOC came into being in 1966 many people were not sure what to do next.

Riccardo Falchini rolled up his sleeves and got to work, replanting vineyards and studying enological treatises. In 1976 he rebuilt the winery, installing temperature-controlled fermentation tanks and temperature control throughout, and in 1979 began making a Vernaccia based sparkling wine as well; along the way he also began experimenting with non-indigenous grape varieties, including Chardonnay, Reisling, and Cabernet Sauvignon. The results have been spectacular, and Casale Falchini is one of the best bargains in San Gimignano, with excellent wines made even better by the quality/price ratio. If you like older vintages and are in the area you should by all means visit, because you'll find crates of all sorts of marvels, including decade-old vinsanto and wonderful Chardonnay, all stored under perfect conditions. You'll also enjoy the vinsantaia, which has some of the barriques that yielded first successful vintage of Sassicaia, in 1968, and the view from the estate is of course pretty -- the view of San Gimignano's towers is hard to beat. Call before setting out, on +39 577 941 305 (email: Rfalchin@tin.it), and don't arrive at lunch time, which is from 12 to 1 (small groups only). To get there turn right at Piazza dei Martiri, circle around the walls and down the hill, and turn right again onto the road for Ulignano. Fattoria Casale will be to the left, after about 2 miles.

The wines: Casale Falchini will be one of my stops at Vinitaly (to the notes written taken at Viniatlay), because I still haven't tasted the sparkling Vernaccia, which won the gold medal for Non-DOC sparkling wines fermented in bottle (the classic metodo Champenois) at last year's Vinitaly, nor have I tasted Campora, a Cabernet Sauvignon whose 1991 vintage was declared the best Supertuscan of 1996 by Wine Enthusiast (and also won the gold medal in its category at Vinitaly). What have I tasted? Many things at dinner, but with notebook in hand only one white:

Vigna a Solatio Riserva 1995 -- A pale gold, has elegant floral notes with the heather and nettles of a hot summer afternoon on the nose, nicely balanced by vanilla from wood, and the characteristic bitter almond of Vernaccia mixed with nuts. On the palate the wine is full, rich, and has an initial sweetness that fades to a nice bitter tartness with vanilla overtones on the finish. A tasty sipping wine that will go very well with appetizers, crustaceans, complex fish dishes, pasta, white meats, and creamy cheeses. I think it will also work well with moderately spiced Chinese.

Ed McCarthy, on the other hand, singles out Casale Falchini's Vernaccia di San Gimignano Vinea Doni 1994 as one of his favorites in the Wine Buying Companion for Dummies, saying it is has "full, rich, honeyed, earthy aromas and flavors, and loads of concentration, a good deal of flavor intensity, and a long finish… (p. 308)"

The final producer I would recommend is Elisabetta Fagiuoli of Montenidoli, who has done a stunning job of turning what must have been a ramshackle farm at the end of a long dirt road into something out of a very nice dream. With the assistance of her companion, Sergio, and her daughter Angelica, who has just returned from harvesting in Australia (as of 03/98), she makes a number of wines, including three different styles of Vernaccia, all of which are superb. As is the case with Riccardo Falchini's wines I have enjoyed them many times but rarely bothered to take notes, so much of the below is from memory.

Montenidoli Vernaccia di Carato 1996 is barrel fermented, and has an elegant bouquet with pleasing floral notes and honey nicely balanced by wood. On the palate there is again an excellent balance between fruit and wood, and great structure, with a long clean finish laced with bitter honey and spice. If you like barrel fermented wines, you should seek this out; it will go especially well with crustaceans or white meats.

Good as it is, it's not my favorite -- I prefer traditional wines made with modern technique, and the Montenidoli Vernaccia Tradizionale is one of the best. It's fermented in cement, which means there are no wood overtones to mask the aromatics of the Vernaccia grapes, and stays on the lees until mid-December, which makes for terrific extraction and depth. The 1996 vintage is a deep golden color with gold highlights, and has an extremely complex floral bouquet that's also delicate and very clean; swishing brings up a steady progression of new things and you could sniff this wine for hours. Not that you'd want to however; on the palate it's rich, and very full bodied for a white wine, with nice fruit and a mild citrus tartness that gives way to a balanced, clean finish with notes of bitter almond and hot Tuscan countryside. This will be an excellent aperitif, and will also be superb with complex fish dishes, cream sauces, white meats, or Oriental foods, especially moderately spiced Chinese. If you like white wines unencumbered by wood this is for you.

Elisabetta's third Vernaccia is called Fiore, and is from free-run must, the juice that runs from the press before it's turned on. This is the reverse of Tradizionale, a delicate wine that is much lighter on the palate, and which will complement rather than overwhelm subtly flavored dishes such as steamed fish. Again, though I like it I have never taken notes on it.

In addition to Vernaccia, Elisabetta makes Cannaiuolo, a rosé that makes for a delightful aperitif; Vinbrusco, a surprisingly rich and flavorful blend of Malvasia and Trebbiano; Il Garrulo, a red wine made following the traditional formula for Chianti, which includes both red and white grapes, and is a nice, undemanding wine that is good drunk young but ages surprisingly well; Montenidoli, a more full-bodied red, and, in great years, Sono Montenidoli, a red table wine made from Sangiovese.

All of these wines are made from traditional Tuscan grapes, which Elisabetta prefers, in part because of the estate's long history (the woman who owned the property in 1404 donated it, "with vineyards, woods and orchards," to the Hospital of Santa Fina, for the salvation of her soul), and in part because she feels that a thorough understanding of the traditions of the past will make it possible to draw the best from them, thus providing a key to continued success in the future.

Elisabetta will be happy to talk wines with you (or almost anything else - she has led an extremely interesting life), though you must call ahead, on 0577-941565. Drive up to San Gimignano, circle past the Porta San Giovanni towards the parking lot, and take the dirt road that goes down the hill, just to the left of the entrance to the lot. It's about two kilometers, though the peace you will find upon your arrival will make you think you have gone much further.

Last thing: If you are looking for a place to use as a base for exploring Central Tuscany, you'd be hard pressed to do better than La Fidanza, the Montenidoli estate whose vineyards yield Vernaccia Fiore.

If, on the other hand, you want more ideas for a trip to the area (e.g. a visit to a grappa distillery), see my Travel Page.

Good Food, Drink & Travel
Kyle Phillips

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Text & photos except Vinsantaia © Kyle Phillips; Vinsantaia photo kindly provided by Fattoria di Cusona, and labels by the respective wineries.