Tuscany and the Antinori family. Where the renaissance of Italian wine began.

Sangiovese, the soul of Tuscany

Sangiovese is grown almost everywhere in Tuscany and is the main grape of its three great reds: Chianti Classico, Brunello di Montalcino and Vino Nobile di Montepulciano. It tends to have a fairly pale color, high acidity and firm tannins, with dark cherry fruit and a savory, slightly bitter, herbal or olive note. When tasting blind, experts look for its typical dusty tannins.

The film explains the differences in style. Chianti Classico tends to be the most approachable and fruity, Brunello is more powerful and built for longer aging, and Vino Nobile sits in between, with deeper color and sometimes more austere tannins.

Chianti Classico and its terroir

Chianti Classico is the original heart of the Chianti area and, within Tuscany, a relatively cool home for Sangiovese. Warm days and cool nights help the grapes keep their acidity. Piero Antinori believes the ideal elevation is around 400 meters. The crumbly, dry schist soil known as galestro forces the vines to dig deep, and the family crushes stones dug from new vineyards and spreads them back on the surface to reflect sun, improve drainage and keep weeds down.

The episode also untangles the labels: the large Chianti appellation with its many subzones versus the smaller Chianti Classico, the Riserva category with its minimum aging, and the newer Gran Selezione. Not every expert in the film agrees that Riserva means better wine, and the discussion about the straw-covered fiasco bottle is a highlight.

Twenty-six generations

The Antinori family comes from the Florentine nobility and began taking wine seriously in the 14th century, which makes the firm one of the oldest family-owned businesses in the world. Piero Antinori joined in 1966, at a time when Italian wine was still largely about quantity. Writer Burton Anderson calls him, perhaps, the father of the renaissance of Italian wine.

Today his daughters Albiera, Allegra and Alessia work alongside him. See how the family balances a large company, with around 22 million bottles a year, against a deep attachment to tradition.

Piero says that at his age he can do only the things he enjoys most: walking the vineyards, visiting the cellars and tasting. His daughters describe a father who guides without intruding, and the family is already looking ahead to the next generation of grandchildren who share the passion.

Tignanello and the Super Tuscans

Piero's boldest move was to break the rules. He aged Sangiovese in small barrels and blended in Cabernet, which was not allowed in Chianti at the time. Tignanello, named after a vineyard, became a blend of mostly Sangiovese with Cabernet Sauvignon and Cabernet Franc. It had to be sold as a simple table wine, yet it cost more than the appellation wines. Solaia followed, with the proportions reversed.

Journalists coined the term Super Tuscan for these unclassifiable wines. Find out why the people who invented the name now think their era is over, and how the movement pushed the whole of Tuscany, including the rules for Chianti Classico, to raise its quality.

Wine made for the table

Tuscan reds are built for food. Their acidity and tannin refresh the palate after every bite, which is why they can seem severe on their own but come alive at the table. With careful vineyard work, smaller and cleaner oak and lower yields, the best Sangiovese can now age for 20 or 30 years.

Visit the family's modern Chianti Classico winery, designed to blend into the landscape, and hear which single bottle Piero Antinori would choose above all others.

Go furtherWant to taste along? Find Antinori’s wines and where to buy them near you on Wine-Searcher.