Wine

Going up towards Larciano and Lamporecchio, in the hilliest part outside Monsummano, grape-filled vineyards await you in a part of Tuscany crossed by the Montalbano Wine and Oil Roads.

In addition to oil, wine has always been the most important and widespread enogastronomic product on Montalbano and in Valdinievole. The excellent quality of these two outstanding products is not only due to the favorable soil, but also to the careful processing that maintains traditional production methods.

This tradition takes us a long way back in time: to the discovery of wine jars inside some Etruscan tombs and to between 50 and 60 B.C. when Caesar allotted his veterans some land parcels between the Arno and the Ombrone, whose vineyards have been cultivated since that time. One of the first documents on wine and oil production in these hills came a few centuries later, in 804 AD, when the Franks ruled.

The blend of grapes is the same as for Chianti: Sangiovese, Canaiolo, Malvasia Bianca, and Trebbiano. Chianti Montalbano DOCG, Bianco della Valdinievole DOC, the Valdinievole Vin santo, and the Bianco Empolese DOC are produced in these areas.

Montalbano Chianti belongs to the great family of Chianti wines, for which not many words are likely needed. Despite having its own personality, the wine maintains the characteristics common to all Chiantis that distinguish them from all other wines: its beautiful ruby color and distinctive winy aroma with hints of violet.

Leonardo and wine

“et però credo che molta felicità sia agli homini che nascono dove si trovano i vini buoni”

“E’l vin sia temprato, poco e spesso. Non fuor di pasto, né a stomaco vuoto”

“Già il vino, entrato nello stomaco, comincia a bollire e sgonfiare;
già l’anima di quello comincia ad abbandonare il corpo;
Già si volta inverso il cielo, trova il cèlabro, cagione della divisione del suo corpo;
Già lo comincia a contaminare e a farlo furiare a modo matto;
Già fa irriparabili errori, ammazzando i suoi amici”.

Leonardo, Codice Atlantico, 1490