White Chianti? 

I just got back from a trip that took me to Castellina, in Chianti, not far from where one of my favorite wineries, Bucciarelli Antico Podere Casanova, is located.  I had visited this winery for the first time ten years ago while staying at a house just down the road. On that first visit, the proprietor, Ezio Bucciarelli was more than happy to give me and my father generous tastings of everything he produced.  This time around, having learned that Ezio is still making wine in the same location, my father and I decided to pay him a repeat visit.  Even though he speaks no English and I speak no Italian, we spent an hour “talking” and sampling his wines in his tasting room/office before he ushered us into his Fiat Panda for a bumpy drive to his newly modernized winery, which is perched on the top of the highest hill in sight.  Once there, he let us sample his Chiantis directly from the ancient wooden casks.

We ended up purchasing some of his Chianti Classico and Chianti Classico Reserva, and my father insisted that we also buy a bottle of Colli Della Toscana Centrale, which Ezio had recently started producing.  I thought that buying a white in Chianti was like buying fish in the desert, but I couldn’t have been more wrong. Of all the Tuscan whites I had on the trip, this was by far my favorite.

The Colli Della Toscana was softly structured and had definite undertones of honey and herbs that were probably reinforced by the blooming rosemary and sage that dotted the landscape where we drank this wine.  There were some apple scents on the nose, but they were very faint.   It seemed the perfect wine to enjoy in the late afternoon while staring out at the Tuscan vineyards… or the backyard.