The 2015 Poggio di Sotto Brunello di Montalcino struts its Castelnuovo dell'Abate origins with pride, taking all of the best aspects of this sunny vintage and adding a savoriness that balances everything out so well. The bouquet is a stunning mix of savory cherry sauce, sage, seared meat, cinnamon, moist earth, and a hint of animal musk. On the palate, its textures are like the purest silk being slowly drawn across the senses in a seamless expression of dark red fruits, sweet spice and inner florals. Nothing is out of place here, showing incredible balance and poise, while remaining tightly wound up in it’s youthful state. The finish seems to go on and on, displaying pretty red fruits and floral tones over a core of salty minerals and rock-solid tannin. You could drink this now, but you’d be missing out, because beneath all of its suave character and textural richness, it is a beast of a wine just waiting to come out. EG

There’s a real Burgundian feel here to the sour cherries, five spice, citrus, nutmeg and fresh oregnano. The tannins have a beautiful, porcelain-like feel; the acidity cuts a wide and long shape. Delicate, floral and refined. All about grace and elegance. Drink from 2021.

Poggio di Sotto doesn't miss a beat with this very special release. This is a glorious expression of the vintage, and the wine has absorbed the golden sunlight of Tuscany, delivering beautifully ripe, round and subtle fruit layers. The 2015 Brunello di Montalcino shows concentration, but not too much, and richness, but not too much. You get the power and the opulence of the vintage presented with the elegance and grace that is the house style at this venerated estate. Poggio di Sotto is one of the benchmarks of Montalcino, and the winery team continues the tradition with this 22,000-bottle release. There's a lot of red fruit energy deep inside that should stir this wine on course as it ages over the next two decades. ML

Luminous red. Delicately smoky and ripe on the nose, with deep raspberry and red cherry aromas complicated by notes of sandalwood, licorice, graphite and sweet pipe tobacco. Full and rich but also very bright, with red and dark berry flavors given life by juicy, harmonious acidity and very nicely framed by supple tannins. Closes long, fresh, and expansive, deeper and less sweet than the estate’s 2018 Rosso di Montalcino also released this year. Utterly delicious and already accessible, this boasts noteworthy elegance and freshness for such a big ripe wine.

The Poggio di Sotto 2015 Brunello di Montalcino is a vintage that could have played out quite differently but was ultimately saved by underground water reserves leftover from the previous year's abundant rainfall. The 2015 growing season was quite hot, resulting in big-boned wines across the appellation, but not here. Thanks to fruit-thinning, earlier harvest times and other important farming decisions, this wine offers impressive finesse and length. It shows dark fruit, underbrush and even a hint of wild mushroom. However, you would have a hard time pegging this wine to the 2015 vintage because it feels much lighter and fresher compared to its peers. Harvest started the first week of September in 2015 and was completed quickly, within a week's time. Local tradition dictates that olives are picked after all the grapes have come off the vines, and winemaker Leonardo Berti says, "We start picking the olives when others are still picking grapes."

The 2015 Brunello di Montalcino is bright and punchy, with a wickedly fresh burst of wild strawberries, dried roses, sage, mint leaf and crushed stones. This sweeps across the palate, lifted and refined, with silky textures ushering in perfumed red berry fruits as brisk acidity maintains a lovely inner freshness. It tapers off long yet with finesse, leaving inner florals that resonate over a staining of licorice and coating of fine tannins that add form without detracting from the 2015's forward personality. While already showing beautifully, there’s still plenty of upside potential here.

A chameleon of a Brunello, whose range of red-fruit aromas and flavours are in perpetual motion in the glass. In a traditional style – the type you thought went out of fashion decades ago – whose underlying power reveals itself gradually. Organic. Drinking Window 2022 - 2035
Tasted by Monty Waldin (at Must-Know Brunello Estates tasting, 15 Dec 2020)
Part of Brunello di Montalcino: The 10 must-know estates

Just mid ruby and still youthful-looking. A nose that still is a little closed and really takes its time to open up in the glass. Balsamic and focused. Savoury raspberry and minerally hints. Fluid, elegant, cool and fresh and with the finely grained tannins adding an arch of tension that goes on and on. A thoroughbred, slowly reaching its peak. (WS)

Tasted blind. Just mid ruby. Gorgeous, perfumed red-fruit nose with an elegant note of oatmeal. Bright, concentrated red fruit with plenty of acidity. Very elegant and understated, with fine sandy tannins. Long and complex finish. Drink 2020 – 2032
Walter Speller - Feb 2020