After a great week-end in London, tasting several Rum from all over the world, it is nice to reverse things and have some relax in our Monteriggioni (very close to our headoffice) , tasting some amazing "km 0" products .
Monteriggioni is a very small town in Tuscany, fully contained inside a medieval castle. The whole town have a diameter of about 500 meters. Despite the dimensions it attracts every year thousands of people that enjoy Tuscany, Chianti and our local products . This week-end Monteriggioni was the place for a Fest called "Mercatale della Valdelsa" taking place on different towns of Valdelsa during this month . The main characteristic of this Fest is to host a "Km 0 Market" in which many bio (or organic) products are presented.
Of course one of the main attraction is the large collection of wines presented in each of the several shops. Here you can find a wide collection of Chianti DOCG and IGT red and white wines from our land : Vernaccia, Supertuscans and many others .
Wines are not the only attractions, the other main player is our typical ExtraVergine Olive Oil, and just in these days you can find the "Olio Nuovo" , that means "new make olive oil" .
The Olio Nuovo is fantastically coloured of a deep , matt, shining green . And the taste is really fantastic : perfect for a salad or just with some toasted bread . The following photo show a bottle of Olio Nuovo that i purchased today in Monteriggioni.... it was bottled just yesterday ! It is a fully organic ExtraVergine Oilve Oil, made by the Azienda Agricola Michele Giorgio, based here in the Siena countryside . Their webstie is http://www.azgiorgio.it/ .
Even if less famous, an other interesting local product is the craft beer, made with organic local barley . The following picture shows a bottle of the "Guadagnata" beer, from "Birrificio 26 Nero" (26 Black Brewery) . This Brewery produces 2 different Beers: "Fedora" a lager beer (defined as “uneasy” and “screwy” , refreshing, well balanced, ideal to taste with delicate flavours) , and "Gudagnata" an amber-coloured beer with a stronger taste . Both are brewed and bottled here in Siena countryside . You can visit their website by clicking here : http://www.birrificio26nero.com/
Then, wine. Red wine of course, but not Chianti this time... well not official DOCG Chianti, but a IGT "Super Tuscan" just from Monteriggioni . For who is not so well informed about red wines, "super Tuscans" refer to red wines that goes over the standard specification for the "Chianti DOCG" and take into consideration a blending of SanGiovese grapes with imported Bordeaux varieties , in particular Cabernet and Merlot . These varieties, planted in Tuscany, like very much the land and climate of our region, becoming a perfect complement to our local grapes . So in 1970s , thanks to a pioneering vision of Antinori, a new kind of high-quality, experimental wines appeared : the Supertuscans . Today the category of Supertuscan allow for wide experimentation of blends, so that you can find excellent wines in this less regulated category . The following picture shows a bottle of " Commendator Enrico IGT", a Supertuscan made here in Monteriggioni by the Lornano winery . This wine is made with 40% Merlot, 25% Sangiovese, 25% Cabernet Sauvignon, and 10% Petit Verdot . The 2007 year of this wine got 3 "glasses" of the Italian "Gambero Rosso" wine guide. More information on this wine and other wines from Lornano can be found here : http://www.lornano.it/blog/?p=260
Finally we purchased also some very good sauseges from a local farm , the perfect complement for our red wine and our craft beer !
