Babo Chianti 2019

Description

Babo wines are made by Australian Justin Bubb (an honorary Italian having spent the last six years making wine in Italy and who splits his time between Tuscany and Tasmania at Pooley Wines) with the idea of utilising the best fruit possible to produce wines of elegance and purity with a focus on vibrancy of fruit, texture and balanced complexity. All the wines are made at a small wine making facility in Empoli.
All of these wines are very well made while still speaking clearly of their origins. They offer exceptional value, and are bottled under screwcap. The BABO philosophy is simple. Source the finest regional fruit from Italy, to produce wines of elegance and purity with a focus on vibrancy, texture and balanced complexity.

This was the first Chianti to be bottled under screwcap and offered in a Burgundy-shaped bottle (of course others have now followed). Quality fruit, sourced from a southwest-facing vineyard in Vinci (near Empoli) elevates this to a status that far exceeds what you’d normally expect at this price point.

The winemaking took two paths. The first was whole-bunch fermentation with roughly 50% carbonic maceration, raised in concrete vats for six months. A second ferment was de-stemmed and matured in concrete for eight months.

The blend captures plenty of Chianti’s trademark sour cherry tang, here combined with lifted florals and orange rind notes, juicy freshness and a hint of aniseed and dried-herb-savouriness, which complements the fine acidity and gentle tannin on the finish. Just a delicious, jubey red that Justin Bubb aptly describes as a “Beaujolais from Italy”.

Mike Bennie, Gourmet Traveller Wine, June-July 2019 “Renowned Aussie winemaker, Justin Bubb, created this Babo range to focus on ideal wine regions of Italy. While his nero d’Avola from Sicily is brilliant, it’s this wildly delicious rendition of Chianti that gets podium placing. It shows scents of sarsaparilla, clove and lavender while offering drinkers a masterclass in fine, al dente tannins stretched over lightly juicy, dark cherry and earthy spice flavours. It’s surprisingly bright, drinkable in its youth and generally feels like a wine of some seriously excellent value.”

RRP $30  Our Price $24.50

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