2018 Canonica a Cerreto Sandiavolo Toscana Tuscany 750 ml

Canonica a Cerreto’s Sandiavolo never fails to light up the table. Grown on a world-renowned vineyard site and crafted by a winemaker Food & Wine called a leader of Italy’s “generation next,” it’s a 92-point crowd-pleaser that tends to beguile not just casual enthusiasts, but collectors too. 

Winemaker Marco Bernabei has consulted for luminaries like Mormoraia, Castello di Corbara, and I Sodi, but he’s more than just a hired hand. He’s also an agronomist who, when he’s not in the cellar, focuses on finding and reviving vines of lesser-known indigenous Italian grape varieties like Vernaccia di San Gimignano, Grechetto, and Verdello.

The editors at Food & Wine placed Bernabei in the vanguard of a new movement, saying he's "leading Italy into the future by taking it back to its past.” His singular expertise also benefits from the experience of his famous father, Franco Bernabei (aka “Mr. Sangiovese”), who put heavyweights like Selvapiana, Fontodi, and neighboring Felsina on the map. 

The Canonica a Cerreto property dates back to the 11th century, when church leaders in Siena decided to build an abbey there. The monastery’s original cellar still exists, although the wine is now made in a new facility built in 2003. The current owners, unsatisfied with the quality of the estate’s grapes, replanted most of the 21 hectares starting in 1998, and those plantings lie on some of Tuscany's most sought-after terroir: Castelnuovo Berardenga's sunbaked, windswept, clay-and-limestone hills, which mark Chianti Classico's southernmost reach. 

The fantastic 2018 vintage is defined by svelte elegance and precision, like 2004 or 2001. For Vinous founder Antonio Galloni, it was a reminder that Chianti Classico’s prized vineyards are “some of the greatest sites in the world.”