2020 Castellare di Castellina I Sodi di San Niccolo Toscana 750 ml

Catellare di Castellina's I Sodi might be the best-kept secret in Tuscany. And as its Sangiovese-based Super Tuscan peers like Le Pergole Torte and Flaccianello della Pieve cross the $200 mark, we've been turning to it more and more often. 

The 2020 boasts the sort of widespread critical praise that's rare even among Tuscany's elite. It earned 97+ points from Vinous—who called it “magical” and “remarkable in every way”—and 97 from Wine Spectator, making both publications’ Top 100 this past year. 

I Sodi is a collaboration between Castellare and the University of Milan to create a wine that could compete with—and beat—the Super Tuscans, using solely indigenous grapes. The resulting blend of 85% Sangioveto (a local Sangiovese clone) and 15% Malvasia Nera hit the mark in a big way, and the critics noticed. When Antonio Galloni sat down to taste three decades of I Sodi, an endorsement in itself, he praised the wine's "impeccable track record of consistency and excellence."

The name comes from a bit of Tuscan dialect: To Tuscan growers, there are fields, and then there are sodi. Fields are soft and easy to farm. Fields are compliant. If you want to whistle while you work, you work the fields. But if you want great wine, you work the sodi. They're brutal, hard, and unforgiving, but few would question their rewards.

The astute critics and collectors who include I Sodi among the major players of Tuscany are onto something: Castellare's Sangiovese-based flagship has quietly established a permanent place at the very top of Italian reds, earning *Gambero Rosso* magazine's Tre Bicchieri (Three Glasses) award—the highest honor in Italian wine—each vintage for the last seven years.