Having found myself at the hands of a rather nasty bottle-shocking of travel from Maynooth to Monaghan over a tedious repetitive money-leeching meaningless "religious ceremony". I decided post-confirmation Rob was going to need something rather nice to cheer him up. Unfortunately, I was in Monaghan, and while it is where I hail from, it is the greatest hole on earth when it comes to wine, or so I thought... 
Car park full of Gilmour's, traditional exchange of wine from my hands to family hands, my sense of bereavement initially stirred by travelling the roads northward, was now well and truly cemented. For those of you who hadn't gathered. I was a rather grumpy arsehole following three hours of travel, a two hour confirmation and the delivery of several wines. Let me re-iterate however, wine bottle-shocking pales in comparison to the bottle-shocking of myself, thus the root of this problem had been travel, the cure? I wanted a nice glass. The Problem, as mentioned, I was in a border county famous for mushrooms among many other things, but not wine.
Enter the the inevitable saving grace of our story and the reason for my having created a context for the succeeding stupefying surprise which I was about to be subjected too. CaVallino's a little Italian Restaurant, just off Carrickmacross main street. How does this tie in as my saviour? Simple. First, I am an Italian wine fiend, the acidity of the reds and the never ending variety is something refreshing to me, as is it to many others. Secondly, these guys not only have their wine heads firmly screwed on, but have decided that they ought to import their own wines- my epiphany peaked, ecstasy over whelmed my little tiny wine brain. Foolishly the bill payer placed the wine list in my hands and the owner and I engaged in some wine banter. Doom was no small uncertainty for the bill payerpocket the voices stirred about the table. Oddly, it wasn't, in fact far from it. Everything on the list was bloody reasonable and most of it was sitting on a restaurant list for less than it would on many off-trade shelves.
What happened next put me in a bubble of pure euphoria. I stumbled on a super-Tuscan. One of my ultimate dirty Italiano-Franco favourites. Better still from 2006, a super vintage for Tuscany. out it poured, a luscious autumn leaf red engulfed the rim. The nose revealed some dried red fruits, but surprisingly a medium layer of a concentrated dark autumn blackcurrant jam, all tore asunder by the clean finish on the nose. Then the food arrived and the wine obviously got better.
So, why am I not instead reviewing the wine as it was in the restaurant? Simple, having battered out a psychology thesis on wine and how it's perceived, I am no goon to underestimate that the effects of setting- which in this case was fantastic. So how to balance? Well, CaVallino's handily offers an off-sales with discounted prices for any of us wino's out there. Picking up my Super-Tuscan and some other pieces, the game was finally set. Back in Maynooth a little while later, corkscrew out and finally the Empty verdict onTenuta Santini Toscana Caricello.
Appearance
A medium, pushing deep intensity, with the same autumn red rim if not a little more ruby than before.
Nose
A clearly developed nose, no mistaking the dried redcurrant fruits. A slight hint in the background wafting over the the fruits, emerging from this comes a breach of dark slightly jam-like fruits; black cherry and blackcurrant acting to end a drought on the nose. Elegant and well defined nose that is pronounced and definitely developed.
Palate
Despite the abundance of developed and dried fruits the first thing that is noticed is core of fresh acidity that bring a vibrancy to the wine. The juice that sat haunting the nose bursts open on the palate offering up concentrated dark blackcurrant and berry with some the remnants of red fruits still littering the palate. A medium bodied, high acidity wine with some fine tannins.
Comments
Just a fantastic wine, peaking and just offering up enough tertiary flavour to add a third dimension to the wine, the Sangiovese and Cabernet dance beautifully and show how well interwoven they are. The acidity on the wine is more than supported by fruits. Definitely a food wine, and a very serous one at that. This is going to be beautiful right up into the winter and maybe spring. (It is with great happiness that I inform you that I am dropping the scores applied to wines, they're too subjective and seem to skew what the words are trying to convey. I'm going to keep up my value system so 0=awful-corked, tainted, 1=Poor - wouldn't buy again and disappointed, 2=Average- what you pay for is what you get, 3=Good- you'd buy another, 4=Very Good-a wine to take time over and a definite buy again, 5= fantastic wine, the reason you drink the stuff, buy as many as life and wallet permit. So from Rob anyway-no more Parkerism. x)
Price: €15.00 - CaVallino's, Carrickmacross
Value: 4.5
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