Sandwiched between seven days visiting wineries in north Italy (Giorgi, La Cappuccina, Collalto and Nicolis) and spending four days vacationing in Roma, I had the opportunity to visit Castello Banfi in Montalcino. My visit was arranged by Filippo di Belardino, artisan vino specialist and Wines of Italy Hall of Fame inductee, and by Nick Shoults, national retail director of Off Premise Chains.

Approaching the castle, I noticed the modern Banfi Winery a kilometer or so away at the base of the hill. The castle and tasting room is perched high on a hill overlooking 7,100 acres of Banfi land; one third of the property is under specialized vine and the balance is shared between olive groves, wheat fields, plum trees, truffle stands, forest and scrub. 

Once inside the tasting room, I was greeted by Michela Dominici at the Enoteca wine shop (located next tothe castle) for the winery tour. We drove back down the hill where Michela walked us through the winery.

Our first stop was to see the Banfi patented fermenters. They call this technology Banfi hybrid composite. The concept is that the winemaker likes both stainless steel as well as French oak for fermenting the premium wines. The 24 Banfi hybrid composite fermenters have stainless on top with French oak in the middle for just the right effect of both! They are rather large, containing over 22,000 bottles worth of wine. Since they are primarily for fermenting, which doesn’t take long, they can be used 4-5 times each harvest season. These fermenters cost around 24,000 euros and have a life of about seven years.

As we ventured further into the winery, I saw a forest of huge temperature controlled stainless tanks that house the one million+ bottles produced each year of what they refer to as their “volume labels.” At this facility, they produce 10 premium and 25 volume wines. The best are the Brunello di Montalcino 100% Sangioveseand Summus, which is a blend of Cabernet Sauvignon, Syrah and Sangiovese. The Brunello, by law, must spend three years in the barrel and two more years bottle aging.

The next amazing thing I was shown was their barrel farm. I don’t think anyone else does this, but Banfi buys freshly cut French oak “barrel stays” and ships them to Montalcino where they age and season them themselves! There are dozens of tall stacks of barrel stays neatly stacked and organized by the specific French forest they come from. Some of these forests include Troncais, Nevers3, Fountainbleau and Allier Ott. They have them labeled by the vintage they were cut. Once they meet their seasoning expectations, Banfi ships them to Piedmont where a master cooper builds the barrels.

After the very informative tour of the winery, we returned to the castle/hotel restaurant for a five course typical Italian meal paired with five Banfi wines.

Banfi was founded in 1978 thanks to the will of Italian-American brothers, John and Harry Mariani. At the tasting room, the pourer said that the money for starting Castello Banfi was generated mainly from sales of the very popular Lambrusco Riunite.

Andy Abernathy, COO of ABC Fine Wine & Spirits