2007 Cantine Colli di Catone Lazio Colle Gaio "The Old White” 94VM
Special price: $74.99

• Practicing organic, hand harvested
• Very low yields - about 20 HL per hectare
• The wine spends 3-4 days on the skins prior to pressing
• Fermentations are slow and long, sometimes lasting up to four months.
• Ages further in stainless steel tanks for 3-4 years
• After bottling aged further in the winery cellar, sometimes buried in sand for years or even decades.

94 pts Vinous Media
The 2007 Colle Gaio explodes from the glass with a heady and layered display of musky dried mangos and peach skins, as notes of lanolin and crushed dried flowers bring you back to earth. This possesses depths of silky textures, balancing savory and sweet with an almondy richness that mixes with salty minerals and ripe apricot to create a sensation that seems more like food than wine. A glycerol-like coating of fruit extract and liquid inner florals lingers incredibly long as the 2007 tapers off to nuances of candied ginger, hazelnut and a bitter yet lovely twang of lemon pith. At the age of 14, this Malvasia del Lazio is rocking!

Owner and winemaker Antonio Pulcini runs Colli di Catone from a Roman villa surrounded by vineyards planted on southwest-facing slopes of mineral-rich volcanic tufa soils. Beneath is a 2,000-year-old cellar, where, more like a wizard than a winemaker, Pulcini matures vintages of his rare and compelling Malvasia Puntinata Colle Gaio. Over 30 years ago Pulcini decided to tear up the current-day plantings of Trebbiano and Malvasia di Candia to instead focus on the ancient varieties of Malvasia del Lazio (or Malvasia Puntinata) and Grechetto (or Greco Bianco). The Colle Gaio is a single-vineyard expression of pure Malvasia Puntinata from a location that is considered the Grand Cru of the Castelli Romani hills. The crushed grapes spend three to four days on the skins prior to pressing, which is followed by a long fermentation that can last up to four months. The wine then refines on the lees in stainless steel tanks for three, four or even more years, until Pulcini feels it’s ready, at which point it’s bottled and cellared, often buried in sand for years or even decades. The results are some of the most uniquely thrilling, mature whites that you’re likely to find in Italy, but they’re not for everyone. While the 2014 and 2007 can easily appeal to a broader audience that enjoys white Burgundy or a musky, mature Vouvray, the 1994 displays all the lovely aromas you might find in an artisan's smokehouse, which I personally find to be quite enjoyable.

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• The Catone estate has been renowned for its wines since the heyday of the Roman Empire.
• Proprietor Antonio Pulcini embraces the region’s native varieties and has particularly championed the ancient Malvasia Puntinata and Grechello.
• Yields are kept to just a small fraction of the appellation’s limits and the wines are aged for extended time with the skins, on the lees, and in the bottle until Pulcini deems them ready.

Italy’s list of transcendent white wines is short, compelling and idiosyncratic.

It begins with three growers famed for their obsessive commitment to the indigenous grapes of their region, as well as to their individuality in expressing them. These men are Valentini, Gravner, and Miani.

But over the past 30 years, a fourth, far more obscure producer, Antonio Pulcini, has quietly been turning out white wines of similarly mind-bending complexity. The obscurity of Pulcini’s wines is in part due to his reclusiveness and how he chooses to sell his wines, exclusively from the cellar door of his estate, Colli di Catone. (He has long eschewed importers and critics.)

Pulcini works in an ancient villa overlooking Rome, whose 2000-year-old, catacomb-like cellar features a 300 A.D. Christian altar. The villa itself once belonged to the sister of Trajan—the Roman Emperor in the century after Christ’s death. And in the 1940s it housed Orson Welles and Tyrone Power, when they were filming on location in Rome. More relevantly, the villa is surrounded by vineyards planted on southwest-facing slopes of volcanic tufa soils; sites rich in minerals and prized by the ancient Romans.

Decoding a Mystery
As one peels back the layers, the compelling character of Pulcini’s wine begins to emerge. Despite a 20th Century spiral into mediocrity, the wines of Rome’s southern hills had once ranked among the finest in Italy. Like Prince Boncompagni Ludovisi at the nearby Tenuta di Fiorano, Pulcini aimed to craft wines that honored that history. He longed to make the kind of structured wines that could live for decades.

Unlike Fiorano, where non-native varieties were introduced, Pulcini chose to focus on indigenous white varieties that once made the region famous. And so, over 30 years ago, he tore out most of his modern Trebbiano and Malvasia di Candia, and today focuses on the ancient varieties, Malvasia del Lazio (a/k/a Malvasia Puntinata) and Grechetto (a/k/a Greco Bianco). Malvasia del Lazio was long recognized as the region’s greatest historic variety; cherished for its wines’ minerality and ageability. Grechetto – unrelated to the Umbrian variety of the same name – was also prized for its minerality and lemony zing.

Pulcini makes an array of wines, but the best introduction to his style is his rendition of Frascati Superiore. He incorporates 40% Malvasia del Lazio into the conventional blend of Malvasia Candia and Trebbiano, and even these latter two varieties gain added character through his fastidious viticulture and famously low yields – less than half the legal limit. In his hands, this DOCG of often frivolous whites offers superb character and minerality.

Pulcini’s top site is the Colle Gaio vineyard, which has long been recognized locally as the viticultural Crown Jewel of the Castelli Romani hills. Here, more than 30 years ago, he planted Malvasia del Lazio; believing that this low-yielding native variety would give him the ageworthy wines he was looking for. And, the resulting wine has become his magnum opus, “Colle Gaio 'The Old White'.”

For, while the yields for all his wines are low, those of Colle Gaio average a mere 20hl/ha; achieving the concentration of grand cru White Burgundy. The wine spends three to four days on the skins prior to pressing and the fermentation proceeds slowly; often lasting up to four months. He then leaves the wine on its lees in stainless tanks for three, four or even more years until he feels the wine is ready to be bottled. And, the wine is then left to slumber in bottle, sometimes buried in sand, for years or decades in the estate’s labyrinthian cellars.

Colle Gaio
Though superbly balanced, and boasting a wondrous acid spine, the most exciting trait of Pulcini’s Colle Gaio is the minerality and otherworldly tertiary aromas that he coaxes from this noble terroir. While one vintage may be Riesling-like in its complexity, another may resemble Chablis in its minerality. Another vintage may exude orange marmalade, while another intrigues with its intense scent of gun smoke.

Though always made by the same methods, the same grapes and the same terroir, these wines are not only a study in vintage subtleties, they demonstrate with remarkable clarity how profoundly white wine can develop with time in bottle. And, they further demonstrate just how relevant the wisdom of ancient wine traditions can resonate in our modern time.