1997 Tenuta San Guido Sassicaia

Bolgheri is a tiny village just inland from the western Tuscan coast with a storybook renaissance castle but no train station. To wine enthusiasts, however, Bolgheri is Italy’s most exciting wine region, and the Bolgheri Sassicaia DOC is particularly noteworthy. It was created in 1994 explicitly for Tenuta San Guido’s highly successful Sassicaia Super Tuscan. Sassicaia, first commercially released in 1968, is considered the first Super Tuscan and it remains a highly prestigious Cabernet Sauvignon/Merlot blend. Bolgheri is the cultural heart of the Maremma, the coastal stretch of Tuscany. Marchese Incisa della Rocchetta planted Bordeaux varietals at Tenuta San Guido in the 1940s, though it took him more than 20 years to win acclaim for his Bordeaux-style blends. By the late 1970s the family was using French oak barriques in the production of Sassicaia, which is now regularly described as one of the world’s finest wines.