Italiano
Sassi-Gaja and Ornellaia
A little background on two seminars that one can experience only a couple of time in their lifetime. The first is an encounter between the prestigious Gaia&Rey Chardonnay and Sassicaia, while the second is a vertical tasting of Bolgheri Superiore Ornellaia and both are not to be missed!
We are in the final stretch for the presentation of our Essential Guide to Italian Wines, which will take place in Milan, October 3 & 4, at the Hotel Principe di Savoia, and we hope without a hitch. It was very complicated to organize everything during the Covid emergency but it was equally essential to do everything fully respecting the rules. We are doing our best and everyone’s caution and common sense will also be crucial, as well some patience and understanding should anything inevitable not go according to plan.
One of the things I would like to underscore is the quality of the seminars that will be staged during the two-day presentation, which are offered at a truly reasonable cost given the content. And I would like to draw attention to two, in particular, which may be the most expensive but are events that one can experience only a few times in their lives.
The first will inaugurate the series of seminars, on Saturday at 1:30pm, and will be entitled somewhat playfully Sassi-Gaja, and will star three vintages of Gaia&Rey, the prestigious Chardonnay produced by Angelo Gaja, and four vintages of Sassicaia, the last three to come out plus a 1997 in a magnum bottle.
The name came to me when I remembered a personal episode. At the end of the 1980s, perhaps 1989, Angelo Gaja, his representative in Rome and yours truly went to lunch at the Roman restaurant Checchino dal 1887. Sassicaia 1985 had just come out on the market, the first to be distributed by Meregalli, and seeing it on the wine list Gaja said: “I’ve heard good things about this, I’d like to try it”. No one, obviously, disagreed and the wine, which was not yet legendary, was truly excellent. So much so, in fact, that Gaja took the empty bottle in hand and changed the “c” is Sassicaia into a “g” for Gaja. By doing this it became “Sassigaia”, to underscore how much he liked the wine.
The second seminar in question will be a vertical tasting of Ornellaia, which will begin with the legendary 1998, the wine that came in first in Wine Spectator’s Top Hundred Wine list for 2001, and will proceed with five other vintages from more or less hot years in order to see how the wine was affected by climate change. I will conduct the seminar together with Axel Heinz (director of production at Ornellaia) and it will also be a very special occasion. So much so, in fact, that I will limit myself to acting as an interviewer, seeing how he knows so much about the wine.
This event will open the seminars on Sunday, October 4, at 10:30am, with the participation of a limited number of people, all socially distanced. Both events will cost 100 euros, which is certainly not small change but not that much if you consider the wines that will be tasted (with no markup on the cost of the bottle).
We hope to see you there.
Here are the links to get your ticket for the masterclasses:
Sassi-Gaja - https://shop.doctorwine.it/prodotti/eventi/sassi-gaja-0310-h-1330-sala-cristalli
