Masseto - Toscana IGT 2008
The 2008 growing season was marked by a cool, rainy spring, with budbreak occurring within the norm. Rainfall during flowering did however affect the fruit set, thus lowering the vine’s production. Summer brought intense heat, with almost no rain, and these conditions lasted through the first ten days of September. This facilitated a good ‘veraison’ and a very satisfactory ripening process, since the cool nights favoured development of aromas and of deep colour, while the sunny days served to further concentrate compounds in the fruit, yielding grapes of impressive depth. September brought the cool northerly tramontana winds, which lowered temperatures. This cool, breezy but generously sunny period was particularly beneficial to late-ripening grape varieties, but also to some of the later ripening Merlots in the central part of Masseto, allowing them to develop full ripeness while maintaining fresh and vibrant aromatics.
Harvest started on 4 September with the youngest vines of Masseto Junior and was completed with the last section of Masseto Centrale on 18 September yielding a total of six different vinification lots. The clusters were hand-picked into 15-kg boxes and then graded and selected by hand on a double sorting table, before and after destemming, and finally carefully crushed. Each grape variety and single vineyard block was vinified separately. Fermentation took place in stainless steel tanks and oak vats at temperatures between 25 and 28°C for ten days. Due to the very tannic character of the vintage extraction had to be handled very carefully working with very soft pumping-overs and extending maceration after fermentation to get the tannins softened.Total maceration time ranged between 28 and 30 days The malolactic fermentation took place in oak barriques, 100% new, keeping all the different lots separate. The wines remained in barrel for a total of 24 month. After the first 12 months of maturation, the wine was assembled and then returned to the barriques for an additional year.
After bottling, the wine aged a further 12 months prior to release.