2018 | Vini Praesidium | Montepulciano d'Abruzzo

The 2018 vintage offers aromas of ripe black fruits, such as black cherry and blackberry, along with notes of spices, tobacco, and leather. The palate is full-bodied, with rich flavours of dark fruit, balanced by a solid structure of tannins and acidity. The oak aging adds hints of vanilla and toast, which integrate harmoniously with the fruit components.

Producer Information

Praesidium is a 7-hectare estate in the Peligna Valley, the genetic birthplace of the Montepulciano grape. Enzo Pasquale, his wife Lucia, and their kids, Antonia and Ottaviano, are the last winegrowers of the village of Prezza. The village itself sits on a rocky outcropping that has a near-360° view of the surroundings. It makes sense, then, that the name Prezza comes from the Latin verb praeesse (to preside), and that the village was the “Praesidium” (defense garrison) of the Peligni tribe, an Italic people who eventually acquiesced to Rome. Praesidium is also one of the main reasons I’m selling wine today. They’re responsible for my first real lightbulb, epiphanic “wine moment.” Every once in a while someone asks me, if I were to become a wine director, which estates I would have to have on the wine list, my list of heartthrobs. I usually struggle to answer—there’s so much great wine out there. But, Praesidium would make the cut, without a doubt. This one’s personal. In 2002 and 2003 I lived in L’Aquila, the capital of Abruzzo. When meeting people all around Italy, I would be asked, “L’Aquila? That’s in Abruzzo, right? What are you doing there?!” The answer to that question is a story for another time; I’m still not sure even I fully know. I know I was playing and teaching music, and that I was young and broke. Wine was a simple accompaniment to a meal, nothing to think much about—it was on most tables in Italy twice a day, right? The €2 supermarket Montepulciano from a co-op was doing us just fine. A few years earlier in school in the States I had friends who ironically, but happily, showed up to parties with jugs of Carlo Rossi ‘Paisano.’ I didn’t turn down those pours. Someone I must have trusted told me that a rowdy bar called Ju Boss (Abruzzese dialect for il Boss!) had the greatest collection of the wines of Abruzzo in a back room. Was that possible? The same place that served hard-boiled eggs and where every night it seemed fights broke out, spilling into the streets? Going from Ju Boss the bar to Ju Boss the enoteca was like going from C.B.G.B. to the set of Masterpiece Theatre. I asked the guy working there for a recommendation. He steered me to the Praesidium Montepulciano d’Abruzzo Riserva. I don’t remember the vintage, because that wouldn’t have been something on my radar at the time. The bottle seemed heavy and impenetrably dark. There was a wax seal near the neck and a symbol of a castle on the label. It seemed special enough. I was told to open it an hour before and drink it with an aged pecorino.

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