I make a lot of wines here at Carhartt Family Wines, but Quello Grande is one of the few that makes people stop and ask questions. It is our Super Tuscan, a big Italian red built on Sangiovese, and I jokingly call this one Sangiovese on steroids. I want to walk you through what that means, where the fruit comes from, and why the 2023 vintage was made for this wine.
If you have not run into the term, a Super Tuscan is an Italian red that blends Sangiovese, the classic grape of Tuscany, with Bordeaux grapes like Cabernet Sauvignon, Cabernet Franc, and Merlot. It started in Tuscany in the 1970s, when a handful of producers decided to blend outside the traditional rules of the region. The wines were so good the category stuck, and today Super Tuscan is one of the most respected styles in Italy.
Quello Grande is our version of that idea. What I love about it is what the Bordeaux side does to the Sangiovese. On its own, our Sangiovese is medium bodied, bright, and driven by red fruit and acidity. It is a beautiful wine, but it is not a big one. Wrap it in Merlot, Cabernet Franc, Petit Verdot, and Graciano and it turns into something darker and more serious. The Merlot brings a chocolate richness. The Cabernet Franc brings spice. The Petit Verdot and Graciano bring structure, color, and darker fruit. You take a medium-bodied red and give it real weight and depth. That is the steroids part.
Here is how the 2023 breaks down: 49% Sangiovese, 16% Merlot, 15% Cabernet Franc, 15% Petit Verdot, and 5% Graciano. About half Sangiovese, half Bordeaux, which is the balance that makes this wine what it is.
There is a ripening story in that blend too. Sangiovese ripens on the earlier side for us, and it brings the tart red fruit and the acidity. The Bordeaux grapes come in later, and they bring the spice, the darker fruit, and the depth. Getting all of those pieces to line up in one bottle takes a season with patience, which brings me to 2023.
This is the part I am most proud of. Quello Grande pulls fruit from all three of our estate vineyards, which is something we rarely do in a single wine. Most of our wines lean on one site or two. This one gathers everything.
The Sangiovese comes off our Eleven Oaks and Canyon vineyards. The Merlot is grown on the Mesa. The Cabernet Franc is a blend of the Mesa and the Canyon. The Petit Verdot comes from Eleven Oaks and the Canyon, and the Graciano is all from the Canyon. Our Canyon fruit is steep, head-trained, and planted at high density, and it gives us concentration and structural backbone. Our Mesa fruit brings aromatic lift and florals.
Eleven Oaks deserves its own mention, because it is the hardest site we farm. It is a little over three acres, planted tight and rocky, on ground that is not very fertile. That stress is the point. It keeps the yields low and the vines honest. The rows are so tight we cannot get a tractor in to do much beyond pulling a bin to load fruit into, so nearly everything out there is done by hand. It is mostly Sangiovese, with a mix of the Isole e Olena and Fontodi selections and clones 6, 12, and 23, plus some Montepulciano and Petit Verdot planted alongside. The Sangiovese that comes off Eleven Oaks has always been the earthy, rustic kind, with good acidity and a classic Chianti edge to it, less about ripe dark fruit and more about that old-world Italian backbone. That is a big part of what gives Quello Grande its Italian soul.
Everything here is estate grown, which is uncommon for a Super Tuscan in California. We farm our own vineyards, pick our own fruit, and make everything on site at the family ranch in the Santa Ynez Valley, in the heart of Santa Barbara County wine country. We are a family owned, small batch operation, and this is a wine my mom and I make together, the same way we have made our wines since our first vintage in 1998.
Here is the thing about how we make wine. We are not chasing big, ripe, high-alcohol reds. Because of that, the vintage shows up in the glass more than it would at a winery pushing everything to the extreme.
2023 was long, cool, and wet early in the year. The fruit hung a long time and reached full maturity while holding onto its acidity. It was a late harvest off a large, healthy crop, one of the longest and coolest seasons our estate has seen in years. I have started calling it our Jordan vintage, for its patience and its balance. For a Sangiovese-led wine that lives on acidity and structure, that kind of season is exactly what you want. It gave us full, mature fruit with the freshness still intact.
We aged the 2023 Quello Grande for 22 months in barrel, then held it about another year and a half in bottle before releasing it. That extra time in bottle is a patience move. It lets the pieces of the blend settle and marry, so the wine arrives open instead of tight.
Give it a decant, about an hour. This wine opens up a lot with air and turns more floral as it breathes. On the nose you get dried florals, an herbal, almost forest-floor quality, and red plum. On the palate it is ripe cherry, espresso bean, and green peppercorn. It is full bodied and serious, with firm tannin and fresh acidity underneath that keeps it from feeling heavy.
One honest note on aging. This wine is tasting great right now, but it is the one in our lineup I would tuck away. Young, it leans spicier and richer. My prediction is that with time the spice settles down and the aged-fruit character comes forward. I would put its window at now through 2038 and beyond.
For food, this is a wine that wants a real meal. Reach for braised short ribs over polenta, a lamb ragu over pappardelle, or a herb-heavy eggplant parmesan. Rich, savory, herb-driven dishes, and tomato-based sauces that link up with the acidity. Keep it away from light plates, which it will overpower, and away from anything sweet.
If you want to taste it the way we do, come see us. We pour daily at our tasting room in Los Olivos, and there is no better way to understand a wine than standing across the bar from the people who made it.
