Tasting Notes
Only one barrel was made of this stunningly beautiful wine. It has an aroma and a flavour that is not all about the fruit of the grape, as with age it's mellowed, and has become more savoury. It has transformed into something special and interesting that is hard to believe comes from a grape. It's got warmth on the nose, maybe baked earth, hints of cedar, herbs, a kind of ethereal note of wood and incense, old leather bound books, with orange and spice. It's very smooth. A temptation can be to make a wine to impress, but this it not big wine. It's going to be superb with slow roast shoulder of lamb with rosemary, but also lamb chops, steak, pasta with tomato sauces, rabbit, and with cheese with herbs. When I was in Tuscany last year I attended a dinner with a few of the top young producers. They all had very good wine, which mainly cost £80 to £140 a bottle, which were shared around. But when Toby, self-deprecatingly handed his wine around at the end, the other winemakers were amazed. Yet this wine is just £42! It is named Il Macaone, after the swallowtail butterfly which is often in the vineyards, and is from Toby's best plot, a one acre vineyard overlooking the Vivo River on the NW flank of Monte Amiata. In 2019 there was only one bunch of grapes per shoot.
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Coste del Vivo is the personal project of winemaker Toby Owen. 20 years ago Toby was manager of a wine shop in Scotland, dreaming of one day being able to make wine like the best of those he sold. In 2009 a chance meeting led to experience working with Brunello producer San Polino in Montalcino. Later, in 2012 he returned to Montalcino as winemaking assistant at Casa Raia. By the following vintage he was winemaker for micro-producer Hortulanus in the beautiful vineyards of Seggiano on Monte Amiata