Poggio Anima

Poggio Anima is a joint venture between Montalcino superstar Riccardo Campinoti of Le Ragnaie and his importer Vine Street Imports. The idea is pretty simple: to source the best vineyards from existing relationships and produce a real wine that conveys a place and a grape. These wines are not bulk wines, nor leftover juice from a winery, but long term contracts with reputable growers. Poggio Anima translates to ‘Hill of Soul.’
Simply put, Vine Street Imports founder Ronnie Sanders has a very twisted sense of humor and marketing! The fusion of his Eastern beliefs with Western philosophy is apparent when you look at the contradiction of red and white (wines), good vs evil (demons vs angels) and modern ideas with old world winemaking practices (catchy, fun packaging with classic old world wine).

Belial

This is 100% Sangiovese sourced from a single vineyard near Siena, in the Chianti Colli Senesi zone, though not labelled as such. Winemaker, Riccardo Campinoti is a firm believer that the wine is made in the vineyard and when he found this one with mature vines (27-47-years of age) he knew he had something special. This is the fifth vintage from this site and the results are quite apparent. 2019 was a vintage that just kept on repeating itself, intense heat, cool, repeat…add rain…repeat…finally in mid-September a welcome dry, warm but cool night, spell set in and the quality of the fruit was very, very high. Ripe fruit, bright acid, ripe tannins.

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Samael

In Jewish texts, Samael is better known as the ‘Angel of Death.’ It is believed that Samael is both good and evil in that he does the work of God but desires man to do evil. Samael is viewed as a seducer as was first spoken of in the Talmud as assuming the role of the serpent and tempting Eve in the Garden of Eden. The correlation here is that Montepulciano can be a very alluring and seductive grape that lends itself to pleasurable drinking. That said, often time Montepulciano is simple, thin and insipid. It is both good and bad. This is 100% Montepulciano, sourced from a steep (for Abruzzi standards) vineyard facing southeast toward the sea.

This comes from two vineyards in Vasto and Monteodorisio. The grapes were handpicked and pressed to tank for fermentation, which was carried out over seven days on skins with frequent pump overs. A further week on skins post-ferment brought a little more structure. The wine was pressed to barrel to age for three months prior to being blended and racked to stainless steel tanks to settle prior to bottling.

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Uriel

Grillo is a very resilient grape and one that withstands a lot of heat and wind on Sicily. It is probably best known as the foundation for Marsala but in its ‘dry’ form has many interesting characteristics. It is the most important white grape on Sicily and therefore the ‘principal light.’

The Grillo vineyard is located in Western Sicily, in the area of Chirchiaro, between Salemi and Vita, roughly 25 miles from Marsala. The grapes are planted east facing following the vertical trellis system on sandy and clay rich soil, using guyot pruning. At an altitude of around 1,600 feet above sea level and with a proximity to the sea there is a definitive freshness to the wine.

After de-stemming and skin maceration for two hours, the grapes are subject to soft-press before fermentation takes place in temperature-controlled stainless-steel tanks. The wine is then left on its lees for a few months before being bottled.

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Asmodeus

In the Book of Tobias, an ancient Hebrew text, Asmodeus is the Demon of Lust. It is said that when Cain killed Abel, Adam and Eve separated for 130 years. During this time, Adam was tempted by Naamah and Lillith, two demons of prostitution. Asmodeus is the offspring of the relationship between Naamah and Adam. Of all of the varietals of Italy, Nero d’Avola is as lustful and pleasurable as it gets. Rich, peppery and opulent. It has many of the same characteristics of Syrah and is the most important grape of Sicily. Until the 1980s, commercial use of Nero d'Avola was dedicated almost exclusively to fortifying weaker reds in France and northern Italy. In the past Nero d'Avola, like other Sicilian reds, was often syrupy, with an alcohol content reaching 18%. New viticulture techniques and night harvesting --placing the grapes in cooled vats to prevent premature fermentation-- have been used by a few vintners to retain flavor without producing an overpowering wine. The result is often compared to Syrah. The vineyards are located in central Sicily, in the province of Caltanissetta, at about 1,600 feet above sea level. The altitude, together with the distance from the sea, provides for excellent diurnal variety where the warm Sicilian sun is alternated with fresh, cool evenings, ensuring great condition for ripening the grapes. The vines are planted south facing following the vertical trellis system on sandy and clay rich soil using guyot pruning. The vinification is pretty straightforward: De-stemming and maceration for 12 - 15 days at 77 degrees with frequent delestage. Soft press and vinification in temperature controlled stainless steel vats. The wine was aged in second year French and American oak for 3 months.

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Lilith

According to Jewish folklore, Lilith was the first wife of Adam. She was banished from the Garden of Eden when she refused to make herself subservient to Adam’s sexual requests. When she was cast out of the Garden, she was made into a demon, and Adam was given a second wife, Eve, who was fashioned from his rib to ensure her obedience to her man. Where Adam was created from dust, Lilith was created from filth and sediment. Primitivo refuses to be submissive to the oenology that it is the same grape as its close relative Zinfandel. Many subscribe to this idea, though they are both mutations of Crljenak, a Croatian varietal. Primitivo always brings plenty of flesh and ripeness to the table with a solid spine of certainty and structure.

The vineyard is located in San Pietro in the province of Taranto toward the top of the inner portion of the Puglian heel. Here the proximity to the sea is everything with the winds acting as an air conditioner maintaining cooler afternoon highs than areas to the north. The area is primarily planted to Negroamaro but because of the extremely poor fertility in the soil select rows of Primitivo ripen well here.

The grapes were destemmed and gently crushed with fermentation carried out in stainless tanks and a small percentage sees rotofermentation to soften the ‘sweet & sour’ notes often seen with Primitivo. After the primary ferment, an additional maceration of 24 days brought more structure after which it is racked into French barriques (20% new) where it aged for nine months.

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Gabriel

Pecorino is a very old grape but was only recently rediscovered and used for monovarietal wines. Named for the ancient tradition of herding sheep (Pecora is the Italian word for sheep), the Pecorino grape is one of the first to ripen and sheep are attracted to the fruit. Less than one mile from the cliffs descending into the Adriatic Sea sits an organically farmed vineyard perched on a steep slope planted with Montepulciano and Pecorino. This is the origin of this wine.  The Pecorino was hand-harvested in early mid-September with a very high concentration of sugar, but also natural acidity.

The Pecorino is hand-harvested and destemmed with a gentle bladder press to tank. Fermentation occurred via a carefully selected strain of yeast and after four weeks in tank the wine is racked off of the gross lees and rests for another four months prior to bottling with just a slight sulfur addition.

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Raphael

Raphael is known as the “patron saint of travelers and ‘happy meetings’.” There are not many wines more fitting to drink while one travels nor to share in happy meetings than a chilled glass of rosé. It is a wine meant to be shared with good company and sharing in the great times that spring and summer so often bring. It is known that Italian rosés (read rosato) are often heavy handed and dark in color. This strays from that summation and brings a touch of the Côte d’Azur to Sicily. Previous vintages were a blend of mostly Zibibbo with a touch of Syrah, but in 2021, it was flipped on its head. This blend is mostly Syrah with a touch of Moscato, lending a floral aromatic quality to this light rosé.

The grapes were all handpicked and brought back to the cellar for immediate pressing. The musts fermented together in stainless steel at 15 deg C, after a static sedimentation at 5 deg C. Fermentation was carried out for 15 days, after which the wine aged for a little more than two months in tank prior to being bottled with a light fining, coarse filtration and reasonable addition of sulfur

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