San Giovanni Classico
⏳ Drinking Window
Typically best enjoyed fresh, within 1 to 3 years of the vintage release, to fully appreciate its vibrant fruit and crisp minerality.
🍽️ Food & Wine Pairings
Excellent alongside delicate seafood antipasti, fresh vegetable risotto, or grilled white fish drizzled with olive oil and lemon.
✨ Technical Specifications
Hailing from the historic Castello della Sala estate in Umbria, a medieval fortress built in 1350, Antinori's San Giovanni della Sala Orvieto Classico Superiore is a masterful expression of the ancient Orvieto appellation. The wine is named after the historic chapel located on the estate. This white blend combines traditional local varieties, Grechetto and Procanico, with international Pinot Bianco and Viognier, grown in volcanic, fossil-rich clay soils. The grapes undergo a brief cold maceration on the skins to maximize aromatic extraction before fermenting in temperature-controlled stainless steel, preserving the vibrant acidity and mineral tension. Historically, Orvieto wines were so prized that they were used as currency to pay the artists decorating the city's famous cathedral; this modern iteration continues that legacy of prestige with its elegant floral notes, ripe peach aromas, and saline finish.
🍾 About the Producer
Marchesi Antinori is one of the world's most storied winemaking dynasties, tracing its commercial viticultural heritage to 1385 when Giovanni di Piero Antinori matriculated into Florence's Arte dei Vinattieri. Spanning twenty-six generations, the family revolutionized modern Italian viticulture under Marchese Piero Antinori and legendary enologist Giacomo Tachis, catalyzing the Super Tuscan revolution with the pioneering release of Tignanello in 1971. Antinori commands an unrivaled tapestry of microclimates across Central Italy, encompassing the galestro and albarese marls of Chianti Classico at Tenuta Tignanello and Badia a Passignano, the maritime gravels of Bolgheri at Guado al Tasso, and the fossiliferous clay-limestone soils of Umbria at Castello della Sala. In the cellar, CEO and chief enologist Renzo Cotarella orchestrates a balance of precision, clonal selection, and judicious French oak barrique maturation. Antinori's benchmark wines—including the Sangiovese-driven Tignanello, the Cabernet-dominated Solaia, and the benchmark Umbrian Chardonnay blend Cervaro della Sala—stand as definitive monuments of Italian winemaking refinement.