Farnese Edizione Cinque Autoctoni 21

A law breaking, game changing and extremely posh wine that’s consistently rated as one of Italy’s top red wines. >

Farnese are one of Italy’s largest producers and Edizione is their big, powerful, flagship wine. A blend produced from five indigenous Italian grapes (“Cinque Autoctoni”) in Montepulciano, Primitivo, Sangiovese, Negroamaro and Malvasia Nera from two different regions, Puglia and Abruzzo.

Because the wine comes from two different regions Italian law doesn’t allow a vintage to be specified. Which is why they put a number on the label representing the number of vintages since the first release. The debut release was in 1999, the harvest of these grapes was 2019, so hey presto you’ve got Edizione ’21!

It breaks all the rules of traditional Italian winemaking and gives a two finger salute to the Italian wine classification laws that technically also make this classed as basic level table wine!

It couldn’t be further from the truth. Maroni awarded this wine a near perfect 99/99 and in his annual Luca Maroni Guide. It’s the bible of all things grapey in Italy and he picked Edizione 21 as this number one red wine overall!