Castelnuovo Berardenga

Castelnuovo Berardenga is the southern gateway to Chianti Classico, about 14 kilometres east of Siena, where the wooded hills give way to the open clays of the Crete Senesi. Its name joins the “new castle” the Sienese fortified here after the battle of Montaperti with Berardo, a tenth-century nobleman of Frankish descent whose lands gave the district its name, the Berardenga. Only part of the comune lies inside the Chianti Classico zone, along its southern edge — but what lies inside is formidable.

We like to call it Chianti’s city of Sangiovese. These are the warmest, most south-facing slopes of the appellation, and here the grape ripens fullest: the wines are dark-fruited, firmly tannic and intense. Two UGAs cover the area — Castelnuovo Berardenga, with some 760 hectares of vines on alberese, tufo and marine clays, and Vagliagli, with about 1,080 hectares on sandstone to the north-west — which together place it, with Greve, among the two largest vineyard comuni of the zone. Fèlsina built its reputation on pure Sangiovese in Rancia and Fontalloro; at San Felice, the Vitiarium vineyard preserves more than two hundred old and nearly forgotten grape varieties; Castell’in Villa is another of the estates that define the area.

The villages repay the detours: San Gusmè, a round walled hamlet entered through the Porta Senese, with its irreverent statue of Luca Cava; Villa a Sesta; Vagliagli; Pievasciata, home of the Chianti Sculpture Park in the oak woods; Pianella; and part of Quercegrossa. In Castelnuovo itself, the park of Villa Chigi Saracini and the Museo del Paesaggio, devoted to how this landscape was made, are worth an hour each.

Castelnuovo belongs to Cittaslow, the network of slow towns, which suits its pace. It is also, perhaps unexpectedly, the most decorated table in Chianti: four restaurants in the comune hold a MICHELIN star — Poggio Rosso, Contrada, Il Visibilio and L’Asinello — more than any other comune of the zone.