2004 Trabucchi d’Illasi – ‘Amarone’ – Amarone della Valpolicella DOC

As some of you might remember from my last blog post, Vino in Love’s blog anniversary was on May 14th. Of course, every anniversary needs to be celebrated with a proper wine. My choice was a 2004 Trabucchi d’Illasi Amarone. To regular readers of this blog, Trabucchi d’Illasi is no stranger because I previously reviewed most of their other wines, including a bottle of their 2006 Amarone della Valpolicella DOC, which I rated with 5/5 stars. Therefore, I was quite excited to try the 2004 vintage.

The 2004 Trabucchi d’Illasi Amarone is produced with Corvina, Corvinone, Croatina, Oseleta and Rondinella grapes. The hand-picked grapes get sun-dried for approximately 40 days on straw mats. During this process, which is called appassimento, the grapes lose most of their weight. The grapes become quite sweet with very intense aromas. However, this process sometimes also leads to an ABV that is above average. I will come back to the ABV later on.

Tasting Notes

Prior to drinking, the wine was decanted for a few hours..

In the glass, the Amarone had a garnet red color, which almost reminded me of an aged Barolo. On the nose, there were aromas of black cherry and lots of spices – mostly cinnamon, roasted coffee and vanilla. Honestly, I expected more aromas and the nose did not meet my expectations.

Alright, let’s talk about the ABV: The label listed alcohol by volume was 16%! At first, I thought that this had to be a mistake but it was not. I can say that I have tried quite a lot of different Amarone but I don’t recall any other Amarone that had such a high ABV.  But because Trabucchi is one my favorite wineries, I was sure that the ABV would not be a problem. I was wrong.

In the mouth, the wine was very, very, dry, quite tannic and warm. Later on, it became slightly sweet. I tasted red cherries and black fruits and cocoa. The wine was full-bodied was of good structure and had a lingering finish Sounds all good right? The problem was that I also tasted quite a lot of alcohol – too much alcohol. After every sip, I felt that the wine became worse because of the alcohol. It was such a pity and I really wished that the 2004 Amarone from Trabucchi d’Illasi had an ABV similar to the 2006 vintage (15% ABV).

Parting words

I really wished, that the 2004 vintage of Trabucchi’s Amarone was only nearly as good as the 2006 vintage or as their 2004 Riserva Cent’Anni Amarone. Maybe it was just my bottle but the bottle seemed fine and was stored properly. If you go for a Trabucchi Amarone, then I recommend that you give the 2006 vintage a try and better avoid the 2004 vintage. Both vintages retail in Munich for 59.90€.

But I have exciting news, if you live in Germany, then I highly encourage you to attend the Trabucchi d’Illasi wine tasting on Monday May 27th at L’Amar. For more information about the Trabucchi wine tasting, visit L’Amar’s website. I will attend the tasting myself and m already looking forward to it.

Have you tried the 2004 Trabucchi d’Illasi Amarone della Valpolicella DOC? If so, how did you like it?

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