98 points | James Suckling

An extremely rich and ripe wine with currant, cherry and balsamic aromas. Hints of leather. Follows through on the finish. Full body, round and velvety tannins that are reserved and beautiful. Sweet and sour. Savoury, too. Drink or hold. This has a long life ahead of it. (Oct 2017)

96+ points | Wine Advocate

The 2009 Bolgheri Sassicaia is the richest and darkest edition in recent memory. This super-charged Sassicaia boasts enormous power and concentration thanks to its impressive phenolic foundation. Black currant and blackberry confit are followed by spice, leather, tar, road paving and black truffle. It shows preliminary tertiary signs of liquorice and crushed minerals. The wine wraps thickly over the palate, delivering tight textural firmness and integrated structure. You taste the fruit’s sweetness and the oak tannins’ depth. No matter how you approach it, this wine scores very high on the intensity meter. Drink 2018 – 2040. (Monica Larner April 2017)

17.5/20 points | Jancis Robinson

Deep brick-garnet. Cigar box and dried thyme scents lift from the glass, with dried cassis too. Touches of black tea and five-spice oak give subtle complexity. Just a touch of volatility. Relatively full-bodied, with a rich and velvety texture. Notably, grainier, firmer tannins than the 2016 – a bigger and more robust wine – without quite the elegance of the 2016. Quite a different character. (Tim Jackson March 2019). Drink 2016 – 2026.

97 points | Vinous

Bright, full ruby. Pure, perfumed aromas of blackberry, cassis, lead pencil, violet and minerals, complicated by a super ripe note of crushed raspberry. Extremely primary and pure, offering sharply defined cassis, violet and mineral flavours of great class. The perfectly integrated acidity and vibrant floral character from the cabernet franc give the middle palate a terrific lift. Though very ripe in its flavour profile, this wine conveys a rare lightness of touch typical of Sassicaia but rare for this vintage on the Tuscan Coast. Finishes with noble tannins and outstanding palate-staining length.

For all its creamy power and charm, I really like this wine’s balance and the subtle delivery of its complex flavours. I have tasted every vintage of Sassicaia on countless occasions, and other than the legendary 1985, I have no doubt that this is one of the two or three best Sassicaias at a similar stage of development. Though 2009 won’t surpass the once-in-a-lifetime 1985, it is starting its life in a bottle with almost the same perfectly balanced, opulent, creamy texture and depth of that incredible wine, which I remember tasting in Rome and Tuscany immediately upon release.

In fact, that wine was so good that even though I was still a university student (and thus on a student budget), it was the first time in my life I ever bought a full case. If I were a university student today, I’d do the same with the 2009, even though the price of Sassicaia is far higher today. There’s profound potential here, but younger wine writers and consumers who weren’t seriously involved in tasting back in the ’80s may well be surprised by this wine’s voluptuous, atypically opulent texture and, thus, miss its sheer greatness. (Ian D’Agata, Sept 2012)