Winemaker Notes
Viberti's flagship Barolo is a blend of fruit from Viberti’s top vineyard sites. An elegant and complex bouquet rich in spices, strawberries, and wild flowers with notes of dried fruit. Full-bodied in flavor with pleasant bitter hints, dry tanninsand a lengthy finish.
Pairs well with game, beef, and charcuterie.
Professional Ratings
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Wine Spectator
A savory version, this red displays eucalyptus, rosemary, juniper, cherry, tar and iron flavors. Starts out fluid before closing up on the dense, dusty finish. The persistent flavors indicate the future potential.
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James Suckling
A lot of transparency in this Barolo, with delicate strawberries, cinnamon, blood oranges and sweet violets on the nose. Tight and firm on the palate with dusty tannins, more bony than supple, medium body and a refreshing finish. Try after 2025.
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Jeb Dunnuck
The deep red 2021 Barolo Buon Padre needs a little coaxing in the glass on opening and leads with a musky aromatic profile of worn leather, dark cherries, sage, and turned earth. The palate offers more freshness with a red-fruited quality, and I imagine this will benefit from another six months or so in bottle. It’s ripe and medium-bodied with a more approachable feel, ripe tannins, even acidity, and a bit of sweet fruit on the finish. As it opens, it shows more licorice-inflected spice aromatics and has a refreshing feel of acidity through the finish. Drink 2025-2032.
Rating: 91+
Viberti, located in the village of Barolo in the northern Italian region of Piedmont, was founded in the early 20th century by Antonio Viberti, an innkeeper and restauranteur. Wine was produced from the estate vineyards exclusively for the patrons of the family restaurant, Trattoria al Buon Padre.
In 1967, ata time when Barolo wines were gaining international notoriety, Antonio's son, Giovanni, joined the family business and realized the potential of the estate vineyards to produce superior quality, world-class Barolo. After selling wines to restaurant patrons, who came from far and wide to enjoy the local cuisine, the reputation of Viberti Barolo spread leading to demand beyond Piedmont.
One hundred years after the creation of the Viberti winery, the family's connection to their beloved land of Barolo and its fine red wines remains unbroken as the 3rd generations of the Viberti family, GianLuca and Claudio, joined their father at the winery. Today, under the direction of Claudio, the winery produces varietally accurate, elegantly structured wines with fresh fruit aromas, bold tannins, and vibrant acidity that are approachable upon release, yet reward extensive aging.
Responsible for some of the most elegant and age-worthy wines in the world, Nebbiolo, named for the ubiquitous autumnal fog (called nebbia in Italian), is the star variety of northern Italy’s Piedmont region. Grown throughout the area, as well as in the neighboring Valle d’Aosta and Valtellina, it reaches its highest potential in the Piedmontese villages of Barolo, Barbaresco and Roero. Outside of Italy, growers are still very much in the experimentation stage but some success has been achieved in parts of California. Somm Secret—If you’re new to Nebbiolo, start with a charming, wallet-friendly, early-drinking Langhe Nebbiolo or Nebbiolo d'Alba.
The center of the production of the world’s most exclusive and age-worthy red wines made from Nebbiolo, the Barolo wine region includes five core townships: La Morra, Monforte d’Alba, Serralunga d’Alba, Castiglione Falletto and the Barolo village itself, as well as a few outlying villages. The landscape of Barolo, characterized by prominent and castle-topped hills, is full of history and romance centered on the Nebbiolo grape. Its wines, with the signature “tar and roses” aromas, have a deceptively light garnet color but full presence on the palate and plenty of tannins and acidity. In a well-made Barolo wine, one can expect to find complexity and good evolution with notes of, for example, strawberry, cherry, plum, leather, truffle, anise, fresh and dried herbs, tobacco and violets.
There are two predominant soil types here, which distinguish Barolo from the lesser surrounding areas. Compact and fertile Tortonian sandy marls define the vineyards farthest west and at higher elevations. Typically the Barolo wines coming from this side, from La Morra and Barolo, can be approachable relatively early on in their evolution and represent the “feminine” side of Barolo, often closer in style to Barbaresco with elegant perfume and fresh fruit.
On the eastern side of the Barolo wine region, Helvetian soils of compressed sandstone and chalks are less fertile, producing wines with intense body, power and structured tannins. This more “masculine” style comes from Monforte d’Alba and Serralunga d’Alba. The township of Castiglione Falletto covers a spine with both soil types.
The best Barolo wines need 10-15 years before they are ready to drink, and can further age for several decades.