Winemaker Notes
#93 James Suckling Top 100 Wines of the World 2025
The 2021 vintage started with a mild, snowy winter that provided important water reserves for the dry season ahead. A spring frost affected some of the vineyards and overall vine growth remained steady. A warm, dry summer with good diurnal shifts allowed Nebbiolo to ripen slowly and beautifully. Harvest ran from late September to mid-October, yielding healthy clusters with firm tannins and vibrant acidity. Despite afew climatic challenges, the 2021 vintage is considered to be a very good - and possibly even an excellent vintage - as it produced structured, well-balanced wines with exceptional aging potential.
Blend: 100% Nebbiolo
Professional Ratings
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James Suckling
Cranberries, dried herbs, underbrush, sage, minerals and violets on the nose. Very aromatic and absorbing. The palate is medium- to full-bodied with precise, linear and elegant fruit. The tannins are firm and balanced tannins, providing a compact, racy finish. Outstanding balance. Better from 2026.
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Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
Moving over to La Morra, the Ceretto 2021 Barolo Brunate is a classical expression of one of the most representative vineyards in this village. You get the delicate fruits associated with Nebbiolo, but you also get the mint that is common to Brunate. If you walk through this vineyard in springtime, you often smell fresh mint brushing against your shoes. Brunate also has an elegant mineral signature of crushed limestone. It ages in 300-liter French oak for 12 months followed by 24 months in French oak botte and then another 12 months in bottle.
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Wine Spectator
A spicy version, whose cherry, raspberry, rose, iron and eucalyptus flavors are shaded by a hint of new oak. This is pure and solid, while the dusty tannins exert themselves on the finish. Shows excellent balance and a long, fruit-infused aftertaste.
"The Langhe hills of Piedmont constitute that area of northern Italy where the wide and flat Pò river valley suddenly disappears and gives way on all sides to hulking and precipitous slopes. The Langhe hills are more than hills. They are ancient and rugged earth. Their narrow peaks are topped by castles, and they are thick to the horizon with grapevines. The Langhe hills are home to a small group of farmers and winemakers who, together, have succeeded in creating some of the planet’s finest expressions of place.
The Ceretto family is among that fortunate group. For three generations members of the Ceretto family have transformed the fruit of the Langhe’s vineyards into wines that speak of the regions identity. The famed Italian gastronome and intellectual Luigi Veronelli wrote, ""The land, the land, the land, the land, always, the land."" This philosophy is central to the Ceretto family. Reverence for this land has passed from Riccardo, who blended fruit from the region’s best vineyards, to Bruno and Marcello, who purchased Langhe vineyards and began bottling single crus, and finally to Alessandro, who is taking the winery into the 21st century by using natural methods to foster vines that are stronger, healthier, and more in balance with their environment. The Ceretto family has always been committed to producing the most expressive and authentic wines their land can yield."
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.