Winemaker Notes
Intense garnet red. Fascinating aromas of red fruits, blackberries, and plums. Elegant notes of vanilla and mint follow through to a full body, with fine tannins an excellent finish. Fruity aftertaste with hints of vanilla and leather.
Professional Ratings
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James Suckling
A clean, lightly spiced Barolo with some nice strawberry and raspberry fruit character. The medium-bodied palate is a little raw with moderate but firm tannins that are standing out a bit for now. Give it a year or two to integrate better. Lovely fruit, though. Should be drinking well in 2024.
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Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
With fruit from La Morra, the Crissante Alessandria 2018 Barolo Capalot is a little slow to open, but it eventually shows a soft side of Nebbiolo with delicate berry fruit, blue flower and dusty earth. This is a pretty and elegant expression with a softly polished mouthfeel. The wine ages in oak for 18 months and in the bottle for 32 months before its commercial release.
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Vinous
The 2018 Barolo Capalot is elegant and polished. There are some youthful Nebbiolo contours that need to soften, but overall the 2018 impresses with its energy and layered personality. Cinnamon, blood orange, cedar, mint and rose petal flesh out nicely with a bit of coaxing. Slightly advanced notes suggest the Capalot is more of a medium-term proposition.
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.