Winemaker Notes
Garnet red in color with orange reflections. An intense bouquet with notes of violet, balsamic and small red berries. The palate is intense, elegant and persistent, with nuances of red fruit, tobacco, licorice and with ageing truffles and cinnamon.
Barolo Brunate is a wine with a great character, which goes perfectly with roasts, braised meat, game and dishes with mushrooms or truffles.
Professional Ratings
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Wine Spectator
This red is bursting with ripe cherry, plum, iron, tar and spice aromas and flavors, aligned with an elegant, supple yet firmly structured profile. Though taut and on the austere side today, this ends with great potential and a mint accent on the finish. Best from 2027 through 2045.
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Wine Enthusiast
This wine embodies the classic Nebbiolo character with sour cherry, mixed spices, leather and tea-leaf aromas, accompanied by an underbrush note. Fine tannins and mouth-watering acidity follow through, leading to a finish with a touch of minerality. Drink 2026-2040.
Cellar Selection -
James Suckling
Such purity of fruit this vintage with cherry, strawberry, raspberry and orange peel aromas. Also violets. Medium to full body, with lovely integrated tannins and a juicy and fruity finish. Yet it remains fine and focused. Drink after 2026 but already pretty.
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.