Winemaker Notes
Elegant wines made for aging, they are sincere and significant wines typically released 10 years after harvest.
Professional Ratings
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James Suckling
Intense aromas of licorice, plums and dried fruit follow through to a full body with rich, round tannins that are very chewy, yet polished, and give this wine strength and form. Very long and rich. Tar at the end. Beautiful now but could use a couple of years of bottle age still.
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Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
A very special, late release of just 2,300 bottles, the Domenico Clerico 2011 Barolo Percristina is stunning. If you can get your hands on a bottle, you will be rewarded with impressive finesse and the kind of tiny detailing that can only come to Nebbiolo after a decade of oak and bottle aging. Old vines in the Mosconi cru supply the fruit for this wine, with notes of dried cherry, crushed flowers, spice, tar and licorice. This was a hot and not always easy vintage, but the Clerico crew has pulled out the very best of that vintage with robust, concentrated fruit and all its inner elegance intact.
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Wine Spectator
Sun-kissed hay, rose, cherry, berry and earth flavors mark this taut, linear red. Compact and lightly astringent on the finish, with a lingering impression of ripe fruit. Best from 2024 through 2037. 209 cases made, 90 cases imported.
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.