Winemaker Notes
Bright garnet-red colored with a pale orange tinge. An unmistakable, intense, persistent and very pleasant bouquet. Aromas of sweet spices, soft fruit, mountain hay and licorice. Dry, soft and velvety on the palate. Great structure and aromatic persistence.
It is excellent with game and meat in general and pairs wonderfully with cheese, both fresh and aged.
Professional Ratings
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Wine Enthusiast
Rose, ripe berry, menthol and sunbaked earth aromas come to the forefront. On the full-bodied palate, enveloping, seasoned tannins accompany dried black cherry, star anise and tobacco. Drink 2024–2029.
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Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
The Figli Luigi Oddero 2017 Barolo is a steady and compact expression with lots of sharp and well-defined fruit sensations. The grapes are harvested across four sites and blended. Those vineyards are Rive in La Morra, Scarrone in Castiglione Falletto and both Baudana and Broglio in Serralunga d'Alba. As a result, you get the floral intensity and freshness of the first two crus and the structure and richness of the last two. All these elements balanced out quite nicely in this classic Barolo.
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.