Winemaker Notes
Classic garnet pigeon blood color. The 2019 Barolo Cerretta is ample and powerful: intense classic marasca cherry, cedar, incense, sweet spices, orange zest all emerge from the glass. The palate carries the signature of Cerretta: brooding and austere yet resolving in an elegant and ethereal finish.
Professional Ratings
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Wine & Spirits
Since the Vaira family became owners of this estate in 2009, Giuseppe Vaira has taken a lighter approach in the cellar, eliminating new French oak barriques in favor of large Slavonian casks and decreasing the practice of salasso (bleeding) to bring the concentration of Cerretta into a more natural balance. The 2019 Cerretta combines power, freshness and depth of fruit to create the most impressive wine we have yet tasted from this estate. Its ample flavors of fresh, thick-skinned red cherry are edged in cool, firm tannins that keep the flavors taut as the wine gains complex spice notes and richer fruit tones over the course of several days.
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Jeb Dunnuck
The 2019 Barolo Cerretta has layers of complex perfume, including notes of black raspberry liqueur and cooling licorice. It is long and complex, and although it is tightly wound, it is starting to show its potential, with notes of wild berries and sweet flowers, ripe tannins, and a long, elegant, perfumed finish. Long and structured, this is a wine to drink over the coming two to three decades.
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Wine Enthusiast
Dark cherry aromas mingle with hints of coffee, dried herbs and flowers. The wine exhibits a super pretty character with incredibly fine-grained tannins, almost as if it were a study in the art of crafting wine. A stunning effort that will continue to give for years to come. Drink 2026–2050+.
Cellar Selection -
Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
The Luigi Baudana 2019 Barolo Cerretta is an open-knit and powerful expression of Nebbiolo from one of the best sites in Serralunga d'Alba. Cerretta is a large MGA vineyard to the north of the village, with Baudana on the hillside to the west and Prapò to the south. This wine offers volume and richness in terms of mouthfeel, with fleeting aromas of wild berry, iris and crushed rose.
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Wine Spectator
Bright and full of strawberry, cherry, violet, mineral and eucalyptus flavors, this red is juicy in texture. A line of dense, mouthcoating tannins awaits on the long finish. All the components are there, this just needs time. Best from 2027 through 2047.
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James Suckling
Spiced orange peel, fresh peaches, red cherries and earl grey tea undertones. Hints of lilac and crushed stones, too. Medium-bodied, juicy and dynamic with chalky, slightly chewy tannins and a polished finish. Better after 2027.
Luigi Baudana is one of the last garagiste estates in Langhe. With just 4 quality hectares, located in some of the most prestigious Barolo crus in Serralunga d'Alba. The wines of the Luigi Baudana collection are an expression of powerful, genuine and true-to-terroir wines, expressing the best of the Nebbiolo grape.
The origin of the cellar is lost in time: Baudana is the name of the family, but it is also the name of the vineyard and of the hamlet of Serralunga d'Alba, where the winery is located.
For over thirty years, Luigi and Fiorina Baudana have grown the vineyards that have belonged to their family for generations. They cared for their vineyards with the same tenderness of their own love and with the same warmth emanating from their cellar, born under the vaults of their home.
From the very beginning, the Vaira family have been impressed by Luigi and Fiorina's ambition, as well as pride in their work. Their mission every day is for Luigi and Fiorina to be proud of the vineyards and of the wines, whilst perpetuating their gestures and seeking for the authenticity of every single vineyard.
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.