Winemaker Notes
The color is ruby red with garnet hints. Great character and complex notes of mature fruit, mint, eucalyptus, and fine spices on the nose. The palate is rich in structure with a weave of fine tannins, standing out for its elegance and harmony, which highlights this truly unique Barolo cru.
Ideal alongside egg with white d'Alba truffle, pan-fried lamb steak, veal braised in Barolo, Castelmagno cheese.
Professional Ratings
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Wine Enthusiast
Earthy aromas recalling new leather, truffle, blue flowers and eucalyptus are just some of the scents you’ll find on this savory red. Elegantly structured, the tightly knit yet weightless palate delivers ripe Marasca cherry, crushed mint and star anise before finishing on notes of black tea and white pepper. It’s loaded with finesse and personality. Drink 2027–2037
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Wine & Spirits
This warming wine shows a mix of fresh and dried cherry laced with notes of licorice and spice. Hints of tar and forest floor emerge with air, but it would benefit from a cooler serving temperature to balance the rich, almost medicinal flavors.
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Wine Spectator
A fragrant version, offering rose, mint, cherry, licorice and tar aromas and flavors, this is backed by a stiff core of tannins, yet stays fresh through the lingering finish.
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.