Winemaker Notes
This Barolo represents the history and tradition of blending different crus of Nebbiolo in order to create a house style. The same care and quality work are employed on this wine as for all of the cru Barolo. This wine is an opportunity for many clients to enjoy a great Barolo with an exceptional price quality ratio.
Professional Ratings
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James Suckling
Vivid aromas of red berries and roses follow though to a medium-bodied palate, where fine tannins provide a lightly firm bed for fresh fruit. The lighter, brighter style of this is true to the character of the vintage, but here it’s been well-handled. All in balance.
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Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
The Paolo Scavino 2018 Barolo is a pretty wine with sweet primary intensity that appears as tart cherry and dried raspberry. With Enrico Scavino's signature on the front label, this is a classic package with silky tannins and a long, polished mouthfeel. Fruit comes from multiple vineyard sites across the appellation. Best After 2024
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Wine Spectator
Leads with deep aromas of cherry, earth, licorice and tar, with cherry and berry fruit prevailing on the palate. Lithe and firmly structured, with nuances of spices and rose hip. Best from 2024 through 2038.
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.