Winemaker Notes
Soils here are comprised of Formazioni di Lequio, a yellow-red sand combined with silty gray marl. Fruit harvested by hand in the third week of October. Skin maceration took place over 12 days, followed by a 20-30 day fermentation in stainless steel with indigenous yeast. Wine aged in a combination of French barrique and large casks for 2 years prior to bottling.
Professional Ratings
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Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
The Paolo Scavino 2016 Barolo Prapò (with fruit from Serralunga d'Alba) opens to a beautifully saturated appearance with bold fruit aromas of black cherry, plum and dried currant. Those rusty mineral notes that are so distinctive of this growing area come through loud and clear. This is the second harvest to emerge from this plot of land in Prapò that the Scavino family purchased in 2008 and replanted two years later. We're off to a great start with high-scoring and cellar-worthy wines from both 2015 and 2016. I'd give a slight edge to this vintage, thanks to the sharp precision and linearity of its aromas.
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James Suckling
A very fine-tannined red with plum, strawberry, chocolate and dark-walnut character. It’s full-bodied, yet the tight tannins provide wonderful precision and focus. Racy at the end. Drink after 2022.
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Wine & Spirits
The Scavino family’s 1.7-acre parcel of Prapò, on the eastern edge of Serralunga d’Alba, had been owned by eight different families and was in need of work. They replanted the vines in 2010, and five years later the fruit was so good that they decided to produce it as a single-cru wine. The wine is already harmonious in its second vintage, opening to lush flavors of cherry and pomegranate brightened by notes of licorice and menthol.
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Wine Enthusiast
Menthol, iris, new leather and dark spice aromas shape the nose. Full bodied and concentrated, the palate delivers mature Morello cherry, blood orange, licorice and white pepper alongside taut, close-grained tannins before an espresso close.
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Wine Spectator
Rose, cherry, freshly cut hay and tobacco notes, with a light accent of oak spice, are the highlights of this elegant, complex Barolo. Silky and harmonious, with well-integrated tannins, freshness and a spicy aftertaste. Best from 2023 through 2042.
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.