Winemaker Notes
Deep garnet-red. Aromas of sage, rosemary, and other earthy hints. Rich texture, round-soft tannins.
Serve with red meat roasts, truffle dishes, all game and ripe cheese.
Professional Ratings
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James Suckling
Wow. This is a super-sensual Barolo with wild black-fruit character, such as ripe elderberries and dried dates. Fresher notes of blood oranges, too. Balanced vanilla edge to the palate that coats the firm, grainy tannins and carries the creamy fruit through the long finish. Super-succulent and enticing. To produce this in 2018 is a real achievement. Hats off to the wine making. So tempting even now, but will only improve.
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Decanter
Vibrant red and orange rim to the glass. Lovely fruit and savoury aspects - the dried flower aromas are so abundant but they're edged with deep and seductive red fruit nuances too. It's soft and delicate on the nose yet so expressive and rich. Generous aromatics, with cola cube aspects. Grippy from the start, the tannins here make an immediate impression coating the mouth and giving structure to the rich, seductive cherry, strawberry and raspberry fruits. The tannins are so well integrated though, soft, plump, slightly chewy and really lovely in their texture. This is well rounded but with a precise and quite deep core. Lots going on here with a real lingering depth of cherry, coffee and stone. Feels mature and sophisticated and more expansive in the mouth than the Mariondino.
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Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
The Parusso 2018 Barolo Mosconi shows that distinctively stemmy element that I always associate with these wines so carefully made by Marco Parusso and his family. The bouquet is firm and powerful with dried cherry, steeped Darjeeling tea and persimmon. The wine is extra solid, both in terms of structure and tannins, and it follows up with an ample 15% alcohol content. Best After 2025
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Vinous
The 2018 Barolo Mosconi is a broad, potent wine. A blast of macerated dark cherry, leather, spice, dried herbs, chocolate and mocha makes a strong opening statement. As always, the Mosconi is a brooding, virile wine with huge depth, tons of intensity and big, brawny tannins that need time to soften. There is a good deal of oak, but the wine has the presence and overall intensity to carry it well.
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Wine Enthusiast
A tad reticent at first, this wine shines after a bit of time. Aromas of ripe cherries, wild strawberries, crushed rock and dried flowers spill out of the glass. On the palate, the wine shows the power of Serralunga d’Alba, the commune where the Mosconi vineyard is located. Fine and firm tannins mix with sweet and savory spices and ripe red fruits, all buttressed by classic Nebbiolo acidity.
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.