Winemaker Notes
Intense ruby red with orange reflections. Intense bouquet of ripe fruits, such as currants and raspberries with hints of violet. The flavor is balanced with silky, sweet tannins, an excellent structure and a long finish
Professional Ratings
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James Suckling
There’s quite a wild, fruit and briar character to the nose, together with a pungent, truffly, earthy note. Hint of chocolate emerges with air. Medium-to full-bodied with dense flavors of ripe berries and medium-grain tannins that are coated with fruit and minerals. All feeling a little raw just now, but loads of character and length. Fun to taste , but give it a couple of years to sort itself out. Best from 2025.
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Wine Enthusiast
High-toned aromas waft from the glass of this Barolo with notes of currant, crushed raspberries, pressed rose petals and sandalwood. Ripe strawberry and cherry pop on the palate with sweet spices that give way to roasted coffee and black tea finishing with a dark savory spice and fine elegant tannins.
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Wine Spectator
Expressive, featuring rose, cherry, strawberry and sun-kissed hay aromas and flavors matched to an elegant frame. Light-bodied yet charming, harmonious and persistent on the chalky finish.
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Jeb Dunnuck
The 2018 Barolo Le Coste Di Monforte is more concentrated, with ripe aromas of leather, red cherry, cedar, and balsamic herbs. On the palate, it is medium-bodied and offers more concentration of fruit throughout, with an earthy mineral profile of fresh soil, dried roses, and raspberries. It is approachable yet structured. Best After 2025
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Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
The 2018 Barolo Le Coste di Monforte shows some sweet oak and baking spice on first nose. As you give the wine more time in the glass, it reveals dark fruit, plum, autumn leaf and forest floor. The oak tones are strong on this mid-weight Nebbiolo and need more time to integrate, if they ever fully do fold into the wine's leaner texture.
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.