We are all Asti

We search the world’s most famous regions for the most profound and moving wines but are caught up by a mix of pedigree and marketing, so often not truly making the connections. We are bought and sold, invested in the attractive and oft times the austere. Beauty is everywhere and sometimes right under our noses, yet are we not blinded or at the very least distracted by confidence and power? These thoughts can be applied to many things but as it pertains to wine there is a clear message. Open your heart, mind and palate to seek what others pass over, to experience what is real. And so en route to Alba for Nebbiolo Prima I first made way to the land of moscato. There and for the third time in four years I visited with seven prominent producers to further an education and understanding about a most important wine. Moscato d’Asti. Why? Simply because we are all Asti.

Moscato, Castiglione Tinella

In October of 2022 I hosted three events in Toronto to pour, speak about and celebrate the precocious joy of Moscato d’Asti. A sommelier lunch and consumer event, both held at Barque Smokehouse shared 18 examples of the lightly sparkling, low alcohol, impeccably balanced, multi-styled, food-friendly and Piedmontese heritage wines. More than 100 professionals and wine lovers chose to experience the wonders of these refreshing wines. Why? Once again the answer is the same. We are all Asti.

Monferrato Hills, Piemonte

I visited the region in December of 2018 and also 2019, then returned again this past January, to reconnect with the land and the people who share an imperative to keep heritage alive, but today growers and producers do so much more than merely follow tradition. New vinification and filtration techniques not only create the cleanest Moscato d’Asti ever made but also equip the wines with better aging potential than before. Moscato d’Asti does age well, in fact I tasted several examples of three to four year-old wines mired in a dumb phase but also seven to 10 year old wines that having now re-emerged, were drinking with giddy delight.

Filtration system, Matteo Sorìa

These moscato producers are 100 per cent all in. Many may make other wines but when it comes to Moscato d’Asti there are no distractions from any other grapes; not barbera, dolcetto, nebbiolo, chardonnay, etc. Some are experimenting with dry iterations while others are practicing long lees aging to craft complex moscato as traditional method sparkling wine. The permutations are endless and while promise is everywhere there is no deviation from the original. Every producer makes one because they could not imagine abandoning their heritage.

Ristorante Curia, Acqui Terme

With moscato one needs to avoid bacteria and fermentative aromas at all costs. Allows the machinery and modern technology to purify, cleanse and determine the purity of these wines though they are all made from hand-picked grapes. They are the cleanest wines in the territory but also expressive of their place, from Canelli to Castiglione Tinella to Strevi. In some cases each year a percentage of the last year’s must is integrated into the current vintage and so in the case of Matteo Soria, each time there is 15 per cent from two years previous, and three, and so on. It’s like a Solera in effect with a decreasing percentage of a previous vintage within the whole of current must amounts.

Carciofi Fritti at Ristorante Curia, Acqui Terme

The following are tasting notes on 18 Moscato d’Asti tasted in Piemonte back in January, 2023. The producers did of course share other wines and so those 28 reviews are included at the bottom of this report. A huge thank you to the Consorzio dell’Asti, to Direttore Giacomo Pondini, Martina Bukavec and my chaperone Paola Baldi. Ci vediamo.

Azienda Agricola Ghiga Enrico Moscato d’Asti DOCG 2022

Davide Ghiga finished oenology school in Alba 2014, his brother in 2009. They are really the only young winemakers making a go of it in Castiglione, the first generation to make wines here, since 2012. Their uncle’s grapes were sold off to cooperatives before then and while barbera, dolcetto and nebbiolo have gained importance, the true heritage is still moscato. Freshness and high aromatic intensity are on full open display, as it must be with a varietal wine that bleeds this place, that being Castiglione Tinella. There are several exposures available, starting with the northern grapes and moving around the exposure wheel, east and west picked next and south the last, where sugars are high and acidity low. Pressed, three musts chosen from, kept at 0-1 degrees celsius, unfermented at this time. Blended, filtered, natural yeasts eliminated, back to zero degree holding tanks. Now in late October early November the vinification starts, selected yeasts are used, for 10-12 days, honing in on and fixing the aromatics and CO2. Done at 14-15 degrees with pressure at one bar. Followed by filtering again and tartaric stabilization at negative four or five degrees. Ready to bottle. Sugar at 120 g\L, acidity between 5.5 and 6, alcohol at five per cent. Tough work but someone has to do it. Spot on moscato in low alcohol, light fizz style with stone fruit and citrus aromatics on full display and in utmost control. Labour of love sets up true Ghiga success. Drink 2023-2026. Tasted January 2023

Cantina Alice Bel Colle Moscato d’Asti DOCG Le Casette di Alice 2022

A truly airy, frothy and easy moscato and yet the tannins of 2022 are there, as always across the board in this vintage. High acidity matches to the 120 g\L of sugar and 5.5 per cent alcohol. So much pear, soft and broken down by citrus with fresh white flowers. This is the straightforward and getable Md’A in all respects. Drink 2023-2024. Tasted January 2023

Cantina Alice Bel Colle Moscato d’Asti DOCG Paiè 2020

The cooperative of Alice bel Colle comprises 350 hectares spilt between 200 moscato, 100 brachetto, 50 barbera plus small amounts of dolcetto and chardonnay. There are approx. 100 members and more than 2,000,000 annual bottles are produced. “Our idea is not to grow too much, otherwise we will lose quality” says President Claudio Negrino who oversees the Cantina along with Vice President Bruno Roffredo. Moscato d’Asti as Paiè is a contra style to the normale, a bit of age added on and yet shy of the dumb phase that is sure to follow. There is more concentration and density on the nose with fresh herbs, sage mainly and even white balsamic. Paiè is a small valley with a warmer micro-climate and the potential for over ripeness. This brings more sugar (140 g\L of RS here), body and stage presence. Stylistically this will attract a different consumer who wants to think about things a bit and also appreciates a bigger wine that matches to more specific cuisine. The suggestion here is of course dessert but also spicy coconut curries. Drink 2023-2026. Tasted January 2023

Cantina Alice Bel Colle Asti DOCG Dolce Metodo Classico

Disgorged in 2015, seven-plus years on the lees and unmistakably white balsamic in aroma. The flowers and orange skin are now candied, the fennel slowly braised with Vidalia to bring out the sweetness. One of the most curious examples of using the moscato grape variety for a style of wine never really having been afforded the opportunity to try. Now a toasty expression fuelled by linalool that has turned to smouldering paraffin and camphor oil. Fine bitters though the sweetness still triumphs in the end. Nothing like this at all, a wine of experience and to experience, wholly unique. Drink 2023-2025. Tasted January 2023

Bera Moscato d’Asti DOCG 2022

Walter Bera started the company in the 1970s with moscato grapes and it has always been a very important wine. His son Riccardo Bera tells that “this is pretty much the history of the winery when only a few guys were making moscato.” This is about the 1970s, along with Roman Dogliotti and others making this style of wine without the help of current technologies to keep the wines clean and safe from spoilage. Here in 2022 the wine is fresh off the charts and announcing its charm without equivocation. Approximately 130 g/L of RS, 6 of tA and five per cent alcohol. Again from 2022 tannin is involved, calling card of the vintage, not common but not impossible. Age some. They will drink well after four years and up to at least 10. Approximately 70,000 bottles made, half of what is made at Bera. Drink 2023-2028. Tasted January 2023

Bera Moscato d’Asti DOCG Su Reimond 2022

Not a cru but a lieu-dit and literally below “Reimond’s house.” More concentration, doubling down on dry extract and also tannin because this is 2022. Aromatics are also intensified and yet so are the sugars but also the herbals in a soapy cilantro way. More idiosyncratic behaviour and specialized style. Not better than the classica, just different. Great curiosity and potential in any case. Drink 2023-2026. Tasted January 2023

Coppo 1892 Moscato d’Asti DOCG Moncalvina “Canelli” 2022

The name Canelli is the key because going forward it may be the only name on the label. In a short time “Moscato d’Asti” could very likely be stricken from the front of the bottle. A wine of heritage and the hardest to produce, here at 2.5 bars of pressure and topped with specially designed Diam corks. The naturally occurring sugar is 245 g/L with upwards of 6 g/L of TA and 5 percent alcohol. Perfectly balanced, true, precise and honest moscato. Or shall we say, “Canelli.” Drink for a year, pause for the next three and then for five to six more after that. Drink 2023-2029. Tasted January 2023

L’Armangia Moscato d’Asti DOCG Canelli 2017

Behold the moscato art meets science of Ignazio Giovine. Aromatics that temporarily disappeared into the Moscato d’Asti black hole are just now beginning to reemerge. The primary linalool beauty of years one and two went away and hid in the next 24-30 months but here they are again, albeit with new found interest and the beginnings of what naturally sweet moscato design is magically renowned to do. Now the peaches, apricots and nectarines, all them stone fruits and lemon segments are gelled, candied and crystallized. Renewed interest is the spark and imagination takes over, wonderment towards what might happen next. Will it be lemongrass tea, diesel emissions, petrol trails, strong scented terpenoids or cyclic ketones? Guesses are premium and another two years should answer the questions with real answers. Drink 2023-2027. Tasted January 2023

L’Armangia Moscato d’Asti DOCG Canelli 2015

Ignazio Giovine’s 2015 has entered the zone where all great aged moscato from Canelli lands are want to go, that is to say their aromatics have re-emerged, been re-invented and replace or rather re-imagine what they were to begin with. The lemon factor runs high from this vintage, more verbena herbal than grassy and the green plant matter is exotic evergreen, oily and strong-scented, to touch and nose. Lots of petrol fuelling and vapour trailing in this ’15 and in many ways the secondary aromas are just the beginning. Still the best years are now up towards the nearing horizon. Drink 2023-2024. Tasted January 2023

L’Armangia Moscato d’Asti DOCG Canelli 1998

Perhaps not the finest 1998 bottle version of what was surely a stellar vintage for Canelli moscato with full on oxidative notes, caramelization and all the lemon tisane that can be imagined on a naturally sweetened fizzy Asti white wine. Noting the excellence of the acidity and the gingered-apple-lemon crème brûlée tells much about what a perfectly sound bottle would offer. If ever the chance might arise again but alas not because Ignazio Giovine says this is it. Ah well, a great showing nonetheless. Drink 2023. Tasted January 2023

L’Armangia Mesicaseu Vino Da Uve Stramature Bianco (375ml)

Aromatic perfume is a floral wave far exceeding that of Moscato d’Asti to little surprise considering the later harvest and serious fruit concentration. Lemon and rose hip tea, mandarin orange, cranberry and dried fruit, namely persimmon and apricot. Tannins, boozy flavours, more lemon and spices, spicy if crisp bite, herbals running like Amaro through veins. Tar and roses. Major curio dessert wine this one. Drink 2023-2027. Tasted January 2023

Marenco Moscato d’Asti DOCG Scrapona 2022

Andrea Costa sets the table. “Strevi is always different from the rest of the Moscato d’Asti areas. You can really see the difference.” Leaner aromatics while conversely bolder in mouthfeel and fatter of structure. Limestone soil makes for fine acidity that is characteristic of this southern area, closer to the Appenines. The palate is full, wide and of a breadth impressive indeed that acts as a great distraction from the level of sweetness. And then comes that 2022 tannin, because of Strevi more forceful than most. Drink 2023-2025. Tasted January 2023

Marenco Moscato d’Asti DOCG Scrapona 2017

Now going back five years and the winemaking no different then, just as it is still today. Though some 2017s are not yet showing a return to aging and development this from Strevi is just beginning its next level evolution and the fascination is upon us. Evergreen and petrol in cohorts, dried lemongrass and some sort of sweet and sour solvent. Grassy and chamomile plus the aromatic skin of “cedro,” aka fine strips of cedar bark. Great mouthfeel and persistence from what may be a vintage that will age quicker than some but for the next three-plus years it will do what we hope from aging moscato. Drink 2023-2026. Tasted January 2023

Marenco Moscato d’Asti DOCG Scrapona 2012

Now we are really getting somewhere with an older moscato that is not only holding well but just a few minutes in the glass and everything begins to change. This bottle is in great shape, the hue of moscato brilliant golden yellow and the aromatics shining just like the wine’s hue. Sweet straw and lemon curd, like aged Icewine from riesling and the vintage just must have provided great balance. Acidity remains perfectly in tact and the tact of this wine is it’s seamlessness, unwavering, still holding a perfect line. Bravo. Buonissimo. Life yet to live. Drink 2023-2026. Tasted January 2023

Matteo Sorìa Asti Brut DOCG NV Bric Prima Bella Sparkling Wine

Actually Extra Brut because there is only 1 g/L of residual sugar and in fact Matteo Sorìa is the only one making Asti Sparkling as bone dry. Maintains the aromatic profile of moscato from here in Castiglione Tinella but the profile is wholly, utterly and distinctly unique. A balanced Asti with slightly higher alcohol at 12 per cent though this is in reality 12.7 and yes, dry as the desert. Fennel seed, rosemary and yet never tart at all. Sees six to eight months on the lees with higher acidity at 6.3 g/L and this is what Sorìa is looking for. First disgorgement of this style and it has my attention. The only change going forward will be to keep extending the lees aging, albeit slowly, slowly. A reminder that it’s a tank method sparkling wine. Drink 2023-2025. Tasted January 2023

Matteo Sorìa Cascinetta Asti DOCG Cascinetta NV

The area was called Cascinetta and also the name of one of Matteo Sorìa’s brands. This is the sweeter sparkler at 140 g\L with 7 g\L of total acidity and 7.0 percent alcohol. Also non-vintage so therefore a mix of at least (but up to 15 per cent) two or three older vintages. All for the purpose of consistency in style and a consumers’ taste. Sugar is quite hidden, flavours are very stone fruit and acidity rules the day. Looong finish, so clean and quite precise for this style of fizzy wine. Drink 2023-2025. Tasted January 2023

Matteo Sorià

Matteo Sorìa Cascinetta Moscato d’Asti DOP

Bottled last week so yes this is about the freshest moscato you will ever find. Intensity of florals and aromatics off the charts and also here lower sulphites than most, with thanks to the newest of filtering technology used in the winery. Passes though 1.0, 0.65 and 0.45 micron filters and finishes with just 150 g\L of sulphites. The flowers and the stone fruit on the nose are matched by the white chalky-clay soil that determine what kind of moscato comes from Matteo Sorìa. Perfectly executed sweeter style. Drink 2023-2025. Tasted January 2023

Matteo Soria Moscato d’Asti DOCG Soria 2012

Ten years old and bottled February 2013. A warm vintage with a great deal of rain and wow has this wine stood the test of time. The bubbles are preserved, it feels drier and the appearance is of a wine only a year or two old. Drier because the acidity is high and after 10 years that acidity hasn’t changed. Probably 120 g\L of sugar and the aromas are so beautifully preserved as well, though they have certainly morphed with some crème frâiche now, but also lemongrass, Vietnamese herbs and the beginning of petrol. Yet to express any solvents or waxiness. That may be coming, not soon but down the road. Incredible freshness. Magic. For now and it remains to be seen what can be gained from 10 more years of aging. Drink 2023-2028. Tasted January 2023

Cantina Alice Bel Colle Cuvée Tresessanta Blanc De Blancs Pas Dosé 2018, Alta Langa DOCG

The alcohol is a bit high (at 13.5 per cent) due to “a bureaucratic problem,” explains President President Claudio Negrino, having obtained the appellative status a bit tardy and so the harvest was delayed, otherwise it would not have been called Alta Langa DOCG. Makes for more gastronomy in a few ways, even it it’s not perfectly suitable to be drunk own its own. All moscato, aged 36 months on the lees in the richest of possible moscato employed ways, like candied ginger, salty kewpie mayo and seasoned sushi rice in a bottle. Carries a metallic note as well, like viognier, but the acidity is really good. Also a golden hue and beneficial bitters. Drink 2023-2025. Tasted January 2023

Cantina Alice Bel Colle Moscato Secco 360 degrees Collezione Filarej, DOC Piemonte

The label depicts a description, of standing at the top of the unnamed hill though it may be affectionately called “Belvedere,” a beautiful panoramic view, 360 degrees, overlooking the village itself. Here a dry moscato that has been made at Alice bel Colle for more than 10 years, well before the DOC was created. Still perfumed with more linalool than a dry example would usually emit and the sugar here is 3-4 g\L, essentially insignificant as it pertains to this grape. Once again there is as much a viognier feeling gained as there is moscato and that is fully attributed to a strong aromatic profile predicated on phenolics which masks the alcohol (at 14 per cent). Clearly a wine that benefitted from expert temperature control during fermentation to capture perfumes and avoid bitterness. A style of wine on the rise, modern and contemporary. Drink 2023-2025. Tasted January 2023

Acqui Secco DOCG Monte Ridolfi Lupus Glorioso 2020

A dry version of brachetto and so an agreement they would be called simply “Acqui,” as opposed to “Brachetto d’Acqui,” which is the sweet version. Not a rule but a marketing choice made by the members of the Consorzio. Avoids consumer misconception. Again the aromatics are captured despite the dry factor and like the moscato concept there is a modernity and a sense of innovation involved. Red fruit with all the right moves, black cherry and just that fine little bit of bitterness from the stone. Fineness of tannin and long on the finish with good natural sweetness and impressive balance. Simple and not complex but quite satisfying. All stainless and some concrete tanks for a good level of freshness though interesting in that there is no real salumi or meaty skin muskiness. Really clean and focused. Drink 2023-2024. Tasted January 2023

Cantina Alice Bel Colle Dolcetto d’Acqui DOC 360 Degrees Collezione Coste Di Muiran 2021

Not a wine of a single vineyard dolcetto but from a specific area out of which grapes are chosen. Bit of a funny barnyard aroma mixed with very ripe strawberry with some musky fruit skin leatheriness. Much lighter than Dogliani versions and yet also fruitier than those from the Monferrato Hills further west from Alice bel Colle. Smells like pizza dough in action, still a bit raw yet getting somewhere. Also mulberry bush, Ribena and yet good acidity keeping the grip and also balance in play. Solid and characterful, yet another wine of gastronomy. Fine bitterness upon the chewy finish. Drink 2023-2025. Tasted January 2023

With Claudio Negrini, President – Cantina Alice bel Colle

Cantina Alice Bel Colle Barbera d’Asti DOCG 360 Degrees Collezione Al Casò 2021

Al Casò faces south-southeast heading from Alice bel Colle towards Nizza, very close, on the right, of vineyards somewhere between young and old, right in the sweet spot. Lions of cherry here, a variegation of ripenesses, in reds and green but mostly concentration. Selected from many small parcels, 95 per cent collected by hand. Fermentations are kept separate and blended after. Expressive of barbera’s acidity but also stringent behaviour, kept in check though surely present in this wine. There is a real presence and persistence and so the wine improves with time spent getting to know its grippy charms. Drink 2024-2026. Tasted January 2023

Cantina Alice Bel Colle Barbera d’Asti Superiore DOCG Alix 2019

The flagship red for the cooperative Cantina Alice be Colle and almost counterintuitive because there is immediate brightness and effusive behaviour straight away. Alix was the ancient name of the village and there were at the time two roads running up and down the hill that formed an “X.” As in going to the X, to the village, now called Alice bel Colle. Now up to 15 per cent alcohol though it wears it well and the aromatics are surprisingly open-knit. Intensely or more so the kind of tart that is truly implosive, reflexive and recoiling. Wood is all about spice and structure, not overwhelming though unavoidably in charge. Ample purity which bequeathes originality and in the end a thank you to the calcareous-quartz soils. Drink 2024-2027. Tasted January 2023

Cantina Alice Bel Colle Brachetto d’Acqui DOCG Le Casette Di Alice NV

The cousin of Moscato Casette, like-minded in sweetness and purpose though brachetto’s key ingredient is more particular, from strawberry to rose, depending on the vintage. An herbal vintage which doesn’t necessarily choose one over the other but brings in the leaves of both. Acidity is maintained and freshness guaranteed. This is quite open and lively with a scrape of orange zest that brightens the finish. Drink 2023-2025. Tasted January 2023

Bera Brut Alta Langa DOCG And DOP 2016

Disgorged in late November from a wine that has been made the same way since the 1980s, 70 per cent chardonnay and (30). Walter Bera’s father Sisto had been growing pinot noir and chardonnay going back even further so he was one of the pioneers, like Carlo Gancia. The ’16 spent 48 months on the lees and this is the last bottle of this disgorgement. Grown on white chalk in the Langhe so yes there is some lightning in here with just 4 g/L of dosage, vintage related but that’s the median point overall. So much flavour, with mid-palate and structure, yet round and so getable. Drink 2023-2026. Tasted January 2023

Bera Dolcetto d’Alba DOC 2021

“Dolcetto has been in our roots for a very long time, on a very historical piece of our land,” tells Riccardo Bera, from a Neive vineyard, once planted as the king of the Langhe as the most important grape. It fetched more money than nebbiolo. It was currency. Today it’s the easiest wine, low in structure and acidity, but also austerity and it’s the perfect match for local food. This ’21 smells so primary, as if it were from the tank and yet it’s more than a year old. Incredibly fresh, bursting with red fruit of every ilk, flesh and size. Supremely aromatic and Riccardo’s brother Umberto is the new gen oenologist keeping the old traditions alive. A week on skins, stainless steel only, some tannin that is Neive but not nebbiolo austerity at all. Perfect mid-weight dolcetto. Drink 2023-2026. Tasted January 2023

Bera Barbera d’Alba Superiore DOCG La Lena 2019

Lena was the name of Riccardo Bera’s great-grandmother, as in Sisto’s mother. Aged in 25 hL casks, the fruit coming from Neive, same area as the dolcetto. Actually Gaia Principe, halfway between the villages of Neive and Barbaresco. Just fresh enough to stay happy and healthy even while temperatures rise and fruit concentrates exponentially. The structure here separates this from other barbera while the wood never dominates. Well thought out, considered, never hastily conceptualized or actualized but made well to deliver persistence and more than ample amenability. Drink 2023-2028. Tasted January 2023

With Riccardo Bera

Bera Barbaresco DOCG Serraboella 2019

The western cru close to Neive village, exposition to the west, from the lower section at 350m. Planted 15 years ago with the intention to make classic “Villages” Barbaresco but the fruit from 2016 changed the family’s perspective. That vintage was the first cru label and here from the fourth consecutive the refinement time is 24 months in grandi botti, part Slovenian and part Austrian oak. Tannic to be sure yet not quite what you’d call austere. Greatly structured wine and still far from readiness. “That’s the young baby we’re talking about,” says Riccardo. “It’s the cru that surprises me.” Great aromatic presence and fine chalky liquidity running through. Drink 2025-2032. Tasted January 2023

Bera Barbaresco Riserva DOCG Rabajà 2015

Rabajà faces southwest and this fruit comes right from the heart, only bottled as Riserva. Vines in and around 40 years of age and three years spent in Grandi Botti. Aromatically you intuit glycerin and as a Barbaresco there is clearly more acumen and experience from plants that first gave this wine life out of the 2011 vintage. Tannins are even more compact than Seraboella, trying to expand but they just keep weighing down and won’t fully relent. Layering of red fruit and they are beautiful layers but each one carries tannin of ilk upon ilk. This is Barbaresco of sapidity as a quotient of acids and pH working in cohorts. The palate attack is quite fantastical. Give this another year. Drink 2024-2033. Tasted January 2023

Bera Barbaresco Riserva DOCG Basarin 2012

Basarin is home to much older vines, upwards of 65 years-old and is one of the steepest vineyards in Barbaresco. A snake of a vineyard and very challenging to work. South exposure, warm for sure and a soil composition higher in chalk than clay but not too dissimilar to Rabajà. Herbaceous notes come from Basarin and “when I was young, every time I went to the tank I had this feeling,” tells Riccardo Bera. The first vintage out of which the tannins are nearly resolved and yet the fruit persists in near whole and perfect freshness. A nebbiolo in wonderful condition and while the vintage was hot there might have been a different result. This is almost, not quite but nearly ready, as far as optimum or perfect windows are concerned. Liquorice here, a touch of tar and well, “most of this job for us is to start with the best grapes you can. The quality is in the vineyard. A good winemaker can keep the 10. A five you cannot fix.” Ten it is. Drink 2023-2032. Tasted January 2023

Bera Barolo DOCG Mosconi 2017

From this vintage the fruit is not 100 per cent Bera and just shortly thereafter the Bera family purchased a portion of the famous Monforte cru. This is the first and only trial vintage before the purchase but the focus was on acquiring a piece. Straight away the dry and brushy vintage while some red fruit freshness persists. Some austerity yet starting, to advance, mature and soften. The reconciliation and full recovery may be a year or two away but this nebbiolo is showing the signs. Quality precursor to what is coming form the new plantation and Bera’s full control of their own Mosconi Barolo destiny. Drink 2024-2028. Tasted January 2023

Coppo 1892 Brut Rosé Clelia Coppo Metodo Classico Vino Spumante Di Qualità 2019

Assemblage of chardonnay with only five per cent pinot noir in a cuvée named for Luigi Coppo’s grandmother. Just five per cent but red fruit really defines this traditional method sparkling wine. Red currants and a hint of strawberry, sweetly leafy and mildly tart. Drink 2023-2025. Tasted January 2023

Coppo 1892 Piero Coppo Riserva Del Fondatore 2013, Alta Langa Riserva DOCG

The 2013 vintage is the turning point to this 60 percent pinot noir and (40) chardonnay becoming and being labeled Alta Langa, recently disgorged in 2022. Previous disgorgements were labelled Vino Spumante di Qualità. Now into wildly vivid and famous complexity, toasty yes but there’s a crème frâiche and an almost strawberries and cream component. Eonologists GianMario Cerrutti, Guiliermo Grasso and Vittorio Pescarmona conspired to see this age 85 to 90 months on the lees, almost unprecedented around Asti. Has hit its stride, in the right place between crunchy and the kind of sparkling wine that you begin to ruminate with in the mouth. Cerebral wine in every respect. Drink 2023-2027. Tasted January 2023

Coppo 1892 Monteriolo 2020, DOC Piemonte

Mainly stainless steel with 10 per cent barriques. Reductive and yet wildly exotic, so much so the protective shell can’t seem to hold back the aromatics. Of minerals and elements, tropical fruit and wet stone. Turns flinty or rather encourages this note, followed by lit paraffin and finally a hit of lemon pith plus fine bitters. Everything in moderation, subtlety and restraint. The dream of generations continues. Drink 2023-2026. Tasted January 2023

Coppo 1892 Monteriolo 2015, DOC Piemonte

Chardonnay at seven years is extraordinary, from the limestone and clay of Castelnuovo Calcea with all the hints of the early days now emerging into the secondary machinations so wished for in Nizza-Monferatto area chardonnay. Of solvents and camphor, paraffin and flintiness stretched elastic for miles and miles. Structured wine of sapidity which is once again the correct and beautiful way for chardonnay to complete its raison d’être. That and freshness so persistent. Drink 2023-2025. Tasted January 2023

Coppo 1892 Chardonnay Monteriolo Riserva Della Famiglia 2017, DOC Piemonte

A warm and dry vintage for concentration to be guaranteed but looking forward to 2022 the lack of winter snow and spring/summer rain will make for a much more difficult proposition. This is not only beautiful as an aged chardonnay but also impressive in its Riserva style concentration. Takes the waxiness, phenolic meets solvent tonic and citrus to an entirely next level. Chardonnay and 2017 make for an ideal and lasting marriage in Nizza Monferrato. Drink 2023-2026. Tasted January 2023

Coppo Barbera d’Asti Nizza DOCG Pomorosso 2019

A Barbera d’Asti from the highest level from Nizza where the soils are key, of fine and friable clay with sparkling mineral content above a layer of nearly pure though porous limestone to raise barbera no other Asti area is able to procure. Castelnuovo Calcea and Vinchio bring the grip and stage presence, mainly from old vineyards. The Pomorosso is a cuvée and while structurally speaking this is a very serious wine, there is a portion from near Agliano Terme that brings a roundness and ultimately balance. The components of acidity and tannin are strongest but they do not dominate as might be expected. There is a juiciness and fine if sharp red fruit presence part plum and part red berry plume. Pomegranate shares the spotlight and this is a very generous vintage. Surprisingly accessible. Agreeable and yet age worthy to. Drink 2023-2028. Tasted January 2023

Coppo Barbera d’Asti Superiore Nizza DOCG Riserva Di Famiglia 2015

Notably evolved yet right in that secondary zone where things have become really interesting. Pine forest, limestone and espresso, a veritable caffè of barbera with juicy black cherries and finishing dark chocolate. A vintage where the wood is really felt and these are the final days of excellence. Thank goodness for top barbera acidity. Drink 2023-2025. Tasted January 2023

With Davide Ghiga

Azienda Agricola Ghiga Enrico Dolcetto 2021, Monferrato DOC

The first of the Ghiga red grapes to be harvested and here from Monferrato the alcohol is still coming in at 13 per cent. Meat scented, a salumi skin but mostly freshness because this zone is still one of the lucky ones. Fruit is fleshy but again the skins are so much a part of determining style; musky plum and minerals cut by an almost raspberry tang. Lovely but complex dolcetto. Liking the length here. Production is approximately 2,000 bottles per year. Drink 2023-2024. Tasted January 2023

Azienda Agricola Ghiga Enrico Barbera d’Asti DOCG 2021

Barbera from a very particular terroir that manages freshness really well because the soils of Costigiole and the winds that come in from the mountains create temperature wings and a maintenance of cooling acidity. A world away from barbera raised in Alba, here at 13.5 percent alcohol and no wood involved in the aging process. Fruit at the centre with great Scott acidity in the range of six to 6.5 g\L. Drinks in many ways like the dolcetto but there is more depth and even some tarry character involved. The vines are 40-50 years of age and it is both concentration and intensity that are provided. Also herbal, like Amaro and in the end a balanced effort. This is the wine for Bollito Misto. Truly. Drink 2023-2026. Tasted January 2023

Azienda Agricola Ghiga Enrico Barbera d’Asti Superiore DOCG Dodici Lune 2019

In Superiore barbera gets special wood treatment, now and since 2016 with two foudres, two barriques and one tonneaux sitting like little Buddhas in a small aging room dedicated to this wine. The rest in those vessels is for one year and another in bottle. The wines are racked in tank to make the blend, usually in June or July. Fruit from the zone (località) of San Michele in Costigiole d’Asti, as always and one of the coolest barbera zones pretty much anywhere in Piemonte. Superiore is a 20-25 per cent selection of the best barbera grapes and the quality in terms of concentration but also purity is evident in this fine vintage of this fine wine. Acidity always high, especially from this place and “this is our style right now,” tells Davide Ghiga. Around 2,000-2,300 bottles annually. Drink 2023-2028. Tasted January 2023

Marenco Rosato Acqui DOCG Ma Ré 2021

Ma Ré as in Marenco and also “Ro-Sé.” An experimental Rosé (third try) labeled Acqui which under the new understanding puts it on the drier side and spends a maximum of 48 hours on the skins. This puts it in similar vinification methodology to the sweeter Brachetto d’Acqui. That said fermentative temperatures don’t need to be cold because immediate gratification is the point of the exercise. Dry and salty, 2-3 g\L of RS, very tisane, namely bergamot, then pomegranate, orange and rose petal. Really nice Rosato. Drink 2023-2025. Tasted January 2023

Moscato Secco Ma Mù 2021, DOC Piemonte

Ma Mù (which carries a Champagne story), is local dialect to speak about the grape moscato and this is also experimental in that dry iterations are neither traditional nor normal. Yet here we are with the grape and the sugar fermented away to finish at 13 per cent alcohol. Barrel fermented on the lees for six months, made to last, to age a few years. Able to capture and maintain the origins of varietal aromatics and so the result is almost pinot gris in temperament, a little bit salty and simultaneously white floral. Citrus is all juice and the terpenes stay in control. This is the second vintage though the first was problematic due to reduction. This 2021 is clean and precise. Drink 2023-2025. Tasted January 2023

Marenco Barbera d’Asti DOCG Bassina 2021

Classic and traditional, never a thought of barriques, not even botti but only stainless steel and concrete. Modern and yet big enough to speak the language of red wine that thinks on its feet and walks a confident walk. “We have two advantages that makes better barbera than 10 years ago,” tells Andrea Costa. “One is climate which maintains acidity and the second is how we think better in both the vineyard and in the cellar.” Expressively juicy and bright, with roundness and mouth filling qualities. What we like to call generous and perfectly without astringencies. Clean as a whistle. Drink 2023-2026. Tasted January 2023

Marenco Barbera d’Asti Superiore DOCG Ciresa 2019

The Superiore ages in botti for 18 months and the expression is much bolder, sanguine, accented by a number of herbs and spices. Caper and dill, tobacco, pine tree, balsamico, black cherry and persistent in its intensity. Needs air and agitation because the wood and the time have conspired for a bit of reduction that must be encouraged to leave the glass. It will if you have the patience and you will because there are charms and structural components worth waiting for. Drink 2024-2027. Tasted January 2023

Marenco Barbera d’Asti Nizza Riserva DOCG Zana

Zana is a cru in Castiglione (recently mapped out by Alesssandro Masnaghetti), high in elevation and the barbera here from Nizza ages 18 months in barriques and tonneaux. Does not show its wood so readily and in fact the fruit aromatics are quite pronounced. The air and breathability from elevation definitely help to keep the windows open in a barbera that should by all accounts be closed and unwilling. Not the case as this sky brightens and the wine shares its charms. Good structure here because of high ranking acidity leaning part sweet and part sour into the tannins. More singularity from Marenco, this time for Nizza. Drink 2024-2028. Tasted January 2023

Marenco Albrarossa Piemonte DOC 2019

Aged in the larger (15 hL) barrel, this time from a variety that has just one or two biotypes. Bottom line is that albarossa is dark matter, tarry, like heavy fuel and the wood only serves to accent what’s already there. Like petit sirah but in Piemonte, or perhaps malbec/tannat from Cahors but truthfully it’s what it is, of its own accord. But acidity here is all Monferrato meets Strevi and this kind of cimmerian red wine is an own character and style. Great acidity here that gives barbera a run for its money. A bit dill pickle and peppery reductive so give it some air. Drink 2024-2027. Tasted January 2023

Marenco Brachetto d’Acqui DOCG Pineto 2022

Pineto, the name of the church across the way. “This wine just needs people to open the bottle and drink it,” not to compare or think about anything else in the world. “It’s so unique” says Andrea Costa. Less muscle as compared to moscato, some tannin aka tisane from a day on skins and just the way of the grape. The grapes were heavier in 2022 because of the skins and thus the tannic sensation is gained. Strawberry and orange zest, cranberry and basilico. An ideal brachetto right here. Drink 2023-2026. Tasted January 2023

Good to go!

godello

Moscato vineyard, Castiglione Tinella

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Life affirming wines di Gianni Doglia

Apr16

Gianni Doglia

During the post-war days of late 1940s and 1950s Europe there were simple, humble and hard-working folk who tempted fate by fighting against the oppression waged by dire destinies. Gianni Doglia’s maternal mezzadro grandfather Eugenio Rivella was such a man who in 1947 decided to buy a farmstead, raise his own grapes and do so in a very specific place. In the 1980s it was Bruno and Marisa who took the reigns of the estate. Today brother and sister Gianni and Paola take care of the tradition their nonno began and do so in a wholly unexpected and antithetical way.

Related – Rock steady Bersano

Azienda Vinicola di Gianni Doglia is situated on the Langhe side of Castagnole delle Lanza, opposite of Monferrato in the province of Asti, Piemonte. Gianni feels “like a Monferrato man, even if he’s literally on the edge of the Langhe.” He farms six hectares across his estate lands plus two more in Monferrato and one in Nizza. He notes the importance of the ascending rise to his hill up to a pinnacle that puts the vineyards at points higher than those in Monferrato. Two winds blow through, a northern Foehn from the Alps and the strong westerner from the Ligurian Sea. The special acidities and intangible magic in the moscato and barbera farmed here comprise the solid centre of the estate. It was Gianni’s grandfather who’s intuition knew and acted upon all of this.

Gianni Doglia’s wines are notable in their modernity and yet so pure, so honest and so steeped in his personal tradition. His wines are effortless to drink and while he clearly puts in the hard work, they seem so effortlessly made. They serve a pragmatic purpose, like literature or painting, with a mission to gift us the fulfillment that makes our essential life duties more palatable. Life affirming moscato, barbera, grignolino and ruché. Taste Gianni’s wines and you may feel the same. These are the seven he and Paola poured for me back in December.

Gianni Doglia Grigolino d’Asti DOCG 2018, Piedmont, Italy ($20.00 – Estimate)

The grignolino of lithe transparency from limestone and clay soils, ripe cherries and the wine of Gianni’s father and grandfather. Gianni tells that “grignolino is the poor man’s nebbiolo” and ‘aint that the truth. Also a nut oil, almond or hazelnut running through the crunchiness of the fruit. Grignolino vero. Speaks the truth. There are 6,000 bottles made. Drink 2019-2020. Tasted December 2019

Gianni Doglia Ruché di Castagnole Monferrato DOCG 2018, Piedmont, Italy ($20.00 – Estimate)

The absolute truth of ruché is spoken as one of the most recognizable profiles on the planet. The speciality is uncanny, semi-aromatic and with this sweet fruit component that’s like malvasia with no baggage. Or colorino the same way or so many others but only this varietal does cherries in this floral to almost tropical way. A scrape of orange zest in this one too. Neither muscular nor soft but somewhere uniquely crunchy and just ripe in between. Drink 2019-2022. Tasted December 2019

Gianni Doglia Barbera d’Asti DOCG Bosco Donne 2018, Piedmont, Italy ($20.00 – Estimate)

A selection from some of the “younger” barbera in the 40 year-old vineyard and not a stitch of oak intrusion. That Gianni Doglia makes an unoaked barbera is so smart, beneficial and a gift to us all. A naked one, full of the natural cherries of the grape and the air breathed in from the woods next door. A beautiful vintage of texture and fruit to the fruity end. Castagnole is such a place, of so much aromatic presence and kudos for making a wine that allows for the natural order, along with a sour candied edge of the terroir to speak. Drink 2019-2022. Tasted December 2019

Gianni Doglia Barbera d’Asti Superiore DOCG Genio 2017, Piedmont, Italy

A very young barbera d’asti named for Gianni’s grandfather Eugenio, only three months in bottle. Gianni loves this harvest, of body from hot temperatures but with tenderness and softness. A spiced barbera, still reeking of its time spent in wood but the mass of fruit is prevalent to predominant, albeit based on what Gianni’s grandfather insisted. “The wine has to stay in the bottle for the same length of time it sat in the barrel.” And then some I would add. This the barbera of heights climbed as in these hills and needing just as much time to come back down. Drink 2022-2029. Tasted December 2019

Gianni Doglia Barbera d’Asti Superiore DOCG Viti Vecchie 2017, Piedmont, Italy

Old vines of 60 years-old bring acumen, generational knowhow and a depth of soul to this Nizza and while the Genio from ulterior terroir takes, feels and oozes more in wood this just seems unencumbered. Perhaps it’s a vintage thing but surely a sense of place above all else. A harvest that was surely fresher and a structure much more vertical. Balanced like a perfectly toned dancer. Don’t you just love it when nothing is too much. The fruit, acidity and tannin are all announced but not pronounced. Finishes with just a crumble of really good chocolate so you can imagine the forest foraged future. Drink 2022-2032. Tasted December 2019

Gianni Doglia Moscato d’Asti DOCG 2019, Piedmont, Italy ($20.00 – Estimate)

The 25th anniversary bottling that combs all the moscato vineyards on the estate though truth be told they all produce quite different wines. “Gianni’s dream was to produce the best moscato ever,” tells sister Paola. The clarity and clean, clean living is evident and with thanks to upstart acidity to balance the sugars. A soil-driven expression of moscato for a fresh and crunchy result. Peaches meet white balsamic for some genuine complexity. Eight to ten bottlings are made each year from wine that sits suspended at one degree in juice format inside steel tanks. At this time of year there is no danger of fermentation. A wine of 5.0 per cent alcohol. Drink 2019-2020. Tasted December 2019

Gianni Doglia Moscato d’Asti DOCG Casa di Bianca 2018, Piedmont, Italy ($20.00 – Estimate)

A single-vineyard moscato from 35 year-old vines and the plot Gianni’s grandfather just knew grew the best vines and so Gianni first decided to separate it from the pack in 2012. And so this particular moscato sees eight or nine months on the lees and finds a next level of complexity for the stylistic and the tradition. Gives a yeasty note on top of green apple, melon, orange blossom and fine herbs. The acidity is greater and so energy is exercised in perpetual motion. The alcohol result is just slightly higher at 5.5 per cent. A wine completely unique in this world that may just deliver some petrol and paraffin with a few years time. Drink 2019-2023. Tasted December 2019

Good to go!

godello

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Rock steady Bersano

Apr14

You’ve got to visit the cantina of Bersano Vini in Nizza Monferrato, if for no other reason than to wander through the on-site, outdoor Museo Bersano delle Contadinerie which houses implements and machinery from peasant life and transportation in the seventeenth and eighteenth century. All the brainchild of Arturo Bersano and in his successor’s words the installation is “a memory of what made our wine great. The cellar, farming tools, wine presses and a collection of old wine prints. Bersano – winemaker, scholar, poet. His anxiety of research, patient and cautious, dictated by a deep passion for the land and for work, has been able to condense in the Collections and in the Museum of the Peasants, the most suffered and joyful testimonies of the wine-peasant civilization.” All of that and of course to taste a portfolio in Monferrato’s widest breadth, consistently exceptional of quality and for consumer value across the board. Rock steady Bersano.

The humble beginnings were early, first decade times in the 20th century. They say 1907 to be exact but surely somewhere between 115 and 120 years later the estates cover 230 hectares, the largest single entity as such in the Monferrato hills. The original and most historic property is Cremosina, once the seat of a great Palazzo (dei Conti della Cremosina) and now home to Barbera d’Asti vineyards. Bersano farms nine estates and two single vineyards in these hills: Cremosina (Nizza Monferrato), Generala (Agliano Terme), Prata (Incisa Scapaccino), Badarina (Serralunga d’Alba), Castelgaro (Baretta – Acqui Terme), Pallavicini (Mombaruzzo), Buccelli (Nizza Monferrato), Serradivaglio Vineyard (Incisa Scapaccino), San Michele (Nizza Monferrato), Monteolivo Vineyard (Castelnuovo Belbo) and San Pietro Realto (Castagnole Monferrato). Today these estates are in production of 90 per cent of what constitutes the Bersano portfolio: Three whites from cortese and arneis, seven sparkling wines from cortese, moscato, brachetto and pinot noir, 13 reds from barbera, grignolino, ruché, nebbiolo and dolcetto.

Pinta Piedmontese

Of great historical interest is the presence in Bersano’s cellar of what Arturo designed and called the “10VT.” The Pinta Piedmontese was a 12.5 litre transportable for the times vessel and four Pinta could be filled from one 50L barrel, half the size found in the cellars of Marchesi di Barolo. This last historical barrel called the 10VT is now housed in the upper floors of Bersano’s Nizza property to avoid flooding. At any given time there can be 80,000L aging ion Slavonian oak casks in this cellar, “of all grandi botti sizes,” 50-60 years of age and from 47 to 107 hL. In fact, no two are the same, perhaps in shape but not in terms of volume. Only 10 per cent of all wines see barrique, they being Nizza Barbera and Barolo Cru.

I have had the pleasure of tasting Bersano wines on many occasions in Toronto and over the past three years I’ve done so four times in Piemonte. The first was at Collisioni Festival in 2017 and then in 2018 on several occasions with winemaker Roberto Morosinotto, namely at the Cascina San Pietro where ruché, barbera and grignolino grow in the Monferrato hills. Then in 2019 on this visit at the Cantina in Nizza and in 2020, at Nebbiolo Prima and Grandi Langhe in Alba. These are the six wines tasted in Nizza with Bersano’s Carmen Pergola and the Consorzio Barbera d’Asti e Vini del Monferrato’s Valerio Bertolino.

Bersano Gavi Di Gavi DOCG 2018, Piedmont, Italy ($21.19)

A fresh and sweetly herbal cortese for a smooth and balanced Gavi of straightforward execution and finesse. Relevant acidity keeps everything set up for levels most simple wines just don’t have access to be there. A very fruity vintage with a crushed almond oil extract, perfectly correct and positioned. Drink 2020-2023. Tasted December 2019 and February 2020

Bersano Barbera d’Asti DOCG Costalunga 2017, Piedmont, Italy (348680, $14.10)

Taken from four estates and without a doubt the most versatile, inexpensive and properly delineated barbera d’asti for the territory to express what needs to the world. Dark fruit, high acidity, classically trained in large Slavonian oak and just exactly what to expect. Never asks too much and delivers across the board amenability. The value is exceptional. Drink 2019-2021. Tasted December 2019

Bersano Barbera d’Asti Nizza DOCG Riserva Generala 2016, Piedmont, Italy (Approx. $52.00)

Drawn from fruit off of the Generala estate and though a recently awarded appellation there is great history in the grapes and the place. Nine months in large Slavonian cask plus nine months in 500L French tonneaux make for a very amenable barbera with a prominent personality. Big on cherries and wood spice, balsam and dried herbs. Dark and even a bit mysterious, cool, almost mentholated and structured for age. Glycerin texture and an oil extract not atypical for the get together of grape, place and elévage. Top vintage for this particular and relatively ambitious wine. Drink 2021-2026. Tasted December 2019

Bersano Nirvasco Barolo DOCG 2014, Piedmont, Italy (713628, $34.95)

The grapes in Barolo come from three areas, Serralunga (Badarina) along with Monforte and La Morra. Aged in large Slavonian casks for three years, easily recognizable as nebbiolo, not just in hue but surely in aromatic rose to tar profile. Classic really and also dried fruits, but especially this wild strawberry note. Dry and then dried cherry, wild and free on the palate. It’s very classic, clean, crisp and easy to get with. Make great use early while other tannic nebbiolo work their way through adolescence. Winemaker Roberto Morosinotto has done all the work for you and serves it up at the right time to drink. Clean and uncomplicated. Drink 2019-2023. Tasted December 2019

Bersano Ruché Di Castagnole Monferrato DOCG San Pietro Realto 2018, Piedmont, Italy (Approx. $22.00)

Fruit is grown on the San Pietro estate to the east of Monferrato and the unmistakeable and specific cherry with cherry stone note is uncanny, not to be missed. A sandy soil with calcaire and small stones of steep slopes make for an aromatic note that stands alone. The herbal amaro play is on the sweet side and what this really wants and needs is a game bird, roasted and savoury of local herbs. You might think gamay meets frappato or somewhere in between but no, this is singular. This is the red wine for Szechuan food. Truly. Drink 2019-2022. Tasted December 2019

Bersano Grignolino d’Asti DOCG Valdelsalto 2018, Piedmont, Italy (Approx. $22.00)

Coming from the same estate as the ruché, meaning San Pietro in the eastern hills of Monferrato. Beautifully effusive and luminous, light in appearance and weight but do not be fooled into thinking it’s light. Castagnole is the origin and the grape is considered the wine of the family. Fresh, young and the summer wine. OK so light it is but salty, mineral, taut and complete. What else do you need? The kind of wine that never makes you tired and is utterly representative of the place. Drink 2019-2021. Tasted December 2019

Good to go!

godello

Agnolotti del Plin, Caffe Roma – Enoteca con Cucina, Costigliole d’Asti:

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Living wine in the moment at Scarpa Winery

Apr12

There are mornings when the conditions are ripe: A mind at ease, a calm and benign wind, an empty highway, a good companion. On the fifth day in Piemonte straddling the passover from November to December these were the conditions and so the first pour at Scarpa Winery was captured in full attention. Not lost in any particular thought there was a perceptible air of quiet, a quivering in the air and very, very quietly the barbera fell into the glass with the slightest burble as if the liquid whispered “shoykill, shoykill.” With very little to distract this breakfast pour had more to do with time than space. The movement was sublime, it was beauty, of time passing, for grapes in a way no longer alive drawn from vines still very much so. This ephemeral configuration of a year’s cycle for making wine encapsulated in movement and the moment. In wine this is how we must see things and live our lives, perched between what is beautiful and what has passed.

Living wine in the moment at Scarpa Winery. The idea that in life we are tracking what is gone or in the past is not lost when you consider how no other Nizza Monferrato producer both waits to release wines and also holds back library vintages for future release. No other estate will make you feel this longing, this sense of contemplation and aesthetics, of thinking about the past. A walk past the cages of older wines is the precursor but their stacks of 1982, 1987, 1990, 1995 at al are there because they will be sold to consumers who will drink them. Every other winery walk through shows old vintages as museum pieces. Not Scarpa. They live wine in the moment, irregardless of age, no matter the reason.

Andrea Roccione

My chaperone was none other than Valerio Bertolino of the Consorzio Barbera d’Asti e Vini del Monferrato and our hosts were Andrea Roccione, Gregorio Ferro and Riikka Sukula. The building that houses the cantina is 119 years of age with 1966 being the first year of current operative production, though there is a bottle of 1949 Barolo on site. Harvest lasts six to seven weeks, from Moscato d’Asti in late August through to Nebbiolo in mid-October. The total production is 100,000 bottles. In 2018 six further hectares were acquired which should increase production by 30,000 bottles. Most everything is macerated and fermented in steel with aging times anywhere from six months to a year. The exceptions are barbera and nebbiolo in La Bogliona, Barolo and Barbaresco. As for museum pieces, Il Filtro Sacci Olandese still hangs, a typical instrument for filtering moscato in the 1900s. The Dutch (sack) filter that looks like a set of inverted bagpipes ceased to be part of production in 1959.

Tasting, assessing and writing about Scarpa wines is exactly the kind of assignment that I believe sits at the antipodes of human understanding. I recently tasted with Andrea over three occasions: At the winery during this December visit, over lunch in Alba and at Grandi Langhe in January 2020. These are the notes on the 11 wines.

Scarpa Barbera d’Asti DOCG Casascarpa 2016, Piedmont, Italy (Approx. $22.00)

Taken from vineyards all from the Monferratto estate of 26 planted (on 50 hectares), mostly located in Asti Alessandria. The ideal amalgamation and from an ideal vintage, everything ripening in synch and all coming together in balance. The freshness comes at the three year mark and that can’t be argued. The acidity melting into high level fruit is ideal in a secular wine for the ages. Drink 2019-2026. Tasted December 2019

Scarpa Barbera d’Asti DOCG I Bricchi 2014, Piedmont, Italy (Approx. $50.00)

From the brownish clay of the single vineyard and the barbera that positions itself between the estate Casa Scarpa and the Bogliona single cru bottling. Challenging vintage with near ideal fruit and above the norm acidity. Dark fruit actually set against a sky of Asti lightning and barbera thunder. Aching for food with the highest impression of passion and feeling. Singular barbera of Asti designation and off of a very steep slope. Drink 2020-2029. Tasted December 2019

Scarpa La Selva Di Moirano 2013, Monferrato Freisa Secco DOC, Piedmont, Italy (Approx. $32.00)

Not the youngest but the best freisa currently on the market. A varietal of demanding tannin that settles after five years but won’t likely improve much further after that point. A dry and still version using a conceptual style fast fading from production. Scarpa is one of the keepers, even now from just 1.5 hectares planted. Sharp red berries and a clementine meets blood orange halfway citrus acidity. Another crazy useful gastronomic wine with a finish of zesty tonic. Drink 2020-2023. Tasted December 2019

Scarpa La Selva Di Moirano 2003, Monferrato Freisa Secco DOC, Piedmont, Italy

Freisa in dry form is not necessarily the norm and the vineyard was slightly larger than it is now (1.5 hectares) as a portion was over-grafted to barbera. This turns back the clock of freshness preservation and overturns the table so to speak and the culpability for speaking its mind to say “I can age.” This from a crazy hot vintage and if you need proof that wines from this territory can maintain acidity and freshness all you need to do is taste this 16 year-old freisa. Some dried fruit but so very notable for high tones, a salty streak and great persistence. Drink 2020-2023. Tasted December 2019

Scarpa Barbera d’Asti Superiore DOCG La Bogliona 2011, Piedmont, Italy (Approx. $80.00)

A powerful vintage widely considered as a great one and also from I Scarpese as such, from lighter, rich in magnesium sandy soils. How this translates is in a particular saltiness that compares to few others and there are many salty wines of this earth. Two years in large French cask and another two in bottle before being allowed out into the world, with ’13 being the current release. Not a Riserva so it is made in every vintage. A cru. An important and essential cru. Fruit of many ilk including dark berry, plum and cacchi. Fresh as the day it was conceived albeit with many developing complexities and more than a magnesium shake of intrigue. Grains of sand, tannin and time, all dropping slowly through the glass. Approximately 14,000 bottles are produced. Drink 2020-2032. Tasted December 2019

Scarpa Barbera d’Asti Superiore DOCG La Bogliona 1996, Piedmont, Italy (Approx. $80.00)

At 23 years you just have to launch yourself headfirst into the blood orange. That this piece of barbera wow factor happened before the year 2000 is the thing, especially because climate was very different. Rain fell often and slowly through the year, as opposed to the deluges of globally disaster-orchestrated today. Higher acidity simply speaking and this of the great lean, salty and direct-fitted pieces of barbera composure. Still fresh with dried fruits and low alcohol (at 13.0 per cent declared) but who knows which way the marketing directed labelling in those days? More than a lovely look back. Educational, instructional, cerebral and mind-bending from the lesser appreciated Piedmontese sector. Drink 2019-2024. Tasted December 2019

Scarpa Rouchet 2016, Monferrato Rosso DOC, Piedmont, Italy (Approx. $56.00)

Rouchet is made from ruché grapes but cultivated outside of the production zone and so the kitschy French spelling tells the wink-wink, nudge-nudge tale. Classic varietal expression, bright and rich, very floral aromatic and the steely version here is effusive, effective and expressive. Such a promising vintage for age ability. Drink 2021-2027. Tasted December 2019

Scarpa Rouchet 2007, Monferrato Rosso DOC, Piedmont, Italy

This elderly one reveals an old school ruché with more secondary notes then either barbera or freisa show at such a stage in their age. There is tar and earthiness, wet forest and real herbology; rosemary and lavender plus a graphite note. Like old cabernet sauvignon! The wood obviously does the talking but both acidity and tannin remain sharp, pointed and full of prescient tang. This one is sadly not for sale. Drink 2019-2021. Tasted December 2019

Scarpa Nebbiolo d’Alba DOC Bric Du Nota 2017, Piedmont, Italy

From two parts of a 2.5 hectare vineyard just outside of Monteu Roero, the highest wine-producing village in the Roero. A soil presence of fine-grained sand for an exacting expression of Roero nebbiolo. Launches with the typically traditional Scarpa design and the exceptionality is 36 months in large Slavonian cask for a later and mellower release than many. Quite formed and refined while constantly regenerating its energy in the glass. Fine tannic refrain and purpose. As goes Scarpa, in every incantation, in every wine. Drink 2021-2026. Tasted January 2020

Scarpa Barbaresco DOCG Tettineive 2016, Piedmont, Italy

Tettineive is “the rooftop of Neive,” a Piedmontese dialectical reference to a small collection of hills. Grapes come direct from the town. Here is the cool, silky smooth nebbiolo in Barbaresco clothing, transparent on the road to ethereal. There is indeed a crunchy feeling in this fruit circulating inside a tension filled housing. Very solid construct and highly recommended for a 10-15 year run. Drink 2021-2029. Tasted January 2020

Scarpa Barolo DOCG Tettimorra 2015, Piedmont, Italy (Approx. $52.00)

Fantasy name, not a vineyard, indicating La Morra and the top of that place. The grapes are purchased though as of ’18 there will be nebbiolo coming off of owned vineyards. Rich and heady nebbiolo with an earthly construct and high acidity. Tannins are very grippy, very firm and very in control. Three years in two types of wood, large Slavonian and smaller French cask, then one year in bottle. Such a baby. Approximately 4,500 bottles are produced. Drink 2022-2029. Tasted December 2019

Good to go!

godello

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WineAlign

Nineteen mind-blowing wines of 2019

Dec23

1964

Tout vient à son heure pour qui sait attendre, wrote Clément Marot, Renaissance poet. Everything comes at its appointed time. From Cahors to Turin. War, peace, hate, love, fruit, acid and tannin. Wine is all about the pauses and the balances. At its core the value is in that feeling of things being natural and equal. That’s the way it should be. When you drink you enjoy what you have, without competition. One sensation after another. You feel like you have more, even if you have less. Like consomée with just a chop of vegetables.

Welcome to Godello’s annual list of the most conspicuous, head-turning and psychotropic moments, better known as his 19 mind-blowing wines of 2019. Godello first initiated the concept for a year-end culminating evaluation in 2012 though did not actually coin the phrase until publishing his 14 mind-blowing wines of 2014. Call it the sixth or the eighth but who really cares because the wines are the crux and the heart of the matter.

Hard to know how many wines he actually tasted in 2019 but the best guesstimate would be 2,500 because that is how many reviews have been posted to WineAlign in this calendar year. A couple hundred were for wines tasted in 2018 but the editing and posting of at least that many for wines tasted in 2019 have yet to become permanent. So the number is pretty close, one way or another.

There were at least a few dozen stellar and jaw-dropping wines that should of, could of, would of made this list. For every one chosen another was left behind for no reason other than necessity and its relationship to the mother of invention. These images exhibited are but a few that had every reason to be one of 19’s 19.

Related – 16 mind-blowing wines of 2016

With thanks to everyone who poured a glass. The producers, winemakers, export managers, friends, colleagues and pirates, please be encouraged and read on. Godello’s 19 mind-blowing wines of 2019.

AB Wines Opçāo Avesso “A” Vinho Verde 2016, Portugal

From winemaker/oenologist António Sousa’s personal label (with partner Bernardo) and a vineyard planted in 2003, in Amarante. These are avesso grapes just a few years away from what António considers the optimum age, when they reach 18 years, 10 years older than the age from which they begin to deliver excellence. This A is in position A, from a perfect vantage point out of a very good vintage. This is the role model and exemplar for avesso, from a project that began in 2016, with all the adjunct components in line; lemon, lime, orange, ripe acidity, juicy nature and just a minor creamy, fleshy and boozy happiness. Great balance. Drink 2019-2025. Tasted October 2019

Marco Felluga Russiz Superiore Tocai Friulano Collio DOC 1997, Friuli, Italy

So remarkable, from the old messaging in the riesling/tocai bottle, stricken from the consorzio record. This is now a wine bottled in Bordeaux style but this look back 20-plus years shows freshness, spirit and only the beginnings of secondary character. Gassy and lemon intense, a near-perfect example of what was and could be, of how aged whites of Collio can keep freshness and the saltiness of place. All thjis and without crazy acidity. That is the conundrum and the magic of Collio. The persistence is romanticism incarnate with fruit oozing out of pores in great remain. Drink 2019-2021. Tasted May 2019

Goisot Gulhem Et Jean Hugues Gondonne 2017, Bourgogne Côtes D’auxerre AOC, Bourgogne, France

A soil of kimmeridgian and marl, of white and blue, with great layering of fruit and that is in fact what you feel from Gondonne. There is something rich and overtly expressive here and while it’s anything but simple it could be imagined that so many consumers would understand this chardonnay, love it and want to drink it with abandon. That said the structure, goût de terroir and joie de vivre are just exceptional. The wood and the land just melt right in. Drink 2020-2029. Tasted November 2019

Ken Forrester Old Vine Reserve Chenin Blanc 2007, WO Stellenbosch, South Africa

These Helderberg vines would have been 33 years of age at the time and to think the wine would have cost $10 or so. Now 12 years later we’re graced with this hyperbole of toast, smoulder, lit paraffin and the edge of saffron honey. It’s hard to believe and this the from the tier-two, non-selected grapes at the back of the line behind a Forrester wine like the FMC. Nothing less than incredible. Drink 2019-2021. Tasted October 2019

Ornellaia Bianco 2016, IGT Toscana Bianco, Tuscany, Italy

The Bianco was first introduced in 2013, following fast forward to the original 1980s and 1990s work with Poggio alle Gazze dell’Ornellaia. That project had been abandoned because says Axel Heinz “stylistically it just wasn’t right.” That wine was mainly sauvignon blanc on one of Ornellaia’s great vineyard sites. What was wanted was something more than a varietal wine and a new age of finding vineyard sites that were more than merely good for white wine. That means making use of northern slopes and those blocks favourable to whites, including the use of (indigenous) vermentino and viognier. The practice had already been proven with success by colleagues. Bianco is the alter ego to the Rosso, priced as such “and reflects the spirit of Ornellaia, but it had to build itself up to that premium level. We intend to make one of the great white wines of the world,” explains Heinz. That may sound like bragging swagger but the reality is that experience, acumen and especially confidence breed the truth. I Bianci are aged for 12-15 months in (30 per cent new) barriques before bottling. I do dare you to find a wine that smells anything like this Bianco. They are flowers unnamed or perhaps not yet discovered. The flinty reductiveness is also truly and wholly unique. Though the way sauvignon is raised and the place are surely not the same, the Bordeaux styling and sensibility of affinities are more than uncanny and even served by purpose. The vintage brings great maturity, fruitiness and salinity. Fruit presence under the spell of fleur de sel. Nothing but a brilliant combination. Says Heinz without equivocation, “it’s a benchmark for us, ’16 that is.” Drink 2020-2031. Tasted March 2019

Domaine Bouchard Père & Fils Chevalier Montrachet Grand Cru 2017, AOC Bourgogne, France

The couverture is all encompassing acting as a full sheathing tapestry in surround of a fruit core of sheer concentration and yet as a whole so understated. It’s hard to imagine more coaxing and less pronouncement. Relatively speaking there’s no estate equal to what has happened here. Great mineral crash into life and love, into fruit and impossible acidity. A magnificent chardonnay with 25 years of life ahead. Drink 2021-2039. Tasted September 2019

Adelsheim Pinot Noir Boulder Bluff 2015, Chehalem Mountains AVA, Oregon

From a steep, southwest facing site and picked really early, especially in the warm 2015 vintage. Again the confluence of vineyard conflagration of more than one soil type leads to an estate stylistic but let’s face it one that is bent into shape by focus and precision. There is great generosity and freshness, again in spite of or despite the hot vintage. More floral from this bluff and bigger, albeit finer quality signature tannin from this neighbourhood, with more thanks to basaltic blocks. Long ageing surely ahead with fruit turning to bramble, at times. Drink 2021-2028. Tasted April 2019

Tenute Bosco Etna Rosso DOC Vigna Vico Pre Phylloxera 2015, Sicily, Italy

The litheness of this nerello mascalese from Mount Etna off of 100-plus years of age pre-phylloxera vines cannot be over-stated or overstressed. The light, ethereal beauty of this wine may very well transport you to a place, to a vacuum within a bubble that is a hidden world inside a biodome. Few words are available when a wine speaks to you such as this Vico does to me at this time. This impossibility of such fruit concentration is also implausibly understated, as are the tannins and the acidity, yet all align and intertwine along a perfectly rendered line. You recognize the automatic brilliance, for the people and from the place. You just know it when you taste it. If you can find this wine, if you ever get the chance to purchase a bottle or two, you owe it to yourself to act, for you and for anyone you might happen to share it with. Drink 2019-2035. Tasted May 2019

Donnafugata Mille E Una Notte 1996, DOC Contessa Entellina, Sicily, Italy

An arch classic from Sicilia sud Occidentale and more specifically Tenuta Contessa Entellina. Of the oldest wines this is one of the highest tonality, not unlike older and older schooled nebbiolo from Barbaresco, in a queen’s throne sort of way. There is siply no way to argue that this wine did not deserve to be aged this way and to be waited on for such a moment of appreciation. Age worthy and load management indeed, with every resolution hoped for and expected. Brilliance and a benchmark, with a half decade of life still ahead. Drink 2019-2026. Tasted May 2019

Scarpa Barbera d’Asti DOC La Bogliona 1996, Piedmont, Italy

Maison Roche De Bellene Charmes Chambertin Grand Cru 2012, AOC Bourgogne, France

Do not adjust your set. The vintage brought everything to the table and while the foreground presents a picture crystalline and transparent the entirety of the frame is frozen clear. As for the aromatics this teases a meaty cure like few other and teases as if by the ambience of a cave, restricted of access, hiding what lurks, hangs and excites. Crunchy to say the least, layered to say more and complex to speak the ultimate truth. Magnifique and still twenty years away from the beginning of the end. Drink 2022-2037. Tasted September 2019

Domaine De La Pousse D’or Pommard Premier Cru Les Jarollières 1964, Appellation Pommard Controlée, Bourgogne, France

Calling this 55 year-old Bourgogne Premier Cru a piece of history is not enough to do justice because family, lineage and the passing of the generational torch beyond domaine lines are everything that matters. Nicolas Potel pulled this one out of thin air and not merely by a human ability to disappear and reappear. No, Nico chose the way of disapparating and then apparating (in the wizard sense of “apparition,” a magical form of teleportation). His father Gérard’s ’64 was in his hands and a great big, merde-eating grin was posted all across his face. Les Jarollières is a 1.44 ha plot of marl and calcaire and even today half of the plantings are those that were fitted in 1925 and 1962. It was Gérard Potel who resurrected Domaine de la Pousse d’Or to its glory and in 1964 he acquired the domaine through a marriage to the then owner’s niece. Along with Henri Boillot this cru has been famous being meaty, earthy and owning an ability for supernatural integration. This 1964 had taken all that, everything and more, left nothing in the vineyard and had now become the epitome of the ethereal. The fruit was fully intact, so bloody strawberry, still with lightning quick reflexes and able to pour fresh glasses of spirit and energy over the course of a full hour. The experience was a once in a lifetime type, a shared moment and the kind to create a banked memory that will always be generous when a good one is needed. Thank you Nico. Drink 2019-2024. Tasted December 2019

I Fabbri Chianti Classico DOCG 2000, Tuscany, Italy

At the time it was labeled as an (Annata) Chianti Classico though it was really Riserva. Yes it has evolved but 18-plus years should have moved it much further along. Carries a spice like the exoticism in resemblance to 2006 but this is something other. Still some very fine, present and notable acidity. Amazing purity, honesty, luck, circumstance, place and gentile personality. The sapidity is there again and the age ability nothing short of remarkable. Drink 2019-2021. Tasted February 2019

Volpaia Chianti Classico Gran Selezione DOCG Il Puro 2015, Tuscany, Italy ($150.00)

Il Puro takes her purity to another level in 2015 with fruit so silky fine and chalky tannins integrated into liquid even finer than that fine. The accumulation is just impressive and the charm meeting grace even more so than that. The Mascheroni-Stianti family has really found a stride in this GS to explain why it exists and how it can make many people happy. The structure here will take this through two or three decades of unfolding. There is a house record to prove it, ironically regardless and in spite of the bottle’s name. This is sangiovese. Drink 2023-2037. Tasted February 2019

Le Chiuse Brunello Di Montalcino Riserva DOCG Diecianni 2010, Tuscany, Italy

“A muscle vintage, of huge character,” tells Lorenzo Magnelli. The name of the wine is Diecianni to tell us that Lorenzo’s Riserva is not released until the 10th year. Brings about all the complexities that come from such an extended elévage. Tobacco, savour, forest floor, frutta di bosco and frutto secco but don’t be succumbing to depths and sottosuolo because the freshness persists. A wine so wise beyond its years, like its maker. Sure you can release a Riserva one year after Annata but when it has been protected and taken care of for you then it presents as it was intended to. We are thankful for the triage and the investment on our behalf. The fruit persists with great natural sweetness out of 2010. Drink 2019-2035. Tasted October 2019

Conti Costanti Brunello Di Montalcino DOCG Colle Al Matrichese 2015, Tuscany, Italy

Andrea Costanti is convinced this is a great vintage. “One of the best.” The weather was perfect following a beneficial cold winter. The harvest was early but not compromisingly so and it saw no hurdles, obstacles or intendments. The barrel use is bigger, older and wiser. This is the sort of concentrated Costanti that speaks to the 2019 philosophy, of acidity, ripeness and balance. Time on skins was about a month (including two weeks of fermentation and oxidation introducing délestage) and no protective sulphur. There is a control in this sangiovese, a powerful restraint but more than that, more so a calm, but not before storm. Finesse, grip and beauty, like a statue of a stag, in a courtyard, lit by moonlight. Tannins are all pervasive, fully stated, yet to feel a necessity for attack. They will and we will retreat, Then we will advance, with caution, further to find full pleasure for two decades. At the very minimum. Drink 2023-2039. Tasted February 2019

Le Ragnaie Brunello Di Montalcino DOCG Vigna Vecchia 2015, Tuscany, Italy ($177.00)

Planted in 1968 and from a warm vintage all the way to the end, into October. Riccardo Campinoti is smiling wryly, knowingly and confidently after he pours and begins to speak of it. “The longer you waited the riper it became” and the healthy grapes allowed for hanging to mid-October. Deeper and of more sponge-soaked earth in the old vines with a higher tone juxtaposed against the depth drawn by long vine roots. The aromatic complexities run, jump and ride off the proverbial charts and you may find yourself drunk and mystified just from the smells. Once you gain palate entry you are hooked and then you climb in, headfirst, unencumbered, no strings attached. A tour de force beloved of sangiovese, Montalcino and old vines. Vigna Vecchia is the epitome of a true structured wine, one which does not grow old, despite the passage of time. Drink 2023-2039. Tasted October 2019

Antiche Cantine Dei Marchesi Di Barolo 1990, Barolo Riserva, Piemonte, Italy

A grande dame or marchesa in the parlance of these woods, a nebbiolo of persistence, resilience and strength of character. Initiates contact with the past and a contract with tradition by way of the things that matter most. Family for one, roots dug into the earth second and the vineyard’s tongue, if it were able to speak. The overall gist in the parlance is heard and even understood although the dialect is hard to decipher if you are not of this place. This 1990 is found to be of high though level tempered energy and then with an ear, a nose and a soul so close to the earth. Smells like the soils amalgamated, preserved and demonstrated through the tempered liquor of a wise old 29 year-old nebbiolo. So much more than a piece of the past, this is an auguri gathering of storytelling, kin, culture and DNA. You must pay thanks for a chance to taste a thing such as this. Drink 2019-2033. Tasted December 2019

Gaja Sorì Tildìn 2016, Barbaresco DOP, Piemonte, Italy ($810.00)

Angelo Gaja sees 2016 as a perfect vintage in Barbaresco and the one from which climate change is viewed with great irony in the wink-wink guise of parenthetical thanks. That means the cosmic and astronomical alignment makes for wines that are both pleasant in their youth and also impossibly structured to age. Named for the sunny position of the slope and Mr. Gaja’s grandmother Clotilde. Now the clay and the calcaire have conspired, along with the purchased land of which Clotilde was custodian and in how she pushed her husband to make great wine. The vines are now on average 50 years-old and the composition meeting aspect bring a depth of complexity as poignant as it gets in this tiny part of nebbiolo production. All the flowers, rocks and elements are contained within the interior walls of this gently forceful Langhe red. It mimics the matriarch by the strongest power of suggestion and will not take no for an answer. Perhaps never will. Drink 2025-2045. Tasted December 2019

Good to go!

godello

1964

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WineAlign

You say you want a Barbera d’Asti revolution

Mar1

Vineyards in Santo Stefano Belbo

rev·o·lu·tion /ˌrevəˈlo͞oSH(ə)n/ noun

a dramatic and wide-reaching change in the way something works or is organized or in people’s ideas about it
an instance of revolving.

To make a revolution you have to bring about change. You need to evolve and revolve. You can’t just keep doing the same things over and over again. To take part in a revolution you have to keep an open mind and seek out the subtleties. You have to get down to what is really real. Revolution is not always fast or dramatic, in fact it’s sometimes barely audible, visible or easily noted in smell or taste. It is perceptible if you can find a way to feel it, especially when it comes down to wine.

Sometimes, there’s a grape, well, it’s the grape for the time and place. It fits right in there. That grape is barbera and the place is Asti, if more specifically in the Monferrato hills. Those hills are the source of the “Barbera Revolution” where farming and winemaking are changing the way we think about the wines of Barbera d’Asti and Monferrato. The revolution is happening now, in the late stages of the second decade of the 21st century because an epiphany is taking place. A new age of understanding, of altitude, solar radiation, heliophany and how to capture the essential tenets of phenolic ripeness and acidity. Knowledge and understanding are zeroing in on growing areas, plant phytochemisry and the sensorial characteristics of Barbera d’Asti.

Acidity is the key to barbera, just as it is with grapes of a similar ilk, grapes like sangiovese and malbec. If you would like to capture the essence of these grape varieties you have to preserve and elevate their natural acidities and you have to do so with a supporting cast of freshness, ripeness and structure. This is the crux of the new revolution in Asti. Never before have we seen farming practices and a scaling back of oak aging getting together to make sure that the grape, that barbera is given the spotlight to be the centre of attention.

Masterclass “Barbera Revolution” guided by Kerin O’Keefe and President Filippo Mobrici, Consorzio Tutela Barbera d’Asti e Vini del Monferrato.

Barbera d’Asti 2.0 is a scientific study that began in 2017, iniated by the Conzorzio Barbera d’Asti e Vini del Monferrato in partnership with the Università di Torino – Disafa and supported by the Regione Piemonte. The goal of the project is to create a sensory map of the Barbera d’Asti DOCG appellation. To define the 5300 hectares of the appellation across 67 municipalities in the provinces of Asti and Alessandria. To connect the characteristics of Barbera d’Asti with the varied geological and climatic conditions of the growing areas. The research involves measuring, quantifying and qualifying precipitation, thermal excursion, soil structures, pH, phenolics, sugar and acidity. Micro-harvests and micro-vinifications have been conducted, 111 samples of DOCG wines have been collected, tested and evaluated by enologists and researchers from the University. In the end a sensory map has been created.

Well, you know
You better free you mind instead

In July of 2017 I spent a week in the hills where Barbera d’Asti grows. I returned in December of 2018 and spent another eye-opening and mind-blowing stretch of time in the varietal home. My attitude has officially evolved, changed and revolved, now resting in affirmation of consideration, to emerge with revolution firmly entrenched, personal and up close to me, of sound body and mind. It was in Canelli at Gancia Castle, at Enoteca Regionale Acqui “Terme e Vino” and Ristorante Nuovo Paradiso in Acqui Terme, at Castello di Costigliole d’Asti and the Italian Culinary Institute for Foreigners in Costigiole d’Asti, at Relais San Maurizio in Santo Stefano Belbo and finally, at Foro Boario di Nizza Monferrato, for the Masterclass “Barbera Revolution” guided by Kerin O’Keefe and organized by Consorzio Tutela Barbera d’Asti e Vini del Monferrato.

The following are 33 examples of barbera d’asti tasted at these events in Piemonte back in December 2018.

Araldica Castelvero Barbera d’Asti Superiore DOCG Rive 2016, Piedmont, Italy (Winery, WineAlign)

Acqui Terme is the source for a darker, slightly brooding and richly, almost chocolate endowed barbera. Acidity is clearly still in charge and there are more grains, chains and presently grisly tannins keeping fruit in check. Will age well but time is needed before the begin. Drink 2021-2026. Tasted December 2018 araldicavini @araldicavini Araldica Castelvero

Family Winery Berta Paolo 1842 Barbera d’Asti DOCG Belmon 2017, Piedmont, Italy (Winery, WineAlign)

The vintage will not always deliver what you expect so never get too complacent with barbera and always pay attention. Paolo Berta turns the plan on its head and brings freshness in the face of jammy potential in a lovely act of balance. Fruit picked on acidity while perfectly positioned at sugar plus phenolic ripeness means this got it all right. It’s a connection between forethought and development that hits the proverbial barbera nail on the head. Never-ending acidity is the fairy tale and the reason for the story. Drink 2018-2022. Tasted December 2018 vinifamigliaberta @wineBerta @viniberta

Family Winery Berta Paolo 1842 Barbera d’Asti Superiore DOCG 175 Vendmmie 2016, Piedmont, Italy (Winery, WineAlign)

In classic Berta Paolo form there is a protective and reductive element plus untapped potential in a barbera from Nizza Monferrato that wraps itself up in layers upon layers of red fruit, white soil and blanketing richness. The terroir is truly all over this wine, in and out of every oozing red fruit pore. It’s complex in so many ways and in time will only improve its interest. Drink 2020-2025. Tasted December 2018

Bersano Barbera d’Asti DOCG Cremosina 2016, Piedmont, Italy (Agent, WineAlign)

“Cremisona is our history. We believe in this kind of barbera, not just about quality, because that is not enough these days. It must be recognized as barbera.” White pepper, red cherry and so young. Really peppery, tart, tight, taut and so very, very Nizza Monferrato. Place, pace, place. Drink 2020-2026. Tasted December 2018 bersano1907 profilewinegroup @BERSANO1907 @ProfileWineGrp @Bersanowine Profile Wine Group

Tenuta Bricco San Gregorio Di Laiolo Barbera d’Asti Superiore DOCG Rossomora, Piedmont, Italy (Winery, WineAlign)

Vinchio’s soil can only mean high toned, high alcohol, Amarone like grip and power. The fruit is up to the task and though we accept this as Vinchio, RossoMora and Barbera d’Asti it pulls no punches nor shies away from advanced solicitation. Screams at you and at the same time asks you to call for time. Huge wine and needing a little humility in the name of balance. Drink 2019-2021. Tasted December 2018 tenutabriccosangiorgio Tenuta Bricco San Giorgio

Cascina Castlet Barbera d’Asti Superiore DOCG Passum 2016, Piedmont, Italy (Winery, WineAlign)

Costigiole d’Asti is the source for a barbera that stands like a stick in the thick consistency of the varietal stew, with lightning bolts of acidity followed by grippy shudders of structured thunder. Such a big wine of larger than life personality with white peppery piques and properly spiced, mild dark chocolate bitterness. Will age without trepidation or any true concern. Drink 2021-2029. Tasted December 2018 cascinacastlet @cascinacastlet Cascina Castlèt

Coppo Barbera d’Asti DOCG L’Avvocata 2014, Piedmont, Italy (Agent, $19.95, WineAlign)

Luigi Coppo’s L’Avvocata is his fresh, come and drink me first red, clearly meant for the here and now. Dedicated to the original owner of this recently purchased vineyard, described as a tough woman, known to all as “the lawyer.” It’s quite floral and shows beautiful acidity. Effusive and rising, this is barbera as part of the shift to recognize quality at the entry level. Successful in that regard in spite of or perhaps as a result of the warmth and concentration. Drink 2018-2019. Tasted December 2018 coppo1892 maitredechai_ca @COPPO1892 @maitredechai @COPPO1892 Le Maître de Chai

Luigi Coppo and Pomorosso

Coppo Barbera d’Asti Nizza DOCG Pomorosso 2014, Piedmont, Italy (Agent, $74.95, WineAlign)

If ever a vintage were going to give the Coppo Pomorosso a most sincere gift of its terroir than 2016 would be the one. In fact Luigi Coppo says uncle Roberto compares it to 1990 and he confirms the connection, if only by way of lab tests and results. The real reason is out there, in three vineyards located in Agliano Terme. “The balance was in place, even before we picked the grapes,” tells Coppo. This Pomorosso speaks young but is of course so very structured and only produced in exceptional vintages. The soil is marine sediment rich in minerals and the name is for the red apple tree on top of the hill. It’s an icon red by nature and design, with 2016 top finesse and the key to barbera’s ability of longevity. Drink 2019-2027. Tasted December 2018

Coppo Barbera d’Asti DOCG Camp du Rouss 2016, Piedmont, Italy (Agent, $25.95, WineAlign)

Luigi Coppo’s barbera is a calcareous Castelnuovo Calcea striker with clay richness and spice brought on by some time in barrel. It’s deeply rendered into a well that pools with cherry liqueur and melted liquorice. Needs some time for the parts to mingle, match and melt into one another. A highly polished wine with plenty of possibility. Drink 2020-2026. Tasted December 2018

Franco Roero Barbera d’Asti Superiore DOCG Sichei 2016, Piedmont, Italy (Agent, WineAlign)

Just a huge barbera out of Montegrosso d’Asti, with acidity and grip, through the roof and got a hold on you. Volatility is certainly at the top edge of the straddled ridge but neither extraction nor concentration dip into and up over the top. It’s a matter of making what place and vintage demand, with swagger, confidence and direct messaging. Truly white limestone screaming which incidentally keeps the concentration in check. Drink 2021-2028. Tasted December 2018 franco_roero_winery cottonwoodwineagency @FrancoRoeroVini @Cottonwood_ @franco.roero Cottonwood Agency Wines & Spirits

Az. Agr. Garrone Evasio & Figlio Barbera d’Asti DOCG 2016, Piedmont, Italy (Winery, WineAlign)

A different sort of deeper clay, moisture retentive for red cherry generosity and because there is a sidle into strawberry but of the drying, concentrated one. It’s a Montemagno matter, picked later and macerated to a greater degree though really fine acidity keeps it very much alive. Drink 2019-2020. Tasted December 2018 #garroneevasioefiglio @vinigarrone

Davide Ghiga

Azienda Agricola Ghiga Enrico Barbera d’Asti DOCG 2016, Piedmont, Italy (Winery, WineAlign)

Young Davide Ghiga’s barbera is the azienda’s normale but it’s certainly a child of selezione. Bright, fresh and tenably intense. Solid would be a good descriptor for the honesty and varietal morality exhibited by this stand up barbera. The fruit is dark in a black cherry way but it’s clearly a matter of Costigliole d’Asti terroir more than winemaking. The high tones confirm this assessment and the way in which the wine is 100 per cent a matter of fruit. So much fruit. Drink 2018-2021. Tasted December 2018 ghigaaziendaagricola #AziendaGhiga Davide Ghiga Azienda Agricola Ghiga Fratelli

Azienda Agricola Ghiga Enrico Barbera d’Asti Superiore DOCG 2016, Piedmont, Italy (Winery, WineAlign)

The Ghiga brothers’ Superiore from Costigiole d’Asti takes the sweetness of dark and hematic fruit, gives it time in new grandi botti then sees it emerge with loads of chocolate and hyper intensity. Young is an understatement and time the declaration for development ahead of a deeper understanding. The vineyard is 22 years-old at this stage and the upside for terroir and winemaking reeks of potential. You just feel the earliest of beginnings involving a special relationship between viticulture and viniculture so we’re “gonna see what them racket boys can do.” This ’16 and coming vintages will likely turn out to be classics someday. So “put your makeup on, fix your hair up pretty and meet me tonight in Atlantic City.” Ghiga, a.k.a. The Boss of barbera, based in Castiglione Tinella-Cuneo. Drink 2019-2025. Tasted December 2018

Gianni Doglia Barbera d’Asti Superiore DOCG Genio 2016, Piedmont, Italy (Winery, WineAlign)

Genio is Piemontese for Gianni’s grandfather “Eugenio” and these ’16 startling aromatics are like genies escaping from the bottle. Some extra altitude up to 350m in Castagnole Lanze brings an expression of solar radiated, polyphenolic aromatics that set this bold and structured barbera apart. There is a presence and a personality of energy despite the weight and the bold attack. It’s really juicy, fresh, high in acidity and just plain exciting. Drink 2021-2029. Tasted December 2018 gianni_doglia_wines Gianni Doglia Azienda vitivinicola Gianni Doglia Paola Doglia

Gianni Doglia Barbera d’Asti Superiore Nizza DOCG Viti Vecchie 2016, Piedmont, Italy (Winery, WineAlign)

Doglia’s old vines are an average of 50 years for barbera from Nizza Monferrato that travels the emotional gamut from freshness through structure and into softness. Gianni’s reminds me of 90s St. Émilion and 2000s Napa merlot but with barbera’s lightning acidity. If it is possible for a red to offer a big hug while scratching your back then this would be the one. The soils may be different than Castagnole Lanze but the treatment in the cellar is virtually the same, with small barrels and 30 per cent new. Twenty-five kilometres separate the Nizza from the Genio and here you get more texture and dark, rich chocolate. Also mint, a salty vein and very ripe cherries. Drink 2019-2023. Tasted December 2018

Gozzelino Barbera d’Asti Superiore DOCG Ciabot d’la Mandorla 2015, Piedmont, Italy (Winery, WineAlign)

This traditional barbera is a well-pressed one from Costigliole d’Asti and spent 24 months in large (30hL) format grandi botti. Very rich, lots of chocolate, some shots of tonic and high acidity intensity. Drink 2019-2022. Tasted December 2018 Azienda Agricola Gozzelino Sergio

Tenuta Il Falchetto Barbera d’Asti Superiore DOCG Bricco Paradiso 2016, Piedmont, Italy (Winery, WineAlign)

A really rich, fully fruit realized, intensely tangy, plum meets currants and pomegranate barbera with density, structure and purpose. The numbers are big and the personality boisterous but there is more than enough fruit to keep the booze and the bones from dominating. Pretty good vitality and energy within the big framework. Drink 2021-2028. Tasted December 2018 tenutailfalchetto @ilfalchettovini @tenutailfalchetto

With Andrea Ivaldi

Azienda Agricola Ivaldi Dario Barbera d’Asti Superiore Nizza DOCG “1613” 2015, Piedmont, Italy (Agent, $31.78, WineAlign)

From Andrea Ivaldi comes the next and generous vintage of Nizza barbera, with an initial waft of intensity on the nose that speaks with volatility, then blows off with just a minute or two of swirl. The calcaire speaks next with lightning quickness while the black cherry spiked by anise fruit hurries to keep pace. There is great peppery presence and a keen sense of place in this Nizza, rich and fluid, ripe and full of classic barbera acidity. Understated chic and real class come forth, take a bow of humility, turn around and go back to work. Tasted again the next day and the day after that it only revealed further complexities. Drink 2019-2024. Tasted May and December 2018 andrea.ivaldi devonmasciangelo @ivaldidario @vinidelmonferrato Devon Masciangelo

You say you wanna @barberadasti revolution? Well you know, a Masterclass with 19 examples led by @kerinokeefe is a fine place to begin ~ #barberarevolution

La Caudrina Barbera d’Asti DOCG La Solista 2016, Piedmont, Italy (Winery, WineAlign)

From Nizza Monferrato Caudrina’s is blessed of the kind of sweet fruit barbera is so capable of delivering. It’s a white lightning example though off of sandy soils but it’s so transparent, lightly tonal in high spoken voice and just bloody beautiful. Drink 2019-2021. Tasted December 2018 #lacaudrina @LaCaudrina

Manfredi Barbera d’Asti DOCG 2015, Piedmont, Italy (Winery, WineAlign )

The confidence oozes from this barbera and it goes to show that the delayed release is truly a matter of planning ahead rather than some sort of reactive response. Three vineyards make up the concerted assemblage and while the levels of Brett and volatility are up there with the funkier barbera they are well beneath the threshold. In that sense this is a wine of stylistic choice more than flawed or not flawed. It’s up to you to decide if the leathery cherry earthiness is up your alley but regardless the juicy nature and exquisite acidity ride up and down everyone’s preferred slope. A very expressive wine this is and if you are a fan of post-funk beats than you will find this very special. Drink 2018-2023. Tasted December 2018 manfredicantine Manfredi Cantine

Marchesi Alfieri Barbera d’Asti Superiore DOCG Alfiera 2016, Piedmont, Italy (Winery, WineAlign)

San Martino Alfieri is a calcareous limestone and clay terroir, not unusual for the territory but here there is a combination of juicy, generous fruit in a darker realm though still moderate in grip and power. This certainly takes barbera to another level and though it initiates the idea of strength it’s really quite balanced and potentially, holding cards to become magically ethereal. Just a touch overripe but really beautiful for the short to mid term. Drink 2019-2022. Tasted December 2018 marchesialfieri univinsetspiritueux #marchesialfieri @UNIVINS Marchesi Alfieri – Cantine e Locanda Univins et Spiritueux / Univins & Spirits

Marenco Barbera d’Asti Superiore DOCG Ciresa 2016, Piedmont, Italy (Winery, WineAlign)

The moscato d’asti specialist out of Strevi makes a plum meets sharply tangy cherry (Ciresa) barbera with high acidity and a liquid chalky texture. It’s different, harder to pinpoint and to get. It needs time, now, in the glass, and for a few years to understand its nuance and speciality. Must be Strevi. Drink 2020-2025. Tasted December 2018 marencovini @MARENCOVINI Marenco

Michele Chiarlo Barbera d’Asti DOCG Le Orme 2016, Piedmont, Italy (265413, $15.95, WineAlign)

The three terroir gathering is by now a barbera institution, from fruit gathered out of Castelnuovo Calcea, Montaldo Scarampi and Agliano Terme. As expected it is 2016 that becomes tbe perfect playground for an archetypal barbera made by Michele and Stefano Chiarlo. The acids are spot on in this ubiquitous bd’a, with fruit at the sparked cherry forefront as well as any in the category. Try to find better value at the price. Really, go ahead and try. Drink 2018-2022. Tasted December 2018 michelechiarlo univinscanada @michelechiarlo @UNIVINS Michele Chiarlo @UnivinsCanada

Tenuta Olim Bauda Barbera d’Asti Superiore DOCG Le Rocchette 2016, Piedmont, Italy (434258, $32.95, WineAlign)

Though Gianni Bertolino’s is a high octane, high alcohol and high tonal Incisa Scapaccino barbera the balance here is virtually spot on, with acidity and tannin sending shots of structure like steel straws through sand, clay, limestone and concrete. So young, lightning quick and needing a pause for several years to gain flesh, texture and fruit pulp succulence. This will act just like a dried persimmon/plum/cherry fruit leather in five plus years time. Poured from magnum so do the age waiting game math. Drink 2021-2029. Tasted December 2018 tenuta_olimbauda hobbsandcompany @tenutaolimbauda @hobbsandco @tenutaolimbauda.it hobbsandcompany

Tenuta Olim Bauda Barbera d’Asti Superiore DOCG Le Rocchette 2011, Piedmont, Italy (434258, $32.95, WineAlign)

Tasting this with Gianni Bertolino he notes how ’11 is really a bridge year, between the classic ’10 and the massive ’12. At seven years on the evolution is on and the revolution begun. It has brought barbera to a new place, still possessive of high phenolics and higher acidity though with the sweetly rendered resolution of ripe red fruit. Though it seems less characteristic of the big and the brooding barbera there is firm grip in its stance. Now beginning to shed its second skin so ready and willing to reveal its honest and forthcoming nature. The probability meeting possibility is now found, not vice versa and so welcome to the best of its times. Drink 2018-2022. Tasted December 2018

Tenuta Olim Bauda Barbera d’Asti Superiore Nizza DOCG 2015, Piedmont, Italy (Winery, WineAlign)

Gianni Bertolino’s Nizza ’15 is barbera at a precise axis where fruit and acidity work, meet, mix and play. They may at first get into an old time Monferrato tussle and a big time Piemontese hassle but get on the same page before too long. In fact with thanks to a generous and amenable 2015 vintage they find a quick and easy way to kiss, make-up and shake hands. On the edge of sour the message gets through, from fruit so sweet and acidity so fine. Ripeness tangles with tangy and soil drive pushes the structure too. Perfectly representative of territory, man and place. Drink 2019-2023. Tasted December 2018

Pico Maccario Barbera d’Asti Superiore DOCG Epico 2016, Piedmont, Italy (Agent, WineAlign)

Plum pudding, chocolate caramel and baking spice are the barrique-influenced order in the very ripe Mombaruzzo 2016 Epico. It’s very generous, tenebrous and deep into its clay soil origins. High acids keep up the energy. Drink 2019-2021. Tasted December 2018 picomaccario @PicoMaccario @PicoMaccario

Ricossa Antica Barbera d’Asti DOCG 2016, Piedmont, Italy (Winery, WineAlign)

From calcareous Nizza Monferrato – Agliano Terme soils, vinified in stainless steel only. The naked grape, cherries upon cherries and more cherries. Simplicity with no approach to any sort of crossroads where any great decisions or soul selling are required. Juicy and forward. Drink 2019-2021. Tasted December 2018 ricossawine selectwinemoments @ricossawine @SelectWinePros Ricossa Wine Select Wines

Scarpa Barbera d’Asti DOCG Casa Scarpa 2015, Piedmont, Italy (Winery, WineAlign)

From Nizza Monferrato vineyards where Poderi Bricchi is elevated to heights between 410 and 480 meters. The youngest fruit is pulled from lower elevations (250m) for Casa Scarpa, the freshest of the estate’s barbera that sees a minimum one year in stainless steel only, followed by another in bottle before release. It’s a magnesium salty barbera, bright, tart, striking and blessed with great acidity. In your face striking, real and immediately promising. Drink 2018-2021. Tasted December 2018 scarpawine @Scarpawines Scarpa Wine

Scarpa Barbera d’Asti DOCG La Bogliona 2010, Piedmont, Italy (Winery, WineAlign)

From the eestate with one foot in the Monferrato Astigiano and the other in the Monferrato Alessandrino, the fruit for La Bogliona is drawn from one of two estate cru, which along with Poderi Bricchi are the reason Scarpa exists. This 2010 has certainly advanced and is a formidable if severe combination of secondary fruit character and exceptional acidity. The maceration time was 14-16 days, followed by 30-36 months in 15 hL grandi botti of various French ages and origins. Silky pure with a note like shoe polish on leather, variegated of high quality red fruit. So alive but also so lived. Impressive and instinctive you can only imagine the things it’s been and seen. Drink 2018-2024. Tasted December 2018

Cantina Terre Artisane Barbera d’Asti DOCG Anno Domini 2016, Piedmont, Italy (Winery, WineAlign)

From Mombercelli this small production barbera is of the old school’s high acid-driven way, with tonality shooting through the roof and to the stars. It’s ripe and light, effulgent and finishing on a note of bitters. Drink 2019-2020. Tasted December 2018 cantinaterreastesane Cantina Terre Astesane Mombercelli

Tojo Barbera d’Asti DOCG Delianna 2016, Piedmont, Italy (Winery, WineAlign)

DeliAnna exhibits more concentration, phenolics and glycerin than so many barbera, probably because the yields are one grappolo per vine, in other words, after the greening one bunch is left to mature and produce highest quality fruit. The noted sense of accomplishment is palpable, felt through the purple flower-scented and sweet red berry fruit. The chiming in of fine acidity elevates and oak is but a dream undreamt. If there is any it’s hidden with 100 per cent deception. Here folks is 21st century barbera d’asti. Drink 2019-2025. Tasted December 2018 tojo_vino Tojo Azienda Agricola Bocchino Vittorio

Viticoltori Associati Vinchio e Vaglio Serra Barbera d’Asti DOCG Vigne Vecchie 50 2016, Piedmont, Italy (Winery, WineAlign)

From white calcaire and sandy soils these Nizza Monferrato – Agliano Terme old vines bring depth and some acid-tannin structure not noted in the more straightforward, juicy and high acid examples. The vine age seems to tame the acids and fruit is concentrated, expressed and up front. Really long and perfectly wise, even developed for the first few years of drinking. One of the worlds wonderful cooperatives with an eye to pinpointing grape and place. Drink 2019-2022. Tasted December 2018 vinchiovaglioserra @vinchiovaglio @VinchioVaglioSerra

Good to go!

godello

Vineyards in Santo Stefano Belbo

Twitter: @mgodello

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WineAlign

Seventeen mind-blowing wines of 2017

Dec18

No, wines do not have to be old to blow your mind but there is just something so mysterious, magical and hypnotizing about the experience of age in preservation. When we use the cliché “tasting history” it distracts from what is most poignant about tasting older wines. It’s the humbling and how wisdom, acumen and meteorological circumstance conspire to take us away from our troubles, to forget about life for a while and to realize that forces greater than us are truly in charge.

There are also young wines so precocious and wise beyond their years that they somehow intuit the future. These too can blow our minds, addle us as if lovestruck and disoriented so that only this confluence of smell, taste, texture and structure are what we know. It takes all kinds to populate a list that separates greatness from the rest, but that does not means only 17 wines were tasted to be extraordinary in 2017. It means that some struck a vein while others grazed on the skin. Most important is that all were experienced because someone chose to share them. Thank you to the producers and the benefactors for bringing these bottles to light.

Related – 16 mind-blowing wines of 2016

Honourable Mentions

Château Haut-Brion 1986, Saffredi 2004, Brokenwood Sémillon 2007, Domaine Gros Frères Clos Voguent Musigni 2013, M. Lapierre Morgon 2010, Domaine G. Roumier Bonnes-Mares Grand Cru 1996, Domaine Jamet Côte-Rôtie 2006, Coppo Barbera d’Asti Nizza Riserva della Famiglia 2009, Le Fraghe Bardolino 2015, Sordo Barolo Riserva Gabutti 2006, Carobbio Chianti Classico 1990, J & J Eger Kékfrankos 2006, Château Léoville Las Cases 2001, François Cotat Chavignol Sancerre Rosé 2009, Domaine La Vieux Télégraphe Châteauneuf du Pâpe La Crau 2005, D’Arie Syrah 2012, Julia Bertram Handwerk Spätburgunder 2015, Planeta Carricante Eruzione 1614 2015, Dominus 1994, Château Lafite Rothschild 1998 and Esmonin Gevrey-Chambertin Clos Saint-Jacques 1993.

Several times a years I gather with groups of like-minded, wine-spirited folks, to break bread and to pop established icons, singular archetypes, varietal rarities and supernumerary misfits. Many of the wines on this 2017 list are a result of having been fortunate enough to be included in repeated repasts with pirates on picnics and doctors at dinner. Most of the rest are travel related, in fact this year alone I tasted approximately 700 sangiovese, 200 barbera, 200 corvina and 100 nebbiolo. So many more of those praiseworthy reds and rosés deserved spots on this docket but alas, the list is short. I do not fulminate them, nor you neither. Here are Godello’s 17 mind-blowing wines of 2017.

It began like this and I got 15 dollars hid above the stove.

Möet & Chandon Dom Pérignon Vintage Brut Champagne 1990, Champagne, France (280461, Agent, WineAlign)

Tasted blind the hue immediately leads the mind in one of two directions; hot vintage or decades of age. I’m tempted to consider a combination of the two, so the decision is warm vintage and a minimum of twenty years age. Further introspection takes me back to 1990 and when the reveal confirms this and in the abide of Dom Pérignon it means one thing. Start the process of thinking again. This wine has done its work, having accumulated a diverse set of developmental traits and processed them so that the language it now speaks is clear and pure. At 27 years of age it’s delicate, smooth, soft-spoken and settled. The finest golden toast (again in hue and more importantly in aroma) glows into the creamy texture, like preserved lemon transformed into gelid curd. The mouthfeel is exceptional with baking bread rising, puffy and satiny glazed across the palate. The seamlessness of this Champagne seeks, solicits and makes rendezvous with no peer or challenger its equivalent, not should any comparison be made. Kudos to a wine that stands on its own and makes you feel this good. It will continue to do so up to and perhaps beyond its 40th birthday. Drink 2017-2030. Tasted March 2017 moetchandon @chartonhobbs @MoetUSA @ChartonHobbs @Champagne Moët & Chandon Charton Hobbs Canada Champagne

Famille Picard Saint Aubin Premier Cru Le Charmois 2014, AOC Bourgogne (522078, $57.95, WineAlign)

This is a chardonnay to place the village of Saint Aubin in a remarkable light if only because it’s the most stony, flinty and tightly wound example just about ever. The Charmois is the elevator that carries the appellation into a purity of climat for Bourgogne Premier Cru. In this case terroir delivers the idea of Climat but it is the interaction of the maker that defines the notion simply because there is no mess and no fuss. It just feels like drinking straight from a bleed of the calcareous land, as might happen in a limestone goblet filled with Montrachet. You have no idea how good a deal this is from the most excellent 2014 vintage. Drink 2019-2028. Tasted October 2017 domainesfamillepicard profilewinegroup #bourgognewines #FamillePicard @ProfileWineGrp @BourgogneWines Domaines Famille Picard Profile Wine Group Bourgogne Wines

Domaine Bouchard Père & Fils Chevalier Montrachet Grand Cru 2015, AOC Bourgogne (Agent, $480.00 WineAlign)

Chevalier-Montrachet is a matter of aromatics, of the finest of the finest, preserved, reserved, impressionable and of quietly powerful impression. The deistic and the parrhesiastic are reached in this Grand Cru, “one who speaks the truth to power.” Elysium in chardonnay is captured for the perfectly ripe orchard and crushed stones. The young palate is almost severe but takes its first steps down the most ethereal path, with the finest drawn lines and rendered streaks of energy lit, sparked and smouldering. This is Bourgogne of intrinsic value, slowly rising to a crescendo where a flame flickers but within the sheltered lamp of a hurricane. How is such harnessed power even possible? Only like this, in Chevalier-Montrachet . Drink 2021-2037. Tasted April 2017 bouchardpereetfils woodmanws vinsdebourgogne @BouchardPere @WoodmanWS @VinsdeBourgogne Bouchard Père & Fils Woodman Wines & Spirits Vins de Bourgogne / Burgundy wines

Domaine Sigalas Kavalieros 2015, Santorini, Greece (SAQ 11814421, WineAlign)

I’ve not yet tasted the Kavalieros 2014, so this single-vineyard, 18 months on lees done in stainless steel Kavalieros 2015 made by “Mr. George” is the benchmark for Santorini, assrytiko and salty white wines everywhere. The first release was 2009. Straight up and turning the world on its head, like the old man on the label and upside down against Apollo’s Aegean Cyclades. This ’15 richer still, more than the seven villages wines and a hyperbole as compared to the entry-level assyrtiko, of deeper mineral, compressed, layered and fantastic. Crushed rocks permeate in aggregate, it’s quixotically saline and textured, of intense presence and finally, structured. For 15 years at least. A late shot of natural Santorini tonic swirls in centrifuge with assyrtiko so wound up. This will need 10 years to unwind and allow for cracks to form in the mineral shell, followed by the birth of its fruit. It should never be forgotten that assyrtiko can and will show fruit but with Kavalieros you’ll have to be patient. Drink 2020-2031. Tasted March 2017 @DomaineSigalas @MajesticWineInc winesofgreece domainesigalas @MajesticWineInc @DrinkGreekWine @DomaineSigalas Panayiota Kalogeropoulou Wines of Greece

Penfolds Grange 2011, South Australia (356121, $750.00, WineAlign)

There is just something about cool, rainy and irreconcilably regarded vintages that brings out the best in wines made by winemakers of elite acumen. Deliver your best from the greatest of harvests but also “give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free. The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.” Leave the middle of the road to someone else. This Grange faced adversity and won. The yields and output may only be 50 per cent of normal but what gives is the silky texture of Grand Cru Bourgogne. This chosen one of singular vision to represent the multi-tiered and faceted Penfolds Estate tells us about the world inhabited by the instinctual and the ethereal. It combines tannin, structure and aesthetic deeply engrossed in the shadow of its own looming destruction, but is designed from the first with an eye to its later existence as a ruin, forever preserved. If a perfect plum and a magical olive were crossed they would welcome this collective spice of no equal. The quality of bite and chew lead to rumination and the savour rests on a chart clearly defined but in high contrast and only to itself. An analgeisc meets hypnotic cooling is mentholated though if not specific in origin it is only and highly natural. Legendary vintage? Why not. This calm, cool and collected 2011 may just outlast some of the more recently considered top vintages of ’06, ’08 and ’10. Drink 2019-2035. Tasted May 2017 penfolds markanthonyon wineaustralia @penfolds @MarkAnthonyWine @Wine_Australia Penfolds @MarkAnthonyWine Wine Australia

A deep #eredichiappone vertical delve with Daniele for perspective and a release of endorphins @ilNizza possibilities #progrettovini #collisionimonferrato

Erede Di Chiappone Armando Barbera D’asti Superiore Nizza DOC RU 2006, Piedmont, Italy (WineAlign)

RU by Daniele Chiappone is this, at first something altogether inexplicable but when tasted alongside his 2005, 2010 and 2011 it makes such perfect sense. Sense in where this fits in his evolution and to speak on behalf of the age-worthy ability of Nizza barbera. In a world where barbera perfume so often performs with perfunctory brevity this goes on and on. It is a unique combination of fennel frond, incense, hibiscus and violet to create an intoxicant and an anaesthetic. Yet another exceptional vintage is revealed, traditional and so alive, spun from earth crusting over cherry and then this smooth leather. The portal backwards 10 years allows for looks forward 10 more, especially into what’s coming from 2015 and 2016. To say the match with a prodigiously spiced in aromatic ragu over linguine was agreeable would be the understatement of the Monferrato century. Perfectly timed acidity seals the deal. This is barbera folks, of wit, age and history. Drink 2017-2021. Tasted July 2017 erededi ilnizza @erededi @ilNizza Erede Di Chiappone Armando IlNizza

Robert Mondavi Reserve Cabernet Sauvignon To Kalon Vineyard 1999, Napa Valley, California (WineAlign)

This from a time when Mondavi labeled the reserve cabernet sauvignon as “To Kalon Vineyard,” a moniker of essential meaning that would return 14 years later on the 2013 bottle. If this were what Mark de Vere referred to as “a confusing moment in history” I could not say but “this strange bottling” provided an unequivocal and seminal turning point in this wine’s storied past, present and future. It was in fact a small, special cuvée, a little bit different than the ’99 Reserve. “The coolest vintage on record, until it wasn’t,” because of a warm period at the end of summer and early fall that ushered forth a certain, singular sort of ripeness. Regardless of memories, characterizations and twists of fate, this single-vineyard cabernet is as finessed, focused and precise as any Mondavi Reserve. It persists chalky, fine and gritty in tannin running amok, dragging the acidity forward and around. The workout is something to behold, a dispatch of late Napa fashion and never more successful than right here. The dépêche mode of To Kalon is by now famous but culminated with this ’99 for everything to follow, with consistency and a guarantee of modern quality. Listen to it croon “try walking in my shoes.” Many have and many continue to pay homage to this Napa Valley originator and pioneer. It’s a cabernet sauvignon of faith and devotion. Drink 2017-2029. Tasted May 2017 robertmondavi @RobertMondavi Robert Mondavi Winery

Quilceda Creek Cabernet Sauvignon 2003, Columbia Valley, Washington (Agent, WineAlign)

A truly remarkable nose, notably violets and peregrine species of spices. There is so much perfume and beauty, an Aishwarya Rai Bachchan nose and then there is the fruit. Blackberry, Cassis then into vanilla, scented happiness like ruby red grapefruit and bergamot. If it should have aged I can’t say but it’s still a voluminous and voluptuous thing to sip. It blinds like first Growth Bordeaux with its perfect extraction. Thoughts keep at it, to blueberries, cigar box and Kirsch. The tannins are sweet and gritty, not fully resolved and imagine Margaux. You could consider taking out a mortgage on yours and your neighbour’s house for this one. It was one of many great reds tonight but I’ve just tasted this. And I wept. Drink 2017-2024. Tasted March 2017 @QuilCreekWinery @thevineagency winesofwashington wa_state_wine @QuilCreekWinery @TheVine_RobGroh Quilceda Creek Vintners @WINESofWA The Vine – Robert Groh Agency Washington State Wine

A great honour to taste this 1995 #carobbio #leone and in memory of #carlonovarese Thank you Dario and Silvia. Would like the chance to do it again in 22 years #toscana #sangiovese

Tenuta Carobbio Leone 1995, IGT Toscana, Italy (WineAlign)

Leone 1995 was made under the auspices of the Vittorio Fiore-Gabriella Tani oenology stylistic for Carlo Novarese. To say that this single-vineyard sangiovese is youthful would be the biggest IGT understatement of the century. From vines that at the time were 25 years-old, Leone is not just a survivor of a universally-declared incredible vintage, it is a singular expression from 1990’s Tuscany, in Chianti Classico and for Panzano. The violets, dried espresso and plum-amaretti semifreddo (savoury, not sweet) mixes with fennel frond, fresh rosemary and the 20-plus years lingering Carobbio tobacco. The acidity is fully intact, still travelling up and down the sides of the tongue, repeatedly and soliciting so much savour, sapidity, a desire for a mouthful of hematic, rare sear of Claudia’s beef filet and then more and more sipping. After 20 minutes the aromatics deliver a raspberry purée and even a black olive and mineral-saline, short of briny caper into the fray by stroke of some aromatic brush and bush in the light afternoon wind. That’s enough. I’m not sure my heart can take any more. Time for Vin Santo. Drink 2017-2029. Tasted February 2017 carobbio_wine chianticlassico @Tenuta_Carobbio @chianticlassico Tenuta Carobbio Chianti Classico

In @chianticlassico mano nella mano 1986, @fontodi #vignadelsorbo & #flaccianello thank you Giovanni Manetti for sharing these two opposing forces of the Tuscan paradox #chianticlassico

Fontodi Flaccianello della Pieve 1986, Tuscany, Italy (WineAlign)

Flaccianello in 1986 is actually though not surprisingly so different from Vigna del Sorbo, more than any other reason because of the cabernet sauvignon, but in a more philosophical way, because they have built a paradox, from the Super Tuscan ideal in revolution. Now the sangiovese going forward will be the most important and also the best wine, like looking back at this 1986, OK, not better than Sorbo but purer, honest, a clearer picture from which to learn from and ultimately a model for the future. Beautiful power, restraint, structure and yes, the kind of wine that deserves to be praised with the term elegance, overused, or not. Perfectly rustic, earthy and full of fruit with its accompanying complimentary, enervating and necessary acidity. Drink 2017-2023. Tasted September 2017 Fontodi chianticlassico #fontodi @chianticlassico Chianti Classico Az. Agr. Fontodi

Cortonesi La Mannella Brunello Di Montalcino Riserva 2010, Docg Tuscany, Italy (Agent, $202.95, WineAlign)

There are few Brunello vintages afforded more attention in the last 10-plus, certainly ’04 and ’06, increasingly better even from ’08 and looking forward towards what greatness will come in 2015. Yes but not solely magnified through the lens of patience and bottle time, from 2010 La Mannella has coupled upon and layered over itself like compressed fruit and puff pastry. Though it begs for drink now attention, another seven years will be needed before it can safely be labeled as uncoiled and to reveal all that is wrapped so tight. Rich is not the operative but unmistakeable as Cortonesi it is; that natural clay soil funk of resolution and fully hydrated chalk. This is to sangiovese as Les Preuses Grand Cru Chablis or Rangen Grand Cru Alsace are to Riesling. It carries in its pocket the absolute meaning and genetic responsibility of where it comes from, with a curative and restorative ability to get you lost. Drink 2019-2031. Tasted February 2017 marcora85 nicholaspearcewines brunellodimontalcino @LaMannella @Nicholaspearce_ @ConsBrunello Tommaso Cortonesi Nicholas Pearce Consorzio del Vino Brunello di Montalcino

Maison Roche De Bellene “Collection Bellenum” Grand Cru Clos De La Roche 1998, AOC Bourgogne, France (Agent, $364.95, WineAlign)

Clos de La Roche 1998 may be 19 years old but you have to swirl the britches out of this Grand Cru because reduction persists in its make-up. Once you work your way over the wall a field of wildflowers and a roses bouquet lays out as far as the nose can mind’s eye. This is pure candy in its most arid, blessed and gout de terroir way. It is as charming as Burgundy can be and yet so fine of tannin, tight and duplicitously-grained in clone upon itself. One of those wines so difficult to put to words because it teaches and you can do nothing but listen. I’d still want to wait two more years, maybe more, before knowing I’ve waited long enough. Close de la Roche speaks to me but to answer with any real credibility and respect I will need to think some more. Drink 2019-2035. Tasted February 2017 domaine_de_bellene nicholaspearcewines vinsdebourgogne @RochedeBellene @Nicholaspearce_ @VinsdeBourgogne Bellene Nicholas Pearce Vins de Bourgogne / Burgundy wines

Not just #meerlust more like major lust. Thank you for the sexy time travel @meerlustwine Laurel Keenan and The South African Wine Society.

Meerlust Rubicon 1984, Wo Stellenbosch, South Africa (WineAlign)

Meerlust dates back to 1693, the house that is “love or pleasure of the sea.” Less than five kms south from the Atlantic Ocean, the property was purchased in 1756 and to this day remains family owned, now in its eighth generation with 260 years of continuity. Rubicon 1984 is poured (with brilliant decision making) from magnum and is therefore fresher than the 1996 with an incredibly controlled level of fineness in tannin, from acidity and at the threshold of understood volatility. “Perhaps one did not want to be loved so much as to be understood,” like this early Rubicon. The future of Meerlust is foretold with Orwellian transparency, bold honesty and expert ability. “Who controls the past controls the future.” Drink 2017-2019. Tasted September 2017 meerlustwine wosa_za wosa_ca liffordgram @MeerlustWine @LiffordON @WOSA_ZA @WOSACanada MEERLUST ESTATE Lifford Wine and Spirits Wines of South Africa

Boscarelli Vino Nobile Di Montepulciano Riserva 1982, Tuscany, Italy (WineAlign)

The Boscarelli acts like a much younger Nobile, from an exceptional vintage and a producer way ahead of its time. The key is to decide which side of the evolutionary fence we’re on, closer to that 1967 from Contucci or to what is happening today. This may actually be the turning point for Vino Nobile because it really has one foot entrenched in each world. Very much in the mushroom and truffle aromatic atmosphere, where sangiovese should feel free and comfortable to travel in the twilight of its golden years. This is beautiful, with some dark fruit persisting and acidity still in charge. You can imagine the old tannins but they no longer make any demands. Drink 2017-2020. Tasted at Anteprima del Vino Nobile di Montepulciano 2017, February 2017 #PoderiBoscarelli lucadeferrarildf artisanal_wine_imports consorzionobile #poderiboscarelli Nicolò De Ferrari #ArtisanalWineImports Luca De Ferrari @artisanalwineimports

Antichi Poderi Dei Marchesi Di Barolo Gia’ Opera Pia Barolo 1958, Piedmont, Italy (WineAlign)

Poured by Ernesto Abbona on his wife Anna’s birthday, a ’58 at the ripe old age of 58 (though it will turn 59 later this year). Simply, in the words of the Abbona family, “a special evening, special friends, special vintage,” with a cork that looks as good as new, though Ernesto takes great time and care in its extraction. The aromas are blessed of a collective umami but would better be served by a new descriptor because they are antediluvian and impossibly preserved. Forget mushrooms and truffles. These scents are brand new, with no truly identifiable frame of reference, as if plucked from some guise of Eden where never before tasted dark berries fall effortlessly into the hand off of gariga savoury-scented bushes, brambly and crawling intertwined with nasturtium on a composting forest floor. The 1958 was and still is a nebbiolo of struttura, of a fibra morale that tells a story of consistency and longevity. With air it became more complex if deeper and turbido. That this magical nebbiolo from another era hovered in the lasting air of a 30 minute long ethereal says that you could open a few more but perhaps not much beyond its 60th birthday. Drink 2017-2018. Tasted July 2017 marchesibarolo majesticwinesinc @MarchesiBarolo @MajesticWineInc @marchesibarolo Majestic Wine Cellars

The mythology of #thorle #riesling in Beerenauslese and Trockenbetenauslese #weingutthörle #gabsheim #rheinhessen #holle

Thörle Riesling Trockenbeerenauslese Hölle 2011, Rheinhessen, Germany (WineAlign)

The Hölle TBA 2011 is a minuscule 180 bottle single-vineyard production and the vintage was simply perfect for the effort. The process involved the collection of a few berries at a time over the course of three weeks, started in the fridge and was then pressed when the amount of approximately 100L could be obtained. “This is the king’s discipline for creating such a riesling” explains Christoph Thörle. Thick like honey, full of unctuousness and viscosity. It is expressly noticed how the colour and the development have not advanced considering the six year mean. The exoticism is what separates this, with fruits far east, creamy and perfectly easy to assimilate, in flavour, consistency and understanding. Sweet herbology, of thai basil and thyme and candied mandarin rind. Here, a piece of history and legacy from Christoph and Johannes. Drink 2021-2041. Tasted March 2017 thorle_c thorleestatewinery univinscanada @thoerle @UNIVINS @germanwineca @gen_riesling

Will be a top ’17 from 2017 #louisguntrum #1976 @weininstitut #rieslingauslese #niersteiner #heiligen #nierstein #niersteinamrhein #roterhang

Weingut Louis Guntrum Riesling Auslese Niersteiner Heilibengaum 1976, Rheinhessen, Germany (WineAlign)

“Roter Hang is a geological statement” says Louis Konstantin Guntrum. If you want to hang around and try to understand its red soils and friable limestone fettle it requires a focused state of mind. Guntrum introduces this 1976 by saying “it’s a young guy, 40 years old,” the same thing he could have said years ago about a 1917 Roter Hang Riesling. The comparative studies is a matter of perspective, a theory of relativity, in reduction, colour, drama, florality and fabulousness. While certain vintages and specific wines will blow you away more than others there is something to be said about older just being more interesting, whether 1917, 1976 or whatever back vintage you want to try your luck with. It’s simply remarkable and crazy how sugar and acidity can preserve riesling like this, especially and/or truly withstanding the Roter Hang. The honey and candied orange blossom are so prevalent but it almost seems dry (relatively speaking) even though 100 grams or more of sugar have driven this wine. Beauty from bitter phenols blend with lanolin, paraffin, ginger and ginseng. Keep returning for 15 more years. Drink 2017-2031. Tasted March 2017 #louisguntrum @weininstitut wines_of_germany @LouisGuntrum @WinesofGermany Weingut Louis Guntrum German Wine Institute i.e. Wines of Germany

Good to go!

Godello

Twitter: @mgodello

Instagram: mgodello

WineAlign

Barbera d’Asti Del Monferrato E Nizza Monferrato

Nov13

This report first appeared on WineAlign. Here it is expanded to include all the wines reviewed in July of 2017; 27 Barbera d’Asti and 44 Barbera d’Asti Nizza from 29 producers.

Consorzio Barbera d’Asti E Vini Del Monferrato
Cascina Gilli Di Vergnano Giovanni
Cascina Galarin
Bersano
Pico Maccario
Azienda Agricola Ivaldi Dario
Az. Agr. Garrone Evasio & Figlio
Michele Chiarlo
Castello Di Gabiano Marchesi Cattaneo Adorno Giustiniani Srl
Rovero
Coppo
Tenuta Il Falchetto
Az. Agr. Franco Roero
Viticoltori Associati Vinchio e Vaglio Serra
Marchesi Incisa Della Rocchetta
Marco Bonfante
Erede Di Chiappone
Gozzelino
Moretti Adimari
Berta Paolo
Borgo Isolabella Delle Croce
Il Botolo
Cascina Garitina
Villa Giada
Bava
La Gironda
Tenuta Olim Bauda
Cantina Tre Secoli
L’Armangia

Back in July of 2017 I hopped aboard the Collisioni Progetto Vino train in advance of four seminar-saturated days in Barolo, to immerse myself in everything the great red hope known as barbera holds in the territory of Monferrato. Here in Ontario we possess a pretty good idea about the nature and the competency of Barbera d’Alba, mainly because of its association with the Piemontese region’s more famous grape variety nebbiolo in production of the noble and regal Barolo and Barbaresco wines. The successes enjoyed by Barbera d’Alba are ensured, not solely because of but certainly by its proximate association. But what about Barbera d’Asti?

Collisioni Festival’s Ian D’Agata recently stated “it is undoubtedly in Piedmont where the grape performs best. To put barbera’s popularity in perspective, consider that 33 per cent of Piedmont’s 45,000 hectares under vine are planted to barbera.” Try throwing this statistic in the face of Monferrato, Nizza Monferrato and so many other Asti barbera growers. So the question begs as to why so many DOC’s exist is such a close proximate place? The answer is quite simple. I am “insert commune name here” and I am this DOC, around my village, with my own very special terroir. Yours may only be five kilometres away from me but I am special and my land and grapes are not like yours. It must be noted that in Piemonte there are as many native grapes then there are in all of France. This is the second and more important reason nearly 50, or almost 10 per cent of all registered Italian grapes are found in Piemonte.

The Barbera DOCGs via somesmartsomm.com

The consortium for Barbera d’Asti and Monferrato wines was founded in 1946 with distinctive labelling and while only seven members were originally on board, today more than 200 band together for the good of the grape and especially the agricultural practices of the territory. I will touch on other Piemontese denominations such as Ruchè di Castagnole Monferrato, Freisa d’Asti and Grignolino d’Asti in a follow-up report but now is the time to discuss, analyze and celebrate all things Barbera d’Asti E Vini Monferrato.

Barbera d’Asti is a DOCG with upwards of 3,900 hectares under vine with nearly 2,500 producers, 30 of which are cooperatives. The wines can be fresh reds made in stainless steel or receive some oak aging while the bigger Barbera d’Asti Superiore, made from selected grapes are required by DOCG law to be aged for at least six months in wood. Both the Barbera d’asti Superiore and Barbera del Monferrato Superiore DOCGs were awarded in 2008, both have maximum yield allowances of nine tonnes per hectare but Monferrato’s minimum alcohol requirement is a half a point higher at 13 per cent by volume. The Vigna (single-vineyard) Monferrato yields are lower, at eight tonnes per hectare. Aging for both is 14 months from November 1st the year after harvest. In Monferrato 85 per cent must be barbera with the remainder allowing dolcetto, grigolino and freisa while Barbera d’Asti Superiore requires 90 per cent barbera.

Barbera vineyards in Costigiole d’Asti

The rich limestone, clay and calcium hills of the Nizza wine zone is one of three Barbera d’Asti sub-zones (that also include Tinella and Colli Astigiani). Nizza’s terroir is a result of marine sediment and with proof supplied by a walk-around tasting and dinner during which wines dating back to 2001 were poured, it is indeed the zone where the most ageworthy and arguably the best barbera d’Asti is made. In 2014 the DOCG was created and the artist formerly known as “Barbera d’Asti Superiore Nizza” has now been abbreviated to simply, Nizza. Like Prince. Power and balance are married in Nizza and many perform well past the 10 year mark after vintage. Wines from Nizza must be 100 per cent barbera, the yields are capped at seven tonnes per hectare and the age requirement is 18 months (six in oak) from January 1st the year after harvest. Reserva is 30 months (12 in oak) and Vigna (single-vineyard) releases must have yields no higher than 6.3 with a minimum of 13.5 per cent alcohol. The first Nizza DOCG wines were released in July of 2016.

Still today the barbera wines of Monferrato and Nizza are virtually ignored worldwide. Many consumers simply think of the name Asti and sweet sparkling wines come to mind. Many others know not of Asti and still countless more associate the grape with Alba. The Consorzio Barbera d’Asti e Vini del Monferrato is working tirelessly to change public perception, first with its proud public speaking president Filippo Mobrici, by enlisting the association with the Collisioni Festival and through the work of ambassadors like Michele Longo. The Collisioni Progetto Vino brings groups of journalists and sommeliers from around the globe to taste, educate and indulge in the multiplicity of barbera.

A compassionate barbera d’asti sky in the dimmet of a piemonte evening.

The following tasting notes of Barbera d’Asti and Nizza wines were executed in the consorzio headquarters in Costigiole and at the Enoteca Regionale di Nizza in July of 2017. The first tasting focused on Barbera d’Asti and Barbera d’Asti Superiore from the 2014, 2015 and 2016 vintages with the emphasis placed on four sub-zones and their differing soils. The second (walk-around) tasting allowed producers to pour at their whimsy so this included portfolios with varietal wines such as grignolino and freisa. The gathering of the Associazione Produttori del Nizza focused beautifully on a comparison of only wines from the 2014 vintage, by way of introduction, followed by two brilliant tastings in which verticals of their wines were offered, first at a (way too fast) high-speed walkabout and then later during a (beautifully slow) dinner at Locanda Del Boscogrande. My full report covers more than 75 reviews of Monferrato barbera from both the Asti and Nizza categories.

Barbera d’Asti DOCG

Consorzio Barbera d’Asti E Vini Del Monferrato Barbera d’Asti DOCG 2015, Piedmont, Italy (Winery, WineAlign)

Every year one wine is chosen through a series of blind tastings from a selection of producers, to be bottled and labeled under the “taken as a while” entity Consorzio Barbera D’asti E Vini Del Monferrato Barbera D’asti. Only the producer and the President (Filippo Mobrici) know who’s wine is chosen, along with wink, wink, everyone else. This 2015 is quite the firm and brambly barbera, as it should be, with an omnipresent blanketing European vintage depth of character, from warmth, quality, quantity and length. This is typically barbera pressed, full on for fruit, specific to a Monferrato territorial claim and nary a moment of intrusive tannin. Drink 2017-2019. Tasted July 2017 barberadasti @barberadasti @barberadasti

Cascina Gilli Di Vergnano Giovanni Barbera d’Asti DOCG Le More 2016, Piedmont, Italy (Agent, WineAlign)

From the silty marl of Monferrato in Castelnuovo Don Bosco, here the traditionally rustic is acquiesced. Of dark berry, dusty, mulberry, a rich mid-palate, leathery, textured, solid if not profound structure. Only stainless steel and possessive of appropriate length. Drink 2017-2019. Tasted July 2017 cascinagilli @cascinagilli @cascinagilli

Cascina Galarin Barbera d’Asti DOCG Le Querce 2016, Piedmont, Italy (Agent, WineAlign)

Out of the silty marl comes this stainless raised barbera, of such a similar profile to Le More, less floral and also less obvious fruity berry. Made with five per cent freisa, here there is more caramel and dried plum, also more VA and a bit of residual CO2. The bitter finish blend into acidity so very tart. Drink 2017-2018. Tasted July 2017 #cascinagalarin Cascina Galarin

Bersano Barbera d’Asti DOCG Costalunga 2015, Piedmont, Italy (Agent, 348680, $13.75, WineAlign)

Bersano’s, like so many of its peers making barbera in and around Monferrato comes from a terroir of silty marl. It spends one year in (large) botti and is a most most floral and perfumed barbera, notably of violets, even a touch of liquorice or fennel. Fills in with more mid-palate and structure than many at this “posto che si chiama” entry level, with bitters as tonics well integrated into the mix. Drink 2017-2020. Tasted July 2017 bersano1907 profilewinegroup @BERSANO1907 @ProfileWineGrp @Bersanowine Profile Wine Group

Pico Maccario Barbera d’Asti DOCG Lavignone 2016, Piedmont, Italy (Agent, WineAlign)

Quite the deep, dark and handsome barbera with a current of black currant and a pure stainless steel raising. Plums and chocolate mark the second half profile for the rich red, no oak lover in you. This pervasive barbera represents just about half of the house’s total (400,000 bottle) production. It’s truly a matter of fresh fruit and the already conscious awareness of its sharp, tart, fugacious youth. Solicits a knowing nod of the head when tasted at the source not long after a moment with the ’14 less than a year before. Drink 2017-2019. Tasted July 2017 picomaccario @PicoMaccario @PicoMaccario

Pico Maccario Barbera d’Asti Superiore DOCG Epico 2014, Piedmont, Italy (Agent, WineAlign)

Epico is the top selection from the oldest (60 year-old) vines developed 14 months in barrel. In its current state the oak is alpha dominant and the volatility quite pronounced. There is something of a jammy quality, not so much a viscous or pejorative, pectin-laced presence on the palate but more like a reduction as barbera syrup or liqueur. The epitome of modern and produced. Drink 2017-2020. Tasted July 2017

Pico Maccario Barbera d’Asti DOCG Tre Rovere 2015, Piedmont, Italy (Winery WineAlign)

The “three oaks” saw to six months in barrel and along with an expressly coffee aroma there too is this sugary scent. Candied plums bring fruit depth and richness and the wine sings the high notes of volatility. It’s quite a tart treat, from liquid clay to blackberry in a combined and distilled affair. A moment of cotton candy is fleeting because the heavy clays and ferric accent take over, stirring up some bitters to mix with the sugars. A deferential and adjustable barbera that condones the ups and downs of the oeuvre. Drink 2017-2020. Tasted July 2017

Azienda Agricola Ivaldi Dario Barbera d’Asti DOC 2015, Piedmont, Italy (Winery, WineAlign)

In the pantheon of red wine made from the barbera grape in Asti lands it is Andrea Ivaldi’s that stands out, like a beacon or a lighthouse, lit up to help mariners find the shore. In this case a summoning light set in a white limestone vineyard and it is the youngest member of the Ivaldi family who resides as the current superintendent of this special barbera. At a locally low 14 per cent alcohol and a hue so Monthelie transparent this is classic, innate, intense liquid stone, bled from the pietra bianca at 300 masl. The blessedly honest red fruit raised in cement tanks for one year is hypo-reductive and only 4,000-5,000 bottles are produced. So balanced, melting, oozing and brisk, structured even. Drink 2017-2021. Tasted July 2017

Az. Agr. Garrone Evasio & Figlio Barbera d’Asti DOCG 2015, Piedmont, Italy (Winery, WineAlign)

Garrone’s barbera climbs out of the silty marl and exhibits more VA than the others but in a good way. If perhaps it acts a bit acetic, it thus so hides its florals, though there is more texture and integration, gliding silky across the palate and finishing long. More complexity and interest here. Drink 2018-2021. Tasted July 2017 @vinigarrone

Michele Chiarlo Barbera d’Asti DOCG Le Orme 2015, Piedmont, Italy (265413, $13.95, WineAlign)

Le Orme or “the footsteps” spent 16 months in stainless steel, taken from variegated terroir; sandy, marly and coarser soils. It sheds developed florals and high yet stretched and creeping acidity and in turn length. The acumen and experience comes through, leading to more refinement and almost a creamy (though unwooded) texture on bright, juicy fruit. Drink 2017-2019. Tasted July 2017 michelechiarlo univinscanada @michelechiarlo @UNIVINS Michele Chiarlo @UnivinsCanada

Castello Di Gabiano Marchesi Cattaneo Adorno Giustiniani Srl Barbera d’Asti DOCG La Braja 2015, Piedmont, Italy (Winery, WineAlign)

Gabiano’s stands apart in a barbera tasting of 13 wines because of its naturally wild personality. Run free off sandy soils it saw 16 months in a combination of botti and barriques. Beyond barbera it also contains some grignolino and freisa, more tannin, certainly reductive (which easily blows off) and I’d even call it righteously and properly stinky. More developed and even wise, this has that acidity that travels up and down the sides of the mouth. Drink 2018-2021. Tasted July 2017 castellodigabiano @CastelloGabiano Gazzola Katia (Castello di Gabiano)

#risotto #ristorantelabarbera #costiglioledasti @costiglioleat

Rovero Barbera d’Asti DOCG Superiore Rouvé (Bio) 2014, Piedmont, Italy (Winery, WineAlign)

Rovero’s wafts with the most perfume by a long shot, by a soaking up and in from 24 months in barrique. The waves of vanilla infiltrate the purple berries, much like Rioja and its wood perfume but in barbera it comes with so much acidity. Like chewing on a stick of wood dynamite overcompensating for fruit that didn’t stack up, though it would have been honest and pure to allow the fruit to talk anyway, in whatever voice it may have chosen. Drink 2018-2020. Tasted July 2017

Luigi Coppo

Coppo Barbera d’Asti DOCG Pomorosso 2014, Piedmont, Italy (Agent, $74.95, WineAlign)

From the house that Piero Coppo built, now in the forward thinking acumen-saturated hands, heart and mind of Luigi Coppo, comes a barbera most ambitious and in 2014, likely to be misunderstood in the throes of its youth. Pomorosso carries the baggage and the experience of 125 years of history in pocket, is only produced in the best vintages and spends 14 months in French oak. A fair to challenging vintage makes cause and pause to consider it a case of over-oak usage because it still overwhelms the terroir while simultaneously in disavow and disallow for the vintage to speak. The big but factor is spoken with a simple term. Balance. Even while the wood is very much in charge the craft behind the scene fills the screen, like a sepia toned vintage movie reel, in which hard at work agriculturalists, agronomists and oenologists move in fast frame motion, tending to their barbera. Beautiful fruit defends itself, because and for the land, reeks through the wood, integrates acidity and lingers, long after the wood perfume has dissipated. Fast forward to the end of the film and enjoy in retrospective view, somewhere mid next decade, while the credits roll. Drink 2020-2028. Tasted July 2017 coppo1892 maitredechai_ca @COPPO1892 @maitredechai @COPPO1892 Le Maître de Chai

Tenuta Il Falchetto Barbera d’Asti DOCG Pian Scorrone 2016, Piedmont, Italy (Winery, WineAlign)

Sees some stainless steel and six months in acacia wood. From a mix of soils in the Piemontese tertiary basin, characterized by sedimentary rocks known as “Marnoso Arenacea,” deposited from a marine environment 30-35 million years ago. A lovely barbera in purity of fruit, perfume and balance. Varietal honesty and bright personality bring dark plum, great acidity and ultimately just a pleasure to drink. 2017-2019. Tasted July 2017 tenutailfalchetto @ilfalchettovini @tenutailfalchetto

Az. Agr. Franco Roero Barbera d’Asti DOCG Carbune 2016, Piedmont, Italy (Winery, WineAlign)

Roero’s is another stainless specimen but this time off of mixed soils cut across two sub-zones. The fruit here is rich, darker, spicy and the acidity less pronounced, rendered, melted in. It too is a pleasure to drink but not as bright as some, to be sure. Just a bit pressed, quite solid and hefty at 15.4 per cent alcohol. Drink 2017-2019. Tasted July 2017 franco_roero_winery @FrancoRoeroVini @franco.roero

Az. Agr. Franco Roero Barbera d’Asti Superiore Docg Mappale 213 2015, Piedmont, Italy (Winery, WineAlign)

From Montegrosso d’Asti Roero’s Mappale takes a heat index step back from Carbuné and from 2016. In 2015 the single vineyard, single (213) block is vinified separately from the others (including Siché and Cellarino) and spends 18 months in large barrels. Still it’s a dark, hematic bruiser with Cassis and dark chocolate, plus the omnipresent energy of acidity. Also ropey, tart and glazed, almost to the point of deep caramel. Then again it always comes back to how young it is. Drink 2018-2023. Tasted July 2017

Viticoltori Associati Vinchio e Vaglio Serra Barbera d’Asti DOCG Vigne Vecchie 2011, Piedmont, Italy (Winery, WineAlign)

The use of generous oak on these old vines rings and scents into secondary notes, of creosote, graphite, vanilla, clove and dried fruit from strawberry to prune. This will soon be turning to figs, chocolate and balsamic when in a year or two the fruit is no longer willing to sing and the acidity will step back into a phase otherwise quiet. From vineyards in Montegrosso, with caramel, more vanilla, creaminess and Amarone like character in alcohol and a perception of sweetness. Drake 2017-2019. Tasted July 2017 vinchiovaglioserra @vinchiovaglio @VinchioVaglioSerra

Marchesi Incisa Della Rocchetta Barbera d’Asti Superiore DOCG Sant’Emiliano 2015, Piedmont, Italy (SAQ, 12278202, $29.45, WineAlign)

Marchesi Incisa Della Rocchetta is from Sassiccaia fame and also a family with a long Piemontese tradition. Their barbera is aged 18 months in French barrels and hails from near (southeast) of Asti. It’s certainly posied and appointed though I can’t help but notice the five-spice, caramel and balsamic aspect. A highly refined if tart style, seriously structured and wholesome though balanced within that formidable framework. As it fleshes and expands it reveals more charm, with some grace and elegance, kept warm and safe from the elements with an expensive scarf to be sure. Drink 2018-2023. Tasted July 2017 #marchesiincisadellarocchetta vins.balthazard #marchesiincisadellarocchetta @vinsbalthazard #marchesiincisadellarocchetta @VinsBalthazard

Marco Bonfante Barbera d’Asti Superiore DOCG Menego 2011, Piedmont, Italy (Winery, WineAlign)

Marco Bonfante’s barbera d’asti made from fruit all over the hill is called Menego, the nickname and in honour of his and Micaela’s father Domenico who passed away in 2000. At the top of Domenico’s hill is Il Bricco and it is this one and a half hectares of south-exposed fruit that separates this barbera from the broad expression that is Menego. The calcareous terroir defines this wine and though the journey here is a high octane, jammy developing one through 14 months in barriques, this is the (relatively speaking) elegant vintage. It stills clocks in at a minimum 15 per cent alcohol and delivers a firm, confident and authoritative message but its elasticity and length allow it to breathe. Still it does not merely wave but punches and is more of a shout than a whisper. At six years the window of pleasure is open, if only just the first crack. Drink 2017-2023. Tasted July 2017 marcobonfantewinery @MarcoBonfante70 @MarcoBonfanteWinery

Marco Bonfante Barbera d’Asti Superiore DOCG Menego 2012, Piedmont, Italy (Winery, WineAlign)

What a difference a vintage makes, here in 2012 out of warmth and into the highest of alcohol level with intensely ripe fruit. Marco Bonfante does not mess around, stretching the elevations of brix and alcohol while maintaining the natural acidity of barbera and waiting it out so the phenolic ripeness can fall, or rather climb to the high line. That he finds a way to work some magic so that balance is achieved is nothing short of remarkable. The most grip, power and brooding comes out of the 2012, like Madiran tannat, Cahors malbec, Napa Valley Petit Sirah and northern Rhône syrah all rolled into one. But this is the genesis of the new barbera d’asti and only Bonfante pushes such limits and scores in the end. This 2012 is the striker every great football club somehow finds, at most times blending in but always the silent assassin. This Menego is coursing with chocolate, Cassis, espresso and black cherry. It’s just a huge wine, easily at the 16 per cent mark and structured to go a decade before any withering or wuthering. Tension builds all the way until the end. Wot Gorilla. Drink 2019-2027. Tasted July 2017

Marco Bonfante Barbera d’Asti Superiore DOCG Menego 2009, Piedmont, Italy (Winery, WineAlign)

In 2009 the hill supplied fruit ready to kill so at eight years Menego has entered its secondary phase. It will not be expected that either 2011 or 2012 will travel this far, this fast though the (more elegant) former will certainly get there quicker then (the massive) latter. A new complexity has emerged with the developing 2009, from out of and with a nod to the southwest facing calcareous vineyard. Cinnamon, orange and subtler spices now grace the aromatics, things the young and powerful Menego do not release. The accents make the eyebrows rise and when noted integrating into the chocolate coated palate there is a tickling sensation. Yet another immensely impressive moment with a Marco Bonfante bruiser is had but with some age the time spent is relenting and ultimately offering some relief. Drink 2017-2021. Tasted July 2017

Erede Di Chiappone Barbera d’Asti DOCG Brentura 2013, Piedmont, Italy (Winery, WineAlign)

From Daniele Chiappone and a 100 per cent stainless steel upbringing at four years old the Chiappone retains remarkable freshness, with not a moment of reduction or careless redirection. Some dried fruit on the nose is curious so changes are in the air but the Brentura’s structure outside of the wood realm is more solid than most. So too is the warmer, rounder and more breathable acidity, now so integrated. Marvellous example of what barbera d’sati can be. Drink 2017-2019. Tasted July 2017 erededi @erededi Erede Di Chiappone Armando

Gozzelino Barbera d’Asti Superiore DOCG Ciabot d’la Mandorla 2012, Piedmont, Italy (Winery, WineAlign)

The underworld of gariga and earthy fox holes are accessed through Gozzelino’s well-aged 2012, a barbera that saw its biased share of barrel by way of a 24 months full soaking in (3000L) Grande Botti. It has emerged vinous and boxy, foxy and full of heavy set moxy, like dried fruit and jerky absorbing like sponges in a pool of campari and aperol. The rusticity is palpable, the figs and the chocolate baking with spice. The alcohol persists while the wine acts fading but it’s certainly persistent. Old-school, traditional, out there in the antediluvian void. Drink 2017-2018. Tasted July 2017 Azienda Agricola Gozzelino Sergio

Moretti Adimari Barbera d’Asti Superiore DOCG 2015, Piedmont, Italy (Winery, WineAlign)

Moretti’s Superiore takes barbera further, out of a stainless steel world and into barriques for eight months. Perfume and acidity are barbera hallmarks, here now merged nicely together, but it is texture that elevates the game. The chalkiness gained from sandy, Franco (white) limestone soils make for a rover of a barbera, through liquid mineral and made creamy by barrel. Moretti as a producer experiments with riesling, chardonnay and sauvignon blanc so there is no surprise this barbera travels hither and thither. And it works. Drink 2018-2022. Tasted July 2017 morettiadimariwines #morettiadimari @morettiadimariwines

Montalbera Barbera d’Asti Superiore DOCG Nuda 2013, Piedmont, Italy (Winery, WineAlign)

Montalbera’s calcareous soils are the catalyst to keeping this barbera scaled back, with teeth still shining white after 20 months in barriques. The unfiltered, oak driven wine is astonishingly divine and elegantly integrated with so much dripping, oozing and glazing chocolate. It’s rich and fine if for certain a mess in a mouthful. Drink 2018-2021. Tasted July 2017 montalbera @Montalbera @montalbera

Berta Paolo Barbera d’Asti DOCG 2015, Piedmont, Italy (Winery, WineAlign)

From vineyards located between the areas of Monferrato and Langa, Berta Paolo’s barbera is a ceremoniously traditional one, possessive of a walk the line beauty specific to the area, at once sonsy in pure red fruit and then volatile to just the right degree. Here is the sort of barbera that exemplifies the natural while unbeknownst to just how raw an affair it really is. Honesty oozes from one that succeeds in being real without even trying. Drink 2017-2019. Tasted July 2017 vinifamigliaberta @wineBerta @viniberta

Borgo Isolabella Delle Croce Barbera d’Asti DOCG 2015, Piedmont, Italy (Winery, WineAlign)

Were that is were so simple for all barbera to take one road or the other, as does Isolabella’s on the darker, full-tempered side. This is so perfectly solid, structured, architecturally sound barbera, with classically styled columns and porticos, tart and with a wealth of 2015 fruit. It’s dark but health-tempered, ever so slightly tannic and streaming with fine natural acidity. So well made. Drink 2017-2020. Tasted July 2017 isolabelladellacroce2001 @ISOLABELLA_D_C_ @isolabelladellecroce

The history of @ilNizza began long ago. Prepare for its storied future. Exceptional tasting, stellar wines #barberadasti #100percent #100percentapproval #piemonte #progettovino #collision

Nizza DOCG and DOC

Bersano Barbera d’Asti Riserva Nizza DOCG Generala 2014, Piedmont, Italy (Agent, WineAlign)

Suave, refined, silky smooth barbera, of a warmth to express and make accessible the sense of its strength, power and alcohol. It is the exceptionality of texture that really shines. Bersano’s Nizza (Riserva) has already done its 30 months of aging time so it can be released 12 days from now. A true case of catching a wine at its potential best. As they say, timing is everything. Like on the stage so on a lighter, theatrical note this is perhaps an ode to 20th century Italian drama, to Signora Ignazia. “Dear, dear Signora! Hail to our great Generala! To our patron saint!” And yet we could do without the theatre, as long as we have barbera. Drink 2018-2024. Tasted July 2017 bersano1907 profilewinegroup @BERSANO1907 @ProfileWineGrp @Bersanowine Profile Wine Group

Bersano Barbera d’Asti Nizza DOC Generala 2013, Piedmont, Italy (Agent, WineAlign)

Something about the 2013 vintage speaks with such great clarity as it does here in Roberto Morosinotto’s barbera from Nizza fruit that spent six months in tonneaux. The chocolate swirl has palpably settled on the palate but it’s just so silky smooth, tempered and demonstrative. Acidity surely runs high, it is barbera after all, but it also drifts into and with the waves of plum, wood spice and just spice in generala. Drink 2017-2020. Tasted July 2017

Bersano Barbera d’Asti Nizza DOC Generala 2010, Piedmont, Italy (Agent, WineAlign)

The summer of extreme heat (though perhaps holding no candle compared to 2017) has delivered a warm to warmest Bersano barbera with a calming effect achieved by cooling time spent in big barrels that date back to 1970. This ’10 is possessive of that sort of delicious perception of sweetness that puts it up there with the richest of the Nizza barbera. The élevage is half and half tonneaux/barriques and texture is full of this Mediterranean liquorice/black olive/gariga/briny tang. Nicely structured to last in this state for another three years. Drink 2017-2020. Tasted July 2017

Bersano Barbera d’Asti Nizza DOC Generala 2008, Piedmont, Italy (Agent, WineAlign)

Another excellent vintage for the Generala is found to be sound and generous at the nine year mark though the fully developed secondary character is duly noted. Helps to prepare and deduce a clear impression of where 2010 will go over the next two to three years. This ’08 has not quite reached the denouement stage though it has peaked, reeking resinous of fruit and wood clasped in a lover’s humid embrace, with notes of dried orange, apricot, fig jam, tar and roses. The acidity still rages quite assiduously while the briny and ecoregion earthy brush have now faded and disappeared from the fragrance trail. Drink 2017-2019. Tasted July 2017

Il Botolo Barbera d’Asti Nizza DOCG 2014, Piedmont, Italy (Winery, WineAlign)

From soils with quite a bit of sediment, in the northeast part of Nizza. Quite the silky feel following on the heels of refinement and freshness. A liquid liqueur that is close to syrup but more of a natural feel, without tonic or medicine, but just pure limestone liquid fruit. The sort of tart that is elongated, elastic and stretched with ease. Drink early because it’s quite a glassful of immediate pleasure. Grows on you too. Drink 2017-2019. Tasted July 2017

Cascina Garitina Barbera d’Asti Superiore “900” Neuvsent CEC Nizza DOCG 2014, Piedmont, Italy (Winery, WineAlign)

Why 900? Because Giancarlo Morino’s momma began working here in the 1900s but the local dialect was spoken so quickly so it was just, “900.” The vineyard “CEC” is pronounced “check,” or short for Francesca, who used to own the vineyard. From the (Castel Boglione) southern part of Nizza with higher acidity and alcohol, here at 15 per cent. Aged 12 months in barrel, there is some deep organic clay and (three) old vineyard (1924, 1949 and 1954) induced layering, astringency and brooding, of a seriousness about it that makes it dense and a bit tempered, finishing with dark chocolate. A minty, savoury and sapid streak runs through, likely with thanks to the cooling Mediterranean “Marin” winds that blow through the vineyards from spring to autumn. Well done but needs as much as five to seven years to show as silky and refined as some of the others. Drink 2019-2024. Tasted July 2017 cascinagaritina @gianlucamorino Gianluca Morino (Vignaiolo indipendente)

I’ve got 900 reasons to drink these @gianlucamorino #cascinagaritina #nizza but need only one #nizzamonferrato #progettovino #collisionimonferrato #cec #neuvsent #barberadasti

Cascina Garitina Barbera d’Asti Superiore “900” Neuvsent Nizza DOC 2010, Piedmont, Italy (Winery, WineAlign)

Having tasted Gianluca Morino’s 2014 earlier in the day it makes this follow up, retrospective look at his 2010 such a satisfying confirmation of his work. That ’14 was way too young to make lifelong friends with but this ’10, well this is something other. While still a seriously brooding, hematic, ganache spread of fine chocolate barbera, the components have filled the kettle to overflowing, but time has worked to now emit a floral and spice perfume. The richness of oak has also rendered a touch of complexity, of caramel and baking spice but even further, into secondary beginnings. The tones are aromatic, musical and textural, of sweet, salty and faintly sour by a fineness of acidity. One more year will bring it all together. Drink 2017-2020. Tasted July 2017

Michele Chiarlo Barbera d’Asti Superiore Nizza DOCG Cipressi 2014, Piedmont, Italy (Winery, WineAlign)

From a loamy locale, aged in large oak barrels, there is a rusticity about it along with its really dark cherry fruit. Some Bretty volatility too, complexity, character, oomph and reason for living. Quite high in acidity and structure is provided by that ideal with addendum by the gentle touch afforded by the higher oxygen exchange, large format wood. Drink 2018-2022. Tasted July 2017 michelechiarlo univinscanada @michelechiarlo @UNIVINS Michele Chiarlo @UnivinsCanada

Michele Chiarlo Barbera d’Asti Superiore Nizza DOCG La Court 2013, Piedmont, Italy (Winery, WineAlign)

Chiarlo’s La Court is actually one of the only Nizza barbera with a hard to get, slightly reserved character. It’s aromas are a bit muted though you get the sense that it’s quite floral behind the veil. Patience and air reveal dark fruits, of plum and black raspberry, then dusty earth and liquorice, with a silky patterning on the palate. Would love to get some wood spice but that too is currently in limbo so time is required to reveal such charm. The acidity is less than barbera raging, something that falls into line with the sneaky structure. Quite singular Nizza cru work right here. Drink 2018-2023. Tasted July 2017

Viticoltori Associati Vinchio Vaglio Serra Barbera d’Asti Superiore Nizza DOCG Laudana 2014, Piedmont, Italy (Winery, WineAlign)

From the hill known as “Bricco Laudana” this is one of two barberas produced from its clay and sandy marls, a barbera d’asti DOC and this extraordinary Nizza DOCG. The Nizza is aged one year in large oak barrels, thus mixing grace, elegance and full on liqueur with high, nearing acetic acidity. Very long but with angular bits and spikes in and out of the morello cherry fruit. Needs a year to settle in and amongst its sharp, moving parts. The cru is farmed by five or six producers and certainly one to watch, explore and anticipate the subsequent glory that near-future vintages will bring. Drink 2018-2024. Tasted July 2017 vinchiovaglioserra @vinchiovaglio @VinchioVaglioSerra

Viticoltori Associati Vinchio Vaglio Serra Barbera d’Asti Superiore Nizza DOC Laudana 2012, Piedmont, Italy (Winery, WineAlign)

Laudana is a warm and inviting barbera, dark with an ambling, rusty variegate, almost traditionally rustic but with a silky texture. Its notes play sweet and sour red fruits, namely raspberry and its constitution is right proper Nizza with the sort of traditional feel to demand not just attention but a raison d’être that says,”grant us our own DOCG.” It’s a dusty and vinous affair, like fully realized merlot with elevated alcohol, acidity and good phenolic ripeness. A solid, unafraid and unabashed barbera to represent the denomination with confidence and poise. Drink 2017-2019. Tasted July 2017

Azienda Agricola Ivaldi Dario Barbera d’Asti Superiore Nizza DOCG “1613” 2014, Piedmont, Italy (Winery, WineAlign)

Ivaldi Dario’s barbera captures the honesty, clarity and purity of Nizza Monferrato, from grapes grown on clay-limestone soils and from vines 50 years of age. This perfectly suited barbera was aged in large Slavonian oak barrels and in 2014 turned out lithe and beautiful at 13.5 per cent. It’s tart as it should be, recounting a brief bit of tradition, earthiness and volatility. This is the most decent and convivial barbera of the lot, from longer, slower maceration with less pump overs and no unnecessary barriques aging. The lighter hue is vintage related but also house-curated, not to (re) mention classic styling. Picked early? Perhaps. Most important is that it is progressively hands-off, proper and most appreciated winemaking to celebrate a white limestone terroir. Drink 2018-2023. Tasted July 2017 andrea.ivaldi @ivaldidario @vinidelmonferrato

Azienda Agricola Ivaldi Dario Barbera d’Asti Superiore Nizza DOC “1613” 2012, Piedmont, Italy (Winery, WineAlign)

Few persuasions in the schemes of wine assessments are more fascinating to study than vintage variation, always great signs and portents from the fringe growing regions of the world. Monferrato is one such place, affected by swings in climatic conditions from year to year, raised here in magnification through the lens of Andrea Ivaldi’s multi-faceted barbera. The depth and structure in this ’12 is so contrary to the bright eyed ’14, now richer and almost brooding, even for Nizza. Ivaldi is a house with a self-predicated idiosyncrasy but here it speaks with Nizza style, perhaps antithetically reflexive but still with fruit that echoes from its manifest gaze into a mirror. Andrea makes exactly what the vintage gives, with blacker than red fruit bruised with a variegated hematoma and yet layered with a mineral underlap from that white limestone hill. As an arrangement it’s bigger than even he would likely have wanted to fashion but he’s a pragmatic winemaker who had to pick his fruit by September 20th. Do the math and see the forest for the trees. Drink 2017-2022. Tasted July 2017

Berta Paolo Barbera d’Asti Superiore Nizza DOCG La Berta 2014, Piedmont, Italy (Winery, WineAlign)

The Berta family wine estate dates back to 1842 with vineyards located between the areas of Monferrato and Langa. Their Nizza barbera d’asti is aged in large 500L oak barrels, lending a perfume that lingers long after this textured wine has stretched into the long aftertaste. Berta’s is quite a warm, rich, welling and dense example, fine liquid grainy, weighty and youthfully cumbersome. Having been afforded the opportunity to taste some older examples later the same day really put this one into perspective and provided a deeper understanding of Nizza structure. Drink 2018-2022. Tasted July 2017 vinifamigliaberta @wineBerta @viniberta

Berta Paolo Barbera d’Asti Superiore Nizza DOC La Berta 2011, Piedmont, Italy (Winery, WineAlign)

The Nizza DOCG was added to Asti’s barbera portfolio in 2014 so this predates the appellative status, though for real intents and purposes this ’11 serves the same purpose. From a hotter than hot summer though the aromatics hide the thought and so you would never know just how warm it was. The palate speaks a different story with a deep-seated liqueur distilled from the top of the Berta Paolo terroir, a 40-70 year old set of plantings at Il Bricco, “The kettle” vineyard, 270 meters above sea level. The veins of this plot stretched over the hill of San Michele at Nizza Monferrato are the reason for Berta Paola’s distinct barbera texture. In 2011 this translates to a creamy, dreamy, suave and fine leathery parochial wine. Another example to set up one’s mind to realize what later vintages will turn out to be. Drink 2017-2022. Tasted July 2017

If 2014 is anything like 2008 the future will shine on #famigliaberta #barberadasti @ilnizza Riserva #progettovino #collisionimonferrato

Berta Paolo Barbera d’Asti Superiore Nizza DOC La Berta 2008, Piedmont, Italy (Winery, WineAlign)

More traditional than ever, partly and certainly because of age but also in an era that predates the level of current Nizza Monferrato understanding. This travels into a secondary, present state savour with the still flowing liqueur of the San Michele terroir. Speaks an older school, barrel-influenced vernacular, of a chocolate and vanilla vocabulary with an edge of Brett and volatility. Character from another time and quite persistent in voice. Drink 2017-2018. Tasted July 2017

Villa Giada Barbera d’Asti Superiore Nizza DOCG Bricco Dani 2014, Piedmont, Italy (Winery, WineAlign)

Here from Andrea Faccio struts with great confidence the dark, hematic, ferric and brooding barbera. A very serious Nizza, mercury rising, full on chocolate, espresso and an oily tar, imagining a nebbiolo-like modernity that places this in a stylistic and über-specific category. High acidity, some grainy tannin and sharp finishings so this needs some time. More than any other thus far in the Nizza DOCG flights. Drink 2019-2024. Tasted July 2017 villagiadawine Andrea Faccio

Bava Barbera d’Asti Superiore Nizza DOCG Pianoalto 2014, Piedmont, Italy (Winery, WineAlign)

A large (500L) barrel aging, this is highly, beautifully perfumed, restrained and deliciously tart. Savoury, herbal and tomato leaf herbal, from a hill with a crest, “the high plain,” or plateau. A current of currants, bell pepper and really ripe acidity. This is the most proper use of barrels, generous but exceptional. The most energy of all, modern and yet somehow classic, even traditional. Drink 2018-2025. Tasted July 2017 bavawinery @bavawinery @bava.winery

Bava Barbera d’Asti Superiore Nizza DOC Pianoalto 2007, Piedmont, Italy (Winery, WineAlign)

Barbera’s secondary moments are upon the 10 year-old Pianoalto though the wine still slides across the palate with creamy barrel texture. Notes of fig and prune are a case of a hot and dry vintage with very low yields. The nose has matured into a perfume only lifted now by the persistence of barbera’s elevated acidity so this continues to fly at a decent altitude. It’s quite perfect at the ripe old age. Drink 2017-2020. Tasted July 2017

Bava Barbera d’Asti Superiore Nizza DOC Pianoalto 2001, Piedmont, Italy (Winery, WineAlign)

Certainly showing its age at 16 and perhaps not as long-lasting due to what was at the time a middle of the road sort of vintage. It was a low and slow, no real heat to speak of, natural and organically rendered season so the wine has in turn done the same in kind. Now into the tertiary it has little to no bite or reason to put up a fight. What does persist is a chocolate, espresso and spice sprinkling, then down towards a slightly sharp, tart and done with it finish. Tannins are now only woody but all in all it’s a curious and worthy look back at turn of the century Nizza. Drink 2017-2018. Tasted July 2017

La Gironda Barbera d’Asti Nizza DOCG Le Nicchie 2014, Piedmont, Italy (Winery, WineAlign)

A barbera return to dark fruit, glycerin into texture across a silky smooth palate. From old vines, many exceeding 50 years. Real concentration and developed fruit with an underlay of stone and clay. It’s rich and intense but not dense, warm but not searing. Everything rising but cresting, on a plateau where it can be handled. Structure is clear and obvious. Take this one deep into the cellar. Drink 2018-2025. Tasted July 2017 la_gironda @LaGironda Susanna Galandrino

La Gironda Barbera d’Asti Nizza DOC Le Nicchie 2011, Piedmont, Italy (Winery, WineAlign)

The vintage for Le Nicchie is deep, dark and handsome, with fruit woven into texture rich and thick, with lots of wood and lit-scented herbs. Smells like rosemary and thyme stalks thrown on an open flame. It’s also almost impossibly silky and smooth while in management of quite refined acidity and tannin. Very polished Nizza barbera. Drink 2019-2023. Tasted July 2017

La Gironda Barbera d’Asti Nizza DOC Le Nicchie 2007, Piedmont, Italy (Winery, WineAlign)

La Gironda’s is yet another 2007 that exhibits very high acidity. It was in fact a hot vintage that concentrated fruit but also that omniscient barbera acidity. Seems very young, almost impulsively so. The flavours are of an extreme Nizza variety, like a slice of Cru cake (in this case Le Nicchie) swimming in a syrupy pool of its own deeply reduced demi-glacé. For fans of barbera density with haute couture style and this is how this house does what they do best. Drink 2017-2020. Tasted July 2017

La Gironda Barbera d’Asti Nizza DOC Le Nicchie 2003, Piedmont, Italy (Winery, WineAlign)

As hot as a vintage like 2007 might have been it held no fingertip burning candle to the likes of the scorcher of 2003. In the case of La Gironda and its Le Nicchie Cru the heat played right into the hands of the house style. This is quite a remarkable specimen because despite the warmth and the time elapsed this barbera is just in the early throes of secondary life, so the level of structure is quite astounding. The heavy wood aspect fully renders in chocolate tones piqued with spice. The combinative use of barriques and tonneaux has struck an accord and this still clings to viable life even if it’s quite the molten chocolate bomb. Drink 2017-2019. Tasted July 2017

Tenuta Olim Bauda Barbera d’Asti Superiore Nizza DOCG 2014, Piedmont, Italy (Winery, WineAlign)

Few barbera from Nizza’s recently appointed DOCG are as polished as Gianni Bertolino’s ’14, a long developed piemontese that spent two years in large barrels. The fruit is really ripe, pushed to the limit of the vintage but just cresting at the edge of dried fruit and the tawny, figgy spectrum. Wild strawberry keeps it fruity and earthy, acidity is round and still in charge, thankfully, for the building and beguiling effect of great structure. Drink 2018-2022. Tasted July 2017 tenuta_olimbauda hobbsandcompany @tenutaolimbauda @hobbsandco @tenutaolimbauda.it hobbsandcompany

Tenuta Olim Bauda Barbera d’Asti Superiore Nizza Doc 2011, Piedmont, Italy (SAQ 11383570, $37.50, WineAlign)

From a hot vintage, especially in summer but the warmth was managed by enough cool nights. Gianni Bertolino tells me about picking on acidity, not sugar, in mid-September. Here is the generous, extremely fresh, tart and silky barbera. A seriously classy, chic, racy and almost perfectly modern wine, very much an acumen-acquiesced and benchmark leader for the Nizza appellation. Drink 2017-2023. Tasted July 2017

Tenuta Olim Bauda Barbera d’Asti Superiore Nizza Doc 2010, Piedmont, Italy (SAQ 11383570, $37.50, WineAlign)

Earlier in the day it was Gianni Bertolino who commented on barbera from Nizza being a six-year wine. His 2010 must have hit its stride at just about exactly the six year mark because here in its seventh just the beginnings of secondary character are showing their tell tale signs. It’s in cantilever mode, stretching out over the barbera abyss, unfurling its wings and truly opening to reveal its charms. Though the acidity still burns, churns and plays devil’s advocate to the depth of fruit and territory, the wood has melted enough to reign in that sapidity and balance is coming into order. It may come as a surprise to find the acidity warm but no longer sharpening its stone but where chocolate, dried fruit (namely plum) and spice are concerned this will be the result. Yet so much life persists in this ubiquitously defined cru of a Nizza. Drink 2017-2022. Tasted July 2017

Cantina Tre Secoli Barbera d’Asti Superiore Nizza DOCG 2014, Piedmont, Italy (Winery, WineAlign)

Cooperative rendered barbera, aged for one year in small barrels. Soil is equally spread across several vineyards, from a rock, sand and loam accrue. Amenable, approachable, warm and vibrant acidity, dark fruit and negligible tannin. Some sweetness, black cherry, berry and fig. Drink 2017-2020. Tasted July 2017 #cantinatresecoli @TRESECOLI @tresecoli1887

Cantina Tre Secoli Barbera d’Asti Superiore Nizza DOCG 2011, Piedmont, Italy (Winery, WineAlign)

It takes but a sip of the Tre Secoli 2011 to gain an understanding in comparison as to where the afore-tasted 2014 is heading. Few Nizza barbera swim with such full on chocolate and dried fruit depth and while the kinship resemblance between the two wines is uncanny, the heat of this ’11 vintage has brought on some fully realized evolution. The richness is all in, drying out and truffles are just around the next bend. Drink 2017-2019. Tasted July 2017

A quadrato of big, bold and balanced @MarcoBonfante70 #barberadasti @ilNizza Bricco Bonfante #progettovino #collisionimonferrato

Marco Bonfante Barbera d’Asti Superiore Riserva Nizza DOCG Bricco Bonfante 2014, Piedmont, Italy (Winery, WineAlign)

In the hills of Nizza and Val di Sacca, Bonfante takes a deferential approach with some drying of the grapes for a handful of days, but unlike the three to four months as in Amarone. His fruit is aged in a combination of small and large oak barrels for 20 months. The extra concentration leads to higher sugar content and therefore elevated (15-16 per cent) alcohol but the wine is vinified dry. Sourced from the Bricco, top of the hill on calcareous clay marl. In the end this is a thick, viscous, shaken but certainly refined and balanced barbera in its large format, unabashed and even braggart style. Drink 2019-2026. Tasted July 2017 marcobonfantewinery @MarcoBonfante70 @MarcoBonfanteWinery

Marco Bonfante Barbera d’Asti Superiore Riserva Nizza DOC Bricco Bonfante 2012, Piedmont, Italy (Winery, WineAlign)

Bricco Bonfante is the one and a half hectare family vineyard though it’s not necessary to label the wine “vigna.” Bricco works just fine. Now the comparison (to the barbera d’asti Superiore) becomes clear because the silk and elegance is noted in clean and pure Nizza. The 5,500 density of vines producing 4,000 bottles works out mathematically to 800 grams of fruit per plant, a number nothing short of ridiculous economics. With necessity the mother of invention the quality must run high and so 24 months in new barriques is bequeathed the precious fruit. The bricco exalted is the origin of the barbera that delivers prescience, presence and a preciseness of being. The hill is the thing, the vineyard its totem, the hot vintage adding heat early and on repeat, at 15.5 degrees alcohol (declared) so ripe, so big and with structure so in control. Drink 2019-2027. Tasted July 2017

Marco Bonfante Barbera d’Asti Superiore Riserva Nizza DOC Bricco Bonfante 2011, Piedmont, Italy (Winery, WineAlign)

The vintage is in fact not so completely unlike the 2012 if perhaps a step taken back, away from power, terribilita and the heat. The palate has already begun to relent into a Nizza meets Bricco Bonfante sweetness and the tannins have resolved one notch down to a point closer to understanding. As a result there is more polish to Marco’s 2011 and a finer layer of silk. Here for the first time there is this purity of dark cherries mixed into the finest chocolate and a touch of secondary character development in balsamic. Should be good to go this time next year. Drink 2018-2024. Tasted July 2017

Marco Bonfante Barbera d’Asti Superiore Riserva Nizza DOC Bricco Bonfante 2010, Piedmont, Italy (Winery, WineAlign)

Travelling in reverse down along a Marco Bonfante vertical is a most interesting exercise and makes so much sense. The 2010 is so similar to 2011, even more than how that ’11 compares with 2012. The fruit in ’10 is less pitchy, in delivery of red to black berries (or black raspberry to be precise) and yet the silky thread runs through the red. The same 24 months in new barriques sends this reeling into the plum chocolate pudding as a veritable bomb of a Nizza barbera. There are some who might find the stylistic overbearing, weighty and dense. They would not be wrong but they would be missing the Bricco point, of a matter that comes from the top of the hill with lowest of the low yields out of a rarity of rarities vineyard. There is no denying the acumen and the ambition but also, mostly the necessity. Drink 2017-2021. Tasted July 2017

Marco Bonfante Barbera d’Asti Superiore Riserva Nizza DOC Bricco Bonfante 2009, Piedmont, Italy (Winery, WineAlign)

It was beginning to look like no matter how far back you travel in a Bricco Bonfante Nizza vertical there would be no signs of evolution, that is until you hit this 2009. Here the first to begin an inkling into secondary notes, if only the etchings of spice symbols and wood derived pericopes. There is also a faint, around the corner idea of tar and candied roses, or perhaps they’ve already begun to join the scented party. I find this 2009 quite cru Barolo-like and it’s interesting to note that this was Marco’s first Nizza Bricco. It also happens to be the one with the most apparent fruit, or perhaps time is the factor needed for such a reveal. It travels from red to black and back. Really quite amazing. Drink 2017-2021. Tasted July 2017

Godello, Michele Longo, Michaela Morris and Dr. Michael Apstein

L’Armangia Barbera d’Asti Superiore Nizza DOC Titon 2013, Piedmont, Italy (Winery, WineAlign)

Titon is a blend of three estate vineyards planted between 1934 and 1990. The plots are also a mix of exposures; southeast, east and west, with warm temperatures abundant throughout. This barbera runs a fever of acidity, doles out plenty of chocolate, has yet to fully integrate its wood and is truly well made Nizza. Drink 2017-2019. Tasted July 2017 armangia.giuly @LARMANGIA

L’Armangia Barbera d’Asti Superiore Nizza DOC Vignali 2011, Piedmont, Italy (Winery, WineAlign)

Vignali is the single-vineyard barbera from the estate vineyard planted in 1934. An approximate 24 months of barrel aging is performed before it then ages in bottle for a further 24 months. At first there are the new 300L oak casks, then small 130L barrels for 12 months and finally large casks for 10-12 months more. Well, all this to say that Vignali is fully involved in its secondary stage of life. It is a most mature barbera, with the three holy trinity tenets of chocolate, balsamic and high level acidity all working as one. The soil and barbera tang is fully felt. Drink 2017-2019. Tasted July 2017

L’Armangia Barbera d’Asti Superiore Nizza DOC Vignali 2010, Piedmont, Italy (Winery, WineAlign)

A later harvest developed riper fruit with higher phenolics and with seven years under its belt that fruit is drying nicely. Chocolate as always with figs, raisins, apricots and as expected balsamic, though here with a shot of dark espresso. All of the above on repeat and that big barbera acidity. Drink 2017-2018. Tasted July 2017

Going back to @ilNizza for a lesson in what tomorrow will bring @Coppo1892 Grazie Luigi #barbera #barberadasti #riservadellafamiglia

Coppo Barbera d’Asti Nizza Superiore DOC Riserva di Famiglia 2009, Piedmont, Italy (Agent, $74.95, WineAlign)

From a small cru located in Castelnuovo Calcea, born in 1998, “a project, not only a wine,” explains Luigi Coppo. Only produced in the best vintages, the previous being 2007 and the next will be 2010, though this ’09 is undoubtedly the finest. “It’s not a wine of economics,” continues Coppo, but a single-vineyard expression for people to think outside the barbera box. It shares less history than Pomorosso and thus the reason why it is only selected from very specific vintages, “to work on the craft.” Few if any Barbera d’Asti carry such precision and presence. It’s adult candy, wise and layered, the key to making great barbera right here, in this texture. Expertly woven are fruit, wood and acidity so that all are blended, with no ego, nothing taken for granted, all in balance. Drink 2017-2027. Tasted July 2017 coppo1892 maitredechai_ca @COPPO1892 @maitredechai @COPPO1892 Le Maître de Chai

Coppo Barbera d’Asti Nizza Superiore DOC Riserva di Famiglia 2007, Piedmont, Italy (Agent, WineAlign)

Higher acidity in 2007 and alcohol pushing at 15.3 per cent (as opposed to 14.7 in 2009) don’t mean the world has come to end but it does make for an electric Nizza barbera. Even then Coppo could be pragmatic when it was called for so the wood use in this barbera was increased, to soak up some of that fantasy and see if the components could strike a balance in accord. You can really sense the fineness of silk on the palate. Still so beautifully managed, or rather you can intuit looking ahead 10 years from signsin this 2007 how in future vintages the winemaker will know how to manage the realities of vintage variable acidities, through the adjustments in wood and how that will determine the levels of tannin. Drink 2017-2019. Tasted July 2017.

Borgo Isolabella Delle Croce Barbera d’Asti Superiore Nizza Doc Augusta 2009, Piedmont, Italy (Winery, WineAlign)

All the Isolabella wines receive a girl’s name, in this instance Augusta, a vineyard selection from a couple of sites on each side of the village limits and named after the proprietor’s sister. The estate produces only 90,000 bottles, each highly specialized and this barbera comes out of the highly prized vintage. In retrospect and with the fortune to taste several 2009s in one walkabout it is now obvious that the season bequeathed the gift of age on its wines. Great because of an extra fineness of acidity from a grape that always gives this way but in Isolabella’s 2009 there is this cool, savoury, reserved character, not unusual but balanced in equal opposition to the strength of perfume and body. A delicato is expressed in what may be referred to as an ultra-über special 2009. Drink 2017-2025. Tasted July 2017 isolabelladellacroce2001 @ISOLABELLA_D_C_ @isolabelladellecroce

A deep #eredichiappone vertical delve with Daniele for perspective and a release of endorphins @ilNizza possibilities #progrettovini #collisionimonferrato

Erede Di Chiappone Barbera d’Asti Superiore Nizza DOC RU 2011, Piedmont, Italy (Winery, WineAlign)

Daniele Chiappone’s 2011 is his richest, warmest, most wood affected barbera replete with an armament of spice. While still in the care of its 16 per cent alcohol frame it is a most underdeveloped specimen but because it’s so big and burly it can’t help but reek, ooze and sweat out the aching masala of aromatics. In talking with Daniele he fully admits this to be the vintage of great demand and pressure so he simply made the wine it asked for. I liken this to Amarone from vintages like 2010 and 2011, unavoidable and so a great winemaker will simply do what must be done and try to seek out balance in a bold and crazy world. With fine acidity void of spikes, peaks and valleys Chappione puts this barbera in a state of equilibrium however high the plain may be. Give this two years minimum to integrate and match it with some lean venison over a bed of tangy polenta. Drink 2019-2027. Tasted July 2017

Erede Di Chiappone Barbera d’Asti Superiore Nizza DOC RU 2010, Piedmont, Italy (Winery, WineAlign)

Chappione’s 2010 is barbera of a powerful maturation and its polyphenolics are quite different than those from 2011. The hard skins, noted by Daniele as pelli durissime might lead to a personality ostinata impermeabilità but a longer maceration broke them down, turned the opposite around to make them flexible and permeable. Though still tightly wound and not yet pliant this precise and very present 2010 of intrinsic structural value will make use of another year in bottle to soften its pertinacious fibres. When it opens up it will bloom, but ever so slowly, over a 15-20 year plan. Its crazy legs, choice acidities and quality tannins will all conspire towards longevity of the indiction degree. Drink 2019-2027. Tasted July 2017

Erede Di Chiappone Barbera d’Asti Superiore Nizza DOC RU 2006, Piedmont, Italy (Winery, WineAlign)

Erede Di Chiappone Barbera d’Asti Superiore Nizza DOC RU 2005, Piedmont, Italy (Winery, WineAlign)

The vintage was a tough one with some hail and difficult to get the grapes into a state of full maturity. It’s amazing how winemakers remember every painful moment of a vintage like 2005 and Daniele Chiappone recalls picking in the first week of October. While that may not be wholly unusual for the RU cru it is quite a late Piemonte harvest. This RU carries deep, dark depth in currant fruit, in a realm where cabernet franc hooks up with nebbiolo and sires a love child. Side by side with 2010 it is really just the quality of tannins that truly sets the two apart and here the chemical reactions in the natural world bring about spice; cinnamon, star anise and then this eminence of Chiappone acidity. In Nizza it is this speciality that is both singular and distinct that creates such a structured feeling of éclat, or in the case of Chiappone, fulgore. Drink 2017-2022. Tasted July 2017

Il contingente canadese @Collisioni #nizza #barberalovers #represent #progettovino #piemonte

Thanks for reading up on the wines of Barbera d’Asti and Nizza Monferrato. Let’s all hope we begin to see more options in both categories made available here in Ontario. A special thanks to Ian D’Agata, Michele Longo, Michaela Morris, Giulia Corino and the entire Collisioni crew.

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Godello

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