Agriculture Reference
In-Depth Information
though at times truly outstanding and always
interesting, never combine structure with per-
fumed, fruity charm, which is a major selling
point of great Barolo or Barbaresco. Though
most people tend to think of wines such as
Barolo and Barbaresco as tannic, ageworthy
brutes, in reality great Nebbiolo wines are para-
gons of grace and perfumed refi nement. True,
they are always marked by high acidity and
assertive tannins, though I think their struc-
ture and size have always been excessively char-
acterized. Certainly any wine made with Caber-
net Sauvignon—a great grape variety—isn't
any less tannic than one made with Nebbiolo,
but I fi nd wines made with the latter have a
gracefulness and refi nement that the former
can only dream of. One whiff of a great Barolo's
or Barbaresco's intense aromas of red rose and
sour red cherry and you're hooked for life; but
the same degree of depth and substance is
inevitably lacking in wines born from the sand-
ier soils of the Roero, and elegance is
desapare-
cido
in hot places like Sardinia or some areas of
California.
As most wine lovers know, there are many
other great, if different, Nebbiolo wines, made
in the Roero, a viticultural zone hugging the
left side of the Tanaro River, opposite the
Langhe. Though there is geological variability
in the Roero, a good portion of its soils are far
sandier than those of the Langhe, and so these
Nebbiolo wines will offer more perfume and
less size. The best Roeros also have enough
creamy fruit to avoid tasting excessively aus-
tere, which is a fl aw I fi nd in a number of Roero
bottlings. Roero is a much cooler and wilder
area than the Langhe: most of the vineyards are
still surrounded by forests (hardly the case in
the Langhe, where entire wooded areas have
been eliminated over the years in order to plant
more vineyards). Further complicating mat-
ters, Roero vineyards are planted on steeper
slopes and therefore late-ripening Nebbiolo
doesn't ripen fully every year. Even in the Roero
though doing a little homework will greatly
increase your chances of buying a wine you'll
like. For example, generally the soils of Monteu
Roero are richer in sand and those around Cas-
tagnito richer in clay, while the Canale area has
soils that combine elements of both. It follows
that similarly made wines from similarly grown
grapes from these three subzones are bound to
be very different.
In these times of climate change the less
well-known Nebbiolo wines of Piedmont's
cooler northeastern sector are becoming
increasingly sought after. Wines to look for from
the northeast are Bramaterra, Gattinara, Boca,
Lessona, Ghemme, and Fara, though most of
the time they contain various percentages of
other local grapes such as Croatina, Vespolina,
Uva Rara, and others (though pure versions do
exist, and they are outstanding). In Valle
d'Aosta, don't miss out on Donnas, perhaps the
least known of all the great Nebbiolo-based
wines (here also local varieties may be included
in the blend), while in Lombardy the best and
richest is Sfursat, made from air-dried Nebbiolo
grapes in the manner of Amarone. Sfursat is
smooth and velvety just like the famous Ama-
rone; because of Nebbiolo's presence it is also
more refi ned and lighter styled, though “light”
is a very relative term with Sfursat and all Neb-
biolo wines. A well-made Barolo or Barbaresco
is one of the world's greatest wines, character-
ized by an amazingly intense and penetrating
aroma of red roses and sour red cherries, com-
plicated by light sweet spices and especially tar
with bottle age. Even nebbiolos, the entry-level
version of Barolo or Barbaresco, are unbelievably
wonderful food wines. Nebbiolos are wines
made from grapes that often are grown in an
area that would allow the producer to make a
Barolo or a Barbaresco, but instead are used to
make a simpler, inexpensive wine (most often
because the vines are still young). Other times a
vintage isn't particularly great and so producers
prefer to downgrade their Roero, Lessona, Gat-
tinara, Barolo, or Barbaresco to simple nebbiolo
status in an effort to protect the image of their
best-known wines.
There are many
grand crus
for Nebbiolo, and
given the variety's penchant for site specifi city
and capacity to translate even minute soil
