Barolo 2010: A First Look
I recently spent a few days in Piedmont getting a head start on my annual look at the latest vintage releases, which in this case are the very highly touted 2010s in Barolo. While the vintage is shaping up to be special, two thoughts did occur to me.
The first was that these are generally not user friendly wines. They are tough, a bit mean, lacking in baby fat, but with exceptional balance and structural grace.
The second, was that 2011, a vintage thought of as another hot vintage, shows little of that hot character and may very well be the best ‘hot’ vintage since 1990. I loved what I tasted, and since those wines will not be released for another year, let’s focus on the vintage du jour for now.
We can begin with Brovia where the 2010s have decided to become a bunch of tough as nails sons of bitches. The 2011s at Brovia are gorgeous, incredible fruit and perfume with structure that I have never seen in a warm vintage. Truly terrific wines and the personality of each cru was so vivid, really exciting wines that should be fabulous relatively early on.
I noticed the same perfume to the fruit at Vietti and G Conterno last year. 2011 was a warm vintage but it's better than the previous warm vintages. Think 1990 not 2009. Unlike many other warm vintages these 11s have plenty of color, terrific colors in fact, which is an oddity. I'm allocating funds for both vintages, though on a 2 to 1 or even three to one basis.
2010 Garblet sue is the best example of that cru I've ever had. The other three are also standouts but perhaps not as far ahead of previous vintages. No doubt about it these are special wines, and while I’m not saying that if you missed the 89 and 90 Giacosas this might be your chance to grab back to back vintages of great crus that will be as legendary some day, I’m prepared to get awfully close to that statement.
Grasso's 2010s are lovely. The Chiniera much more feminine and attractive today showing great freshness and complexity, spicy and herbal. The Casa Mate decidedly more masculine and a bit less complex. Both show great potential and have a purity of fruit that is compelling, though stylistically a bit on the modern side in that the fruit is incredibly fresh and precise. Not a knock on the wines at all, just a stylistic not, I'm buying both, though more of the Chiniera
It's worth noting that almost every 2010 I've tasted this week has a bit of a vegetal edge to the fruit. These are not going to be easy wines when they are young but have the potential to develop for decades. Sometimes it's more a chinato note, like with the Grasso wines, other times its more camphor and integrates well into very strong floral aromas as is the case with the Einaudi Costa Grimaldi, but it's there.
Einaudi's wines were also very strong. they moved from barrique then botte to half barrique for a year, then blended with the half already in botte. The percentage of new wood has also dropped from 50% to 30%. The wine show more delicacy and lightness than they previously exhibited and the Costa Grimaldi shows this in spades. Their Cannubi is a classic, it lacks the elegance of the Costa Grimaldi but makes up for it with depth of flavor, complexity and classically austere structure. The Costa Grimaldi is cursive with a fine ball point pen, the Cannubi a felt tip marker.
While 2011 may be a mixed vintage for Barolo it premisses to be a great vintage for Barbera and both the Einaudi Vigna Tecc and the Massolino Gisep are packed with incredible fruit, again showing an explosive ripeness and perfumed nature but without any exaggeration or roasted notes that were obvious in vintages like 2007 and 2009.
Massolino's Barolos in 2010 are classic old school Barolo. In need of patience to be sure, but so well delineated and capturing the soil imprint of each cru in Serralunga. Impressively complex and mineral driven on the palate. Their Parussi, from Castiglione north of Montanello and Bricco Boschis, is another powerhouse in 2010, a really fascinating contrast to the learner, more angular crus of Serralunga and an opulent, rich style for Castiglione.
I'm alway a fan of the wines of Guido Porro. They are easy to like as they offer great value but in some vintages he knocks it out of the park. 2010 Lazzairasco is one of those times. The Santa Catarina is lovely, elegant and refined, but the Lazzairasco is just explosive. Tasted 11 and 12 of both out of botte as well, more perfumed fruit from the 11s here, the 12s are so young but show good purity if modest scale.
At Brezza the winery has begun to use native fermentations with both red and white wines in 2010. This is a bit of a departure obviously and while the impact on the 2010 Barolo is rbably pretty small, the wines do seem to lack a bit of the immediacy some previous vintages offered. This is not surprising at all, as native ferments tend to be a bit more mysterious, showing off certain aromas earlier in life, and greater transparency, and less overt fruit. These were solid wine with everything in place to develop well, particularly the Cannubi, and the Saramassa, which in 2010 includes the juice fermented separately for the Bricco Sarmassa bottling. Interesting wines which are showing signs of early drinkability.
Rizzi in Barbaresco was also on my list this visit, a break from all that Barolo! The line-up here in both 2010 and 2011 was very strong. Three crus are produced, the tight, focused nerve, the more classically open and delicate Pajore, and the Boito which is now bottled as a reserve. Both in 2010 and in 2011 the Boito was spectacular. Elegant and powerful. We overlook Barbaresco producers far too often, and wines like this slip by when we're not paying attention. Really lovely efforts.
And let's finish up with Burlotto. As you might know this is one of my favorite producers, so take this with a grain of salt perhaps. The Monvigliero is stunning in 2010, and both the Cannubi and Acclivi are super with such elegance. The Acclivi shows a bit of a smoky note which is a recurring theme in many of the wines of 2010, and I'll get to that in a moment. The prices for these Burlotto wines remain compelling, and the wines, beautiful and traditionally made as they are, somehow still manage to drink well fairly early yet age magnificently for decays. Stock up!
I did also taste a slew of additional bottling from producers, some at ProWein in Germany last week, which helps round out this brief introduction to 2010 Barolo. Allow me to run through them quickly to help frame some closing thoughts.
2010 Pio Cesare Barolo A touchstone of classism, and in 2010 showing a touch more fruit than is typical
2010 Prunotto Barolo - Elegant fresh and almost sweetly fruited but with gorgeously ripe tannins. A textbook Barolo.
2010 Scavino Bric del Fiasc - A bit sweet and toasty with some wood spice soft tannins and easy red fruits.
2010 Vietti Lazzarito - Shows great energy and drive through the palate with unusual transparency and length.
2010 Azelia Margeria - Deep, powerful and intense, this is packed with dark fruit and just a hint of wood spice, but shows terrific balance
2010 Damilano Cannubi - A touch tight and austere, with attractive red fruits.
2010 Cordero di Montezemolo Monfalletto - A bit simple with some sweetness to the fruit and a touch of spice, but the fruit is very attractive and fresh.
So a few conclusions and observations.
First off 2010 was a cool vintage, there was enough accumulated heat to get the fruit ripe, but the character of a cool vintage is imprinted on that ripeness. There are vegetal edges, not as pronounced as with 2008 but adding tension and freshness in the background. There is also a smoky note that some of the wines have. Something that knits together floral and soil perfumes. These are not negatives, but they do show that the character of the vintage is savory as well as fruity.
The fruit, as most of the wines show, is decidedly red fruited and fresh. I noticed red currant notes in many of the wines. Slightly astringent and perhaps indicative of a touch of un-ripe tannin in a cross section of the wines. Again, not a negative per se, just something to be aware of. Unripe tannins may resolve just beautifully, but it takes quite some time. As evidenced by the brilliant performance of a horizontal of 1980 Barolo enjoyed earlier this year.
The vintage seems to have two great strengths, purity and elegance. There are some very powerful wines in 2010 as well, but structurally they are lean and fast, like a racing chassis drilled for weight reduction. Everything is held in place by balance and tension, but these have very little extra padding and like with those race cars that can mean a bit of a brutal ride. There is little buffering material on many of these wines. They seem to already be shutting down, meaning that many of you will be buying on faith. Here’s what you need to know. This should prove to be a long lived, slow ageing vintage. There is plenty of fruit, but it is not obvious and fabulous. For that I would suggest waiting for the 2011s.
These are wines for people who already love Barolo. Understand their ageing trajectory, enjoy austerity, tannin, nuance, promise, and being disappointed. If you want to know what I mean by that, try a couple of 1996 Barolos. 2010 is much in the mold of 1996, another cooler vintage that produced great wines that have had little to say for more than a decade. While the 96s are starting to wake up, and just to make sure I’ll be cracking into a case in the coming months, they still will not supply the hedonistic experience many wine drinkers prefer. Perhaps more than any other wine, Barolo in particularly reveals the shortcomings of the 100 point rating system we have universally adopted. Too many people are buying by points, and not enough are stopping to think about what they are getting themselves into.
I think I’ve given a fair early peek into the vintage, with much more to come after a return to the region in May, but at this point, for the wine market at large I am more excited about the prospects for 2011 than for 2010. Which is not to say that 2011 is a better vintage, though is may very well be preferred by many consumers. It’s just to say that 2010 is a grand, classical vintage that has produced wines that demand ageing, and seem particularly unwilling to compromise in that regard. So be forewarned. Buy carefully. Read everything you can, and speak to trusted retailers, many of whom will be in Piedmont in May as well.
2010 is a tricky vintage, and the bottom line is that many critics mis-read vintages, and then say oops, my bad and the public instantly forgives them. 2008 was a prime example. A vintage that was dismissed as underwhelming only to explode from the glass. I tasted several 2008s during this trip and can report back that their early exuberance, particular aromatically, has faded, the wines are gaining weight, and slowly shutting down. Time has proven though that 2008 is a very good vintage, one to add to one’s cellar. Are they at the level of the 2010s? I don’t think so. Would I trade my 2008s for more 2010s? Not a chance.
That is the bottom line. We obsess over trying to create an artificially hierarchy for wine, but the truth is that 2008, 2010, and 2011 all offer brilliant examples of Nebbiolo as seen through different vintage lens. It is of course a cop out to say buy them all, you are after all looking for some guidance here so let me just end with a word to describe each vintage. Let me know what you think about this single word replacing the idea of scoring, or ranking a vintage. yes it’s easy to say that these three vintages are standouts, and lets just leave it at that. But what do they stand out for?
2008 Elegance
2010 Purity
2011 Fruit
That was harder than I thought, and I’d love to add a few words to each, but for the moment let’s just say that’s all folks. Please let me know if you have any questions, as I would love to continue this conversation with you!
The first was that these are generally not user friendly wines. They are tough, a bit mean, lacking in baby fat, but with exceptional balance and structural grace.
The second, was that 2011, a vintage thought of as another hot vintage, shows little of that hot character and may very well be the best ‘hot’ vintage since 1990. I loved what I tasted, and since those wines will not be released for another year, let’s focus on the vintage du jour for now.
We can begin with Brovia where the 2010s have decided to become a bunch of tough as nails sons of bitches. The 2011s at Brovia are gorgeous, incredible fruit and perfume with structure that I have never seen in a warm vintage. Truly terrific wines and the personality of each cru was so vivid, really exciting wines that should be fabulous relatively early on.
I noticed the same perfume to the fruit at Vietti and G Conterno last year. 2011 was a warm vintage but it's better than the previous warm vintages. Think 1990 not 2009. Unlike many other warm vintages these 11s have plenty of color, terrific colors in fact, which is an oddity. I'm allocating funds for both vintages, though on a 2 to 1 or even three to one basis.
2010 Garblet sue is the best example of that cru I've ever had. The other three are also standouts but perhaps not as far ahead of previous vintages. No doubt about it these are special wines, and while I’m not saying that if you missed the 89 and 90 Giacosas this might be your chance to grab back to back vintages of great crus that will be as legendary some day, I’m prepared to get awfully close to that statement.
Grasso's 2010s are lovely. The Chiniera much more feminine and attractive today showing great freshness and complexity, spicy and herbal. The Casa Mate decidedly more masculine and a bit less complex. Both show great potential and have a purity of fruit that is compelling, though stylistically a bit on the modern side in that the fruit is incredibly fresh and precise. Not a knock on the wines at all, just a stylistic not, I'm buying both, though more of the Chiniera
It's worth noting that almost every 2010 I've tasted this week has a bit of a vegetal edge to the fruit. These are not going to be easy wines when they are young but have the potential to develop for decades. Sometimes it's more a chinato note, like with the Grasso wines, other times its more camphor and integrates well into very strong floral aromas as is the case with the Einaudi Costa Grimaldi, but it's there.
Einaudi's wines were also very strong. they moved from barrique then botte to half barrique for a year, then blended with the half already in botte. The percentage of new wood has also dropped from 50% to 30%. The wine show more delicacy and lightness than they previously exhibited and the Costa Grimaldi shows this in spades. Their Cannubi is a classic, it lacks the elegance of the Costa Grimaldi but makes up for it with depth of flavor, complexity and classically austere structure. The Costa Grimaldi is cursive with a fine ball point pen, the Cannubi a felt tip marker.
While 2011 may be a mixed vintage for Barolo it premisses to be a great vintage for Barbera and both the Einaudi Vigna Tecc and the Massolino Gisep are packed with incredible fruit, again showing an explosive ripeness and perfumed nature but without any exaggeration or roasted notes that were obvious in vintages like 2007 and 2009.
Massolino's Barolos in 2010 are classic old school Barolo. In need of patience to be sure, but so well delineated and capturing the soil imprint of each cru in Serralunga. Impressively complex and mineral driven on the palate. Their Parussi, from Castiglione north of Montanello and Bricco Boschis, is another powerhouse in 2010, a really fascinating contrast to the learner, more angular crus of Serralunga and an opulent, rich style for Castiglione.
I'm alway a fan of the wines of Guido Porro. They are easy to like as they offer great value but in some vintages he knocks it out of the park. 2010 Lazzairasco is one of those times. The Santa Catarina is lovely, elegant and refined, but the Lazzairasco is just explosive. Tasted 11 and 12 of both out of botte as well, more perfumed fruit from the 11s here, the 12s are so young but show good purity if modest scale.
At Brezza the winery has begun to use native fermentations with both red and white wines in 2010. This is a bit of a departure obviously and while the impact on the 2010 Barolo is rbably pretty small, the wines do seem to lack a bit of the immediacy some previous vintages offered. This is not surprising at all, as native ferments tend to be a bit more mysterious, showing off certain aromas earlier in life, and greater transparency, and less overt fruit. These were solid wine with everything in place to develop well, particularly the Cannubi, and the Saramassa, which in 2010 includes the juice fermented separately for the Bricco Sarmassa bottling. Interesting wines which are showing signs of early drinkability.
Rizzi in Barbaresco was also on my list this visit, a break from all that Barolo! The line-up here in both 2010 and 2011 was very strong. Three crus are produced, the tight, focused nerve, the more classically open and delicate Pajore, and the Boito which is now bottled as a reserve. Both in 2010 and in 2011 the Boito was spectacular. Elegant and powerful. We overlook Barbaresco producers far too often, and wines like this slip by when we're not paying attention. Really lovely efforts.
And let's finish up with Burlotto. As you might know this is one of my favorite producers, so take this with a grain of salt perhaps. The Monvigliero is stunning in 2010, and both the Cannubi and Acclivi are super with such elegance. The Acclivi shows a bit of a smoky note which is a recurring theme in many of the wines of 2010, and I'll get to that in a moment. The prices for these Burlotto wines remain compelling, and the wines, beautiful and traditionally made as they are, somehow still manage to drink well fairly early yet age magnificently for decays. Stock up!
I did also taste a slew of additional bottling from producers, some at ProWein in Germany last week, which helps round out this brief introduction to 2010 Barolo. Allow me to run through them quickly to help frame some closing thoughts.
2010 Pio Cesare Barolo A touchstone of classism, and in 2010 showing a touch more fruit than is typical
2010 Prunotto Barolo - Elegant fresh and almost sweetly fruited but with gorgeously ripe tannins. A textbook Barolo.
2010 Scavino Bric del Fiasc - A bit sweet and toasty with some wood spice soft tannins and easy red fruits.
2010 Vietti Lazzarito - Shows great energy and drive through the palate with unusual transparency and length.
2010 Azelia Margeria - Deep, powerful and intense, this is packed with dark fruit and just a hint of wood spice, but shows terrific balance
2010 Damilano Cannubi - A touch tight and austere, with attractive red fruits.
2010 Cordero di Montezemolo Monfalletto - A bit simple with some sweetness to the fruit and a touch of spice, but the fruit is very attractive and fresh.
So a few conclusions and observations.
First off 2010 was a cool vintage, there was enough accumulated heat to get the fruit ripe, but the character of a cool vintage is imprinted on that ripeness. There are vegetal edges, not as pronounced as with 2008 but adding tension and freshness in the background. There is also a smoky note that some of the wines have. Something that knits together floral and soil perfumes. These are not negatives, but they do show that the character of the vintage is savory as well as fruity.
The fruit, as most of the wines show, is decidedly red fruited and fresh. I noticed red currant notes in many of the wines. Slightly astringent and perhaps indicative of a touch of un-ripe tannin in a cross section of the wines. Again, not a negative per se, just something to be aware of. Unripe tannins may resolve just beautifully, but it takes quite some time. As evidenced by the brilliant performance of a horizontal of 1980 Barolo enjoyed earlier this year.
The vintage seems to have two great strengths, purity and elegance. There are some very powerful wines in 2010 as well, but structurally they are lean and fast, like a racing chassis drilled for weight reduction. Everything is held in place by balance and tension, but these have very little extra padding and like with those race cars that can mean a bit of a brutal ride. There is little buffering material on many of these wines. They seem to already be shutting down, meaning that many of you will be buying on faith. Here’s what you need to know. This should prove to be a long lived, slow ageing vintage. There is plenty of fruit, but it is not obvious and fabulous. For that I would suggest waiting for the 2011s.
These are wines for people who already love Barolo. Understand their ageing trajectory, enjoy austerity, tannin, nuance, promise, and being disappointed. If you want to know what I mean by that, try a couple of 1996 Barolos. 2010 is much in the mold of 1996, another cooler vintage that produced great wines that have had little to say for more than a decade. While the 96s are starting to wake up, and just to make sure I’ll be cracking into a case in the coming months, they still will not supply the hedonistic experience many wine drinkers prefer. Perhaps more than any other wine, Barolo in particularly reveals the shortcomings of the 100 point rating system we have universally adopted. Too many people are buying by points, and not enough are stopping to think about what they are getting themselves into.
I think I’ve given a fair early peek into the vintage, with much more to come after a return to the region in May, but at this point, for the wine market at large I am more excited about the prospects for 2011 than for 2010. Which is not to say that 2011 is a better vintage, though is may very well be preferred by many consumers. It’s just to say that 2010 is a grand, classical vintage that has produced wines that demand ageing, and seem particularly unwilling to compromise in that regard. So be forewarned. Buy carefully. Read everything you can, and speak to trusted retailers, many of whom will be in Piedmont in May as well.
2010 is a tricky vintage, and the bottom line is that many critics mis-read vintages, and then say oops, my bad and the public instantly forgives them. 2008 was a prime example. A vintage that was dismissed as underwhelming only to explode from the glass. I tasted several 2008s during this trip and can report back that their early exuberance, particular aromatically, has faded, the wines are gaining weight, and slowly shutting down. Time has proven though that 2008 is a very good vintage, one to add to one’s cellar. Are they at the level of the 2010s? I don’t think so. Would I trade my 2008s for more 2010s? Not a chance.
That is the bottom line. We obsess over trying to create an artificially hierarchy for wine, but the truth is that 2008, 2010, and 2011 all offer brilliant examples of Nebbiolo as seen through different vintage lens. It is of course a cop out to say buy them all, you are after all looking for some guidance here so let me just end with a word to describe each vintage. Let me know what you think about this single word replacing the idea of scoring, or ranking a vintage. yes it’s easy to say that these three vintages are standouts, and lets just leave it at that. But what do they stand out for?
2008 Elegance
2010 Purity
2011 Fruit
That was harder than I thought, and I’d love to add a few words to each, but for the moment let’s just say that’s all folks. Please let me know if you have any questions, as I would love to continue this conversation with you!