2016 Bartolo Mascarello Barolo Magnum
How does this wine taste?
How full and heavy the wine feels in your mouth, like the difference between skimmed milk and cream. More alcohol, sugar and oak ageing make a wine fuller.
The drying, grippy feel on your gums and tongue, as with strong tea. It comes from the skins and seeds of black grapes and from oak, and softens with age.
How much sugar you taste, from dry to sweet. Fruity is not the same as sweet: a dry wine can taste of ripe fruit.
How fresh and juicy the wine is: acidity makes your mouth water. High acidity tastes lively and refreshing, low acidity soft and round.
What we taste What you taste Click a taste for what it means
The bars follow how sommeliers taste (WSET): body, tannin, sweetness and acidity, each from low to high.
Body: powerful. Like most red wines from ; 14.5% alcohol.
Tannin: tannic. From ; aged in oak.
Sweetness: dry. Red wine from is almost always dry.
Acidity: high. from the temperate climate of .
Aromas: earthy notes, flowers and spice, typical of
Made: in , aged at least 38 months, 18 of them in wood
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Log inBartolo Mascarello is a legendary winery in Barolo, Piedmont, known for its dedication to traditional winemaking methods. Founded in the 1920s by Bartolo's father, Giulio Mascarello, it has become a symbol of elegance, authenticity and craftsmanship in the world of Barolo wines. Bartolo Mascarello stands for craftsmanship and purity. They avoid modernist techniques such as new French oak barriques or micro-oxygenation. Instead, they use large Slavonian oak barrels (botti grandi) for longer aging, which creates delicate tannins and layered complexity. The winery produces a limited amount of wine of around 25,000 bottles annually, making its wines rare and sought-after.
The grapes come from prestigious cru vineyards such as Cannubi, San Lorenzo, Rue and Rocche dell'Annunziata. The grapes are all vinified as a blend, which emphasizes balance and harmony rather than individual cru expressions.
The Barolo 2016 from Bartolo Mascarello is considered one of the most exceptional vintages in the recent history of Barolo. The 2016 vintage offered perfect growing conditions: a cool spring followed by a warm, dry summer and an ideal harvest period. This resulted in wines with impressive balance, structure and ageing potential. The 2016 vintage was awarded the maximum 100 out of 100 points by Parker.
Colour: Bright garnet red, typical of Nebbiolo grapes.
Nose: A complex bouquet of rose petals, violets, cherries, blueberries, dried herbs and a hint of tar. Subtle earthy and mineral notes add depth.
Taste: The wine is elegant and powerful, with fine, structured tannins. Red berries and cherries dominate, together with hints of tobacco, truffle and spices. The wine has a lively acidity, which provides freshness and an exceptionally long finish.
The Barolo 2016 can be enjoyed now after decanting, but has excellent ageing potential. The wine will develop further and gain more depth over the next 20-30 years.
Perfect Wine and Food Pairings:
- Truffle dishes, such as risotto with white truffle.
- Game dishes such as deer or pheasant.
- Braised meat (ossobuco or brasato al Barolo).
- Matured cheeses such as Castelmagno or Parmigiano-Reggiano.
This is an extremely scarce 1.5 liter magnum.
Character
The wine
- 100%
Origin
Bottle
Wine features
Parker
The Wine Advocate
RP 100
Reviewed by:
Monica Larner
Release Price:
$160
Drink Date:
2026 - 2060
This is the stuff of dreams. Tasted so young, I did a lot of coaxing to nudge the wine along, thanks to a double decant and a few extra hours in an open bottle. I tasted both samples I had over the course of a few weeks. Those efforts served well, but the wine remains packed tight and full of nervous energy regardless, indicating that its true potential won't be seen for another 10 or 20 years, or likely more. The Bartolo Mascarello 2016 Barolo is a true icon of the vintage. The approach is elongated and silky, like lifting honey from a jar. The aromas are chiseled and focused with wild berry, licorice, candied orange peel, campfire ash, rusted iron, crushed graphite and pencil shaving. The wine's personality is downplayed, elegant and demure in one tasting but exuberant and expressive in the next. The tannins show snap and crunch, indicating they will drive the wine forward over many years of cellar age. This is one of those rare wines that is poised to improve with each increment of time. Structurally, it is perfect. If we were to create a template for an aspirational Barolo, this would be it.
The indomitable Maria Teresa Mascarello has finished building a new facility in the lower part of Barolo village, just a few hundred meters from her existing historic winery. The new space allows for greater temperature and humidity control for storage, and means that much of the vineyard equipment can be consolidated under one roof. Those who have visited this estate know how tiny the workspaces are in the village. However, fermentation and aging will continue in the historic cantina, and visitors will be welcomed to the same homey offices packed with books and paintings on Via Roma. Nothing will change in terms of winemaking, but more space is now available for storage, bottle aging, packing and shipping. As readers know, the Bartolo Mascarello Barolo is a blend of fruit from Cannubi, Rué and Monrobiolo della Bussia (in Barolo) and Rocche dell'Annunziata (in La Morra). These parcels are co-fermented.
Published: Jul 23, 2020
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Vinous
98
Drinking Window
2026 - 2056
From: Bartolo Mascarello 1955 to…from Magnum (Jul 2023)
The 2016 Barolo (magnum) is obviously a very, very young wine and yet its inclusion in this flight is essential, both for getting a glimpse of the wine at this early stage and also for understanding its place among recent vintages. Supremely elegant and classically austere in bearing, the 2016 is sublime. The vibrancy of the flavors is captivating, as is the wine’s energy. All the 2016 needs is time.
- By Antonio Galloni on July 2023
98+
Drinking Window
2026 - 2056
From: 2016 Barolo: Right Place, Right Time (Feb 2020)
Maria Teresa Mascarello made one of the wines of the vintage in 2016. Her 2016 Barolo is soft and sensual, but also quite hushed - as many wines are in this vintage in the early going. Medium in body with silky tannins and exceptional balance, the 2016 has so much to offer, but it is also going to require quite a bit of time to be at its very best. Just after bottling, the 2016 was more generous and rich, but it is decidedly closed today. I wouldn't dream of touching a bottle before age ten, and even that will be early for a super-classic Barolo. Rose petal, mint, crushed flowers, anise and blood orange develop with time in the glass, but the 2016 is a Barolo for readers who can afford to be patient.
- By Antonio Galloni on November 2019
Maria Teresa Mascarello’s 2016 Barolo is thrilling. Mascarello gave her 2016 40 days on the skins, which is exceptionally long by the estate’s standards. The 2016 has been magnificent on both occasions I have tasted it so far. I also had a chance to revisit the 2015, which reminds me that producer style always wins out over vintage. Sure, the 2015 is a riper, racier wine, and I suppose it is less classic, but it still very much captures all the signatures that make these artisan wines so special.
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Deze Barolo toont een elegant maar krachtig smaakpalet van rozen en viooltjes, rijpe kersen en bosbessen, met ondertonen van tabak, truffel en warme specerijen, gedragen door fijne tannines, levendige zuurgraad en een indrukwekkend lange afdronk. De frisse zuurgraad en gestructureerde tannines snijden door het vet van rund, lam en wild en versterken de aardse, umami-karakters van truffel en gerijpte kazen, waarbij klassieke bereidingen zoals brasato al Barolo of ossobuco, langzaam gegaard lamsvlees of rosé gebakken hert met jeneverbessen en een risotto met witte truffel bijzonder goed uitkomen.
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