2020 Pio Cesare Barolo

The Nebbiolo grapes for Barolo come from the most beautiful slopes of the region. The majority, around 70%, come from the family's own vineyards in Serralunga d'Alba. The rest comes from producers in Castiglione Falletto and Monfort, who have been supplying grapes to the family for over a hundred years. The grapes from Serralunga give strength, those from Castiglione Falletto fragrance and seduction, and those from Monforte refinement and subtlety. The grapes are harvested and selected by hand, and are only harvested when they are perfectly ripe, from mid-October to early November. The grapes ferment at around 25 degrees and remain in contact with the fermenting wine for between three and four weeks, just like with Barbaresco. The maturation is also the same, in barriques, partly new French oak barrels, partly in new Slavonian oak barrels. Here too, a long wood maturation was chosen, up to three years for part of the wine, to give it more complexity and to further emphasize the beauty of the wine. It produces a special, monumental Barolo.

The Barolo of Pio Cesare is broad and complex, powerful, herbs, roses, earthy, truffle and laurel, the taste beautifully powerful, but also velvety and soft, beautifully balanced, with lots of finesse and with beautiful tannins afterwards. Beautiful with venison steak or hare stew, mature cheeses, but of course also delicious as a wine after a nice meal

The Pio Cesare house is one of the classic producers of the region. Based in Alba, the 'wine capital' of this region, and founded in 1881 by Cesare Pio. His name has been retained in reverse order as the name of this trading house and family business. It is still in family hands, because at the head is Pio Boffa, the great-grandson of the founder. He continues the work of the family in an excellent way, and in the meantime is also responsible for a number of modernizations and changes in this beautiful, traditional company. Pio Cesare has always been a trading house, which obtained the grapes on contract from winegrowers in the region. This is also a common practice in this region, which has many small winegrowers with small plots of vineyard, who are always ready to sell their grapes to one of the trading houses. In this respect, the region is a bit like Burgundy, with all those different vineyards, each with its own name, divided into small vineyard plots, each owned by a different winegrower.

Pio Boffa decided that it was good for the quality of the wines to also own vineyards. Over the years he has bought a number of vineyards, mainly in the famous areas of Barolo and Barbaresco. The vineyard property now covers 45 hectares, and produces some of the house's finest wines, with a few special vineyard cuvées as top performers. These are only released in good years.

The necessary changes have also been made in the winemaking. A very restrained vinification has been chosen, in which the wine is left alone as much as possible, so with as few interventions as possible. Each wine receives the individual treatment that best suits that particular wine, with a shorter or longer fermentation on the skins, followed or not by a classic maturation on Slavonian oak, the traditional wood of the region. It produces wines with a classic finesse, balanced and complex, worthy representatives of this special wine region.