The New Paradigm For Barolo?

AG recently revisited 8 top end Barolo (or is that Baroli) from the 2008 vintage. He describes a vintage that reflects a new paradigm for Barolo in that many of the wines no longer require decades in the bottle to be both approachable and enjoyable. One of the wines was Bartolo Mascarello and he suficiently motivated me to pull the cork on one and give it a whirl. I have to say that I thought the wine to be both delicious and profound. Anecdotally I agree that many modern Barolo can be enjoyed young, without having to feel that drinking them early was a waste of good wine. What do you think?

I have a fraction of the experience that others do on this topic, but I’m not sure I agree. I also pulled a cork on an 08 Bartolo Mascarello recently, and I have to say that while it is absolutely a profound wine, it’s still painfully young – the acids especially are dialed to 11 – and I don’t see it really hitting its stride until a decade or two of aging. And 08 isn’t even a long-aging vintage in the style of 06 or similar vintages. The few tastes I’ve had of '10s suggest to me that they will actually need decades.

When we were in Barolo in 2012 every winery we went to, despite knowing who we were/knowing we buy and cellar wine/knowing we are in the business, never once said “these wines age.” The theme was that the wines were made in a style that made them approachable and drinkable at a young age. This was repeated like a mantra at the places we went to even in the face of customers who are inclined to age wines. We went through a bunch of 2004 Barolos from a variety of producers while the majority of our 2004 Barbarescos are untouched.

Outside of a few producers, mostly the ultra traditionalists, modern Barolo is made to drink at a younger age. And by modern Barolo I don’t mean Barolo made in a modern style. There have been many changes in the vineyard and cellar that have moved the wine to the state it is in today. To put it simply, they have better raw materials to work with from the vineyards. Improvements in the cellar along with higher skill level from the winemakers have allowed for the capture and transfer of some very good -great vintages to the bottle. It never hurts to have a great vintage and a little luck also. And I think we need to understand that the wines will still benefit from age and will improve dramatically. But it is certainly no longer a crime and a painful one at that to drink young Barolo. Opened a 2009 E.Cogno Barolo Ravera and 2009 Sperino Lessona last night. And drank them side by side. Both were a little tight. But some really nice complex elements to these wines. And the tannins, certainly present, were not aggressive.

I was going to ask this exact question, Gary. Thanks for reading my mind.

What exactly is being done differently now?

What exactly is being done differently now?

Not much at the houses owned by those many of us would consider the very best traditionalists. Bartolo Mascarello’s place certainly looks very different these days since his passing and Maria Teresa’s succession with a modern new office and cheery lighting but the wines are being made in pretty much the same way as always. Ditto for G. Rinaldi where his daughters (anyone notice how many women are taking over cellars in the Langhe these days?) are in the process of taking over and have so far succeeded in spiffing up the cellar and organizing things. The wines there are being made exactly the same way I can remember since my first visit over 20 years ago though recent legislation is forcing Beppe to change his blends a bit. Same thing at G. Mascarello where the only change in the cellar that I notice has been to clean things up a bit with better, cleaner wine as a result imo. Marcarini, Burlotto, Canonica, G. Conterno… Tinkering with an old recipe yes but no big changes in philosophy. Global warming has certainly had an impact on these wines over the last 20 vintages or so and the same can be said about most every wine region in Europe. Lower acids and hjgher alcohol may be the new paradigm.

As for aging? I’ve never found good vintages of wines made in Barolo or La Morra difficult to drink in their youth, different story in Serralunga and much of Monforte. I’ve also never found that the wines of any but the best sites in La Morra or Barolo are capable of aging and improving as long as those from the Serralunga Valley. These are very different soils from different geological epochs and the resulting wines are very different.

AG said on his forum that he intended to open a 2006 Monfortino last night. It should be interesting to hear how it showed.

I would guess they take the ageability for granted, and they have to fight the view that their wines are unapproachable for 20 years.

Who did you visit? I’m curious.

Even G. Mascarello macerates for about 30 days now vs. 60 days historically. B. Mascarello ferments in concrete to allow temperature control and has shortened maceration times a bit from the old days. These are two of a very small number of the most traditional producers. I don’t think anyone makes wines exactly the same way that they did decades ago. Many other aspects are unchanged, but these things must significantly impact extraction and thus the style of the finished wine as it shows in its youth.

I’d like a good answer to that, too. But I think one key thing is that the wines spend less time in barrels/casks, so there’s more fruit left when they’re bottled. The true old-style riservas like Monfortino that spend many years in cask can be pretty tough to drink young.

Control of fermentation temperatures also has allowed more control over tannin extraction and keeps more fruit flavors.

And then there’s Burlotto, which does a 60-day maceration on their Monvigliero, which is one of the most elegant Barolos around. So go figure.

Wikipedia says this: “Better canopy management and yield control have led to riper grapes being harvested earlier with more developed tannins in the grape skins.”

That makes a lot of sense. I know they are picking barbera and dolcetto later than they were 20 years ago, with (to me) vast improvements in quality, particularly in the barbera.

I’m glad you mentioned viticulture, John. I’ve suspected that this is the most major factor in the ultra-traditional wines being far more approachable in their youth, but I didn’t know enough about the changes there to comment.

I was going to suggest the same. The actual wove making may not have changed (much), but better vineyard practices and more modern farming can make a lot of difference.

I think the reduction of the time in wood and temperature control were major factors, and were widespread.

Gary: I totally agree that the early approachability of these wines does not in any way diminish their ability to improve with age. I drank the 08 Bartolo over 3 days and it showed the best on day 3.

I recently opened a 2001 E. Pira - Chiara Boschis Barolo, and while it was possible to have a sense of the wine’s integrity, it was shut tight as a drum. I bought
some 2008 Travaglini Gattinara and it is sheer joy, so peppy like a puppy and ready to play.

This from Tanzer, 2007:

"More than on any previous tour of this region—and I’’ve been visiting here regularly since 1991—the differences between so-called traditional and New Wave wines have blurred when it comes to the Piedmont’s great nebbiolo wines. For starters, the number of strict traditionalists—those who carry out very long macerations and then age their wines for several years in traditional large old Slovenian oak casks, or botti—has declined to a very small number as the older generation of makers gives way to their sons and daughters. The new kids as a rule are more aware of today’s international market’s preference for immediate gratification, and perhaps are more likely themselves to enjoy wines that don’t need a decade or more of aging in bottle to become presentable. With very few exceptions, they are updating their ancient casks, shortening their fermentation and total maceration times, and bottling earlier. They are also far more aware of the need to avoid volatile acidity and premature oxidation. And, thanks to cleaner winemaking and aging facilities, not to mention the advice of consulting enologists, their wines today are less rustic, and in that sense more modern. (How much of the “traditional” tar and leather taste of Barolo was a function of the years of gunk that accumulated on the insides of giant old casks?) And of course, with global warming, these winemakers are vinifying healthier fruit with much better phenolic maturity: their wines rarely need five or more years of aging in cask to become semi-civilized.

At the other extreme are the so-called modernists who were the first to switch to very quick, hot fermentations in rotary fermenters [or “rotofermenters,” usually stainless steel cylindrical vats in which pigeage is done by means of a propeller that rotates inside the vat; in some cases, the tank itself slowly revolves]. To stabilize the color of their quickly fermented wines, in which color was extracted more by heat than by alcohol, these folks aged their wines in small French barriques, a high percentage of which were often new, and they bottled much earlier. But the modernists too have backed away from their earlier excesses. Today, they’re drawing out the fermentations, doing gentler extraction during vinification even if they still use rotofermenters, and cutting back on their use of new wood, in some cases switching to larger tonneaux (usually holding 500 or 600 liters of wine) or even botti, which now typically hold 10 to 30 hectoliters of wine. Some are even pushing back their bottling times as they allow their wines to evolve in wood at a more leisurely pace. So while there are a few remaining strict conservatives and a few unapologetic New Wave producers, it’s rarely black or white anymore. "

Greg dal Piaz organized a big tasting of 01s last fall and that was the story with most of them. (I can’t find the thread or I’d link it.) They were not fun to drink, for the most part, even after they’d been open several hours and food was served. This was a mix of traditionalists and modernists – about 20 wines. So I’m not sure it’s accurate to say that today’s Barolos are enjoyable much younger. I think it may be more accurate to say that more are approachable for a few years, and enjoyable in that early window because there’s fruit there that wasn’t in old-style wines a generation ago. Of course, it’s hard to generalize.