TN: 1985 Castello di Neive, Barbaresco Riserva, "Santo Stefano"

Ciao Berzerkers,

Last night I zipped up to Yardley, PA for dinner with some old friends.

They had a bottle of 2011 Barboursville (VA) Chardonnay open for an aperitif. Wow, what a delicious wine, buzzing with fresh crisp apple and citrus fruit, light bodied, aromatic, crisp and clean and not a touch of oak. Wonderful stuff. Grade: B+.

Dinner was butterflied leg of lamb on the grill. I had decanted the 1985 Castello di Neive Barbaresco Riserva, “Santo Stefano” at my place about 4 hours before dinner, cork was solid, and I removed a large amount of sediment and put the wine back in the bottle and recorked. I also checked the color in the natural sunlight, and it was as hoped, a gorgeous, vibrant rust/garnet/brick red with a slight orange tinge, clear, healthy, and mature.

At dinner the nose was beautiful with violets, spicy red cherry/red raspberry fruit but also a strong suggestion of orange peel, smoke/incense and light red licorice. On the palate it drinks medium bodied, it’s lithe and lean, tannins have resolved but there is good acidity, cherry and orange fruit, and a long, silky finish. The wine has held up and matured beautifully at age 26+, although I think it has peaked and does not improve from here. This was my last bottle (a Wasserman stash wine) and was showing a bit more orange and age than the previous bottle two and a half years ago. This wine is what I would consider classic old school Barbaresco and the style I prefer. Grade: solid A.

Ciao, dc.

Nice. I have one of these left as well. Would like to drink it as part of a vertical or something though.

Ken,

This is one of those “if only I had grabbed an extra bottle or two at the time” wines. This bottle was from Wasserman’s stash but the previous bottles I had bought independently. You will love this wine, I think. There is a sense of elegance, class and purity about it I know you appreciate.

This is the kind of bottle that makes all the corked wines, oxidized wines, cooked wines etc. all worth while. The pot of gold at the end of the Barbaresco rainbow. dc.