2007 Giacomo Conterno Barolo Cascina Francia- Italy, Piedmont, Langhe, Barolo (2/12/2012)
My curiosity got the better of me as my trusted wine retailer friends, Ian and Matt told me how expressive the wine is at the moment. The color is burgundian, bright ruby. Pop and pour, the nose displays balsamic note iron/mineral, in very ripe cherry and strawberry fruits, licorice, tar, a hint of smoke and earth. This is where none-blind tasting helps as I am quite certain that this will be like a Monfortino, sweet balsamic note, licorice, iron and rose pedals will emerging with perhaps fifteen to twenty years of cellaring.
Drank a couple glasses over two hours after putting the kids to bed, it completely transformed a number of times. After fifteen minutes also, neither Monfortino nor Barolo, it becomes very Burgundian, start showing cool raspberry fruits, perhaps slightly less acidity, extremely silky and polished palate and no noticeable tannins. It ends with warmer strawberry fruits. Then another fifteen minutes also, very animal, licorice and strawberry preserve, reminding me the 09 Cuvée Marcel Lapierre Marcel Lapierre. It gets darker and denser and also starts to show a bit of tannins at the end.
With an hour of air, it once again shows a young Monfortino nose, balsamico, strawberry, iron, earth, coffee and etc. It now shows the bright sweet acidity that one gets from an old balsamico or a madeira. It also shows quite noticeable young Barolo tannins, ie not dry but resonates in the palate from the mid to the end notes. The impression of young Monfortino remains for the rest of the night. Although expressive and intellectually stimulating, it is not extremely pleasurable at the moment. It however is very clear that this will be a very special wine in twenty years. I am thinking the 82 version of the same wine. Current drinking 93, potential 97. BTW, I read the Antonio’s note and apparently there was no Monforino made in 2007. No wonder…(97 pts.)
Thanks Kevin, I have some. 07 too hot and dry for Monfortino, a early decision that possibly did not give full justice to the wine, seemingly so from this note anyway. Cheers Mike
I always understood Monfortino to be the same wine as the “normale”, just being aged longer in barrel. If this is true (and Monfortino heads can correct me if this is in error) it seems to me that as long as not all the 2007 has been bottled, they can indeed still hold some back for a Monfortino, if they desire. If all the 2007 Barolo has been bottled and sold, then it is too late. dc.
Hi Kevin, I wonder if a Monfortino selection was made in 07, it seems there may have been. Perhaps it was not too different to the Francia selection early on so they did not persist with it.
Hi Mike,
Per Antonio “In 2007 Conterno decided against bottling his Monfortino. Conterno believes Nebbiolo can handle rain and humidity (hence his decision to make Monfortino in rainy years such as 1987 and 2002), but not drought. The result is a Cascina Francia that is unusually dark, rich and powerful.” not sure about being dark but rich and powerful for sure.
Monfortino is made in almost every vintage, and then the decision is made whether to bottle it or not, and that’s where the extra ageing comes in.
As far as 2007 being like a modern day 82, I don’t see it. The 07 is not very similar to the 82 on release. I don’t think you can really compare many of the wines of the last decade or so to their previous incarnations.
Greg,
I wasn’t quite old enough to drink wines back then. There is a lot of balsamic and iron note on the 07. Perhaps the 82 didn’t show much of balsamico when young but my last bottle drank in 2008 showed a lot. Was there a major change in wine making?
Hey Kevin,
For better or worse I was old enough. I remember the old Conternos, and the 82s in particular, for their noticeable oxidation on release, along with all sort of aromas derived from extended time in old, and probably not quite as clean as today, wood.
I don’t think there has been a major change in wine making, though the 82 might have been made in wood, without temperature control, and it spent longer barrel than the wines do today. Little changes continue to have big impact on the way these wines show. I do not know of any changes over the past half dozen vintages, but the wines appear to continue to change slowly with each passing year, though this may now by the weather talking.
These new wines are fruitier and cleaner, there is no doubt of that, how they age is anybodies guess, but some of the aromatic complexity of old Barolo is derived from the barrels they lived in, even if they might be defects to some. Those notes are mostly gone today, and in time we’ll see wines that are cut from this cleaner cloth fully matured.
The winery has always been somewhat vague about the distinction between Monfortino and CF. My understanding is that the grapes are separated at picking based on various factors such as location in the vineyard, ripeness, and age of the vine. Once in the winery, the wines are treated differently, e.g. longer maceration time for Monfortino. After some period of time, a decision is made as to whether there is sufficient difference between the two to make separate bottlings. Roberto Conterno said that there was not enough difference in 2007 to warrant 2 separate bottlings. This leaves open the question as to why in 2002, the one wine made was Monfortino, while in 2007, it is CF.
Interestingly, the 2002 Monfortino was aged longer before release than any other vintage in the last few decades, so it may just be the quality of the wine. Also, it was the last Monfortino made while his father was alive.
Nice note Kevin. So many of the 2007s I’ve recently delved into are absolutely delicious, despite what some have said about the vintage. A recent 07 Monprivato was killer delish!
Align with Greg on the '82 comparision, especially to the extent that a 25 year age disparity makes it darn near impossible to compare. But it sounds alluring.
Ken, I think that’s pretty much right about the differences between Monfo and CF in terms of handling prior to determining whether or not to bottle or blend.
Contemporay Modern Monfortino Style, now that’s a mouthfull~
Rico,
I had the 82 Cascina Francia and the Monfortino side by side and found them very similar. As I posted earlier this shows a lot of very ripe fruits, balsamico and mineral. It will be very much like the 82 in that aspects with twenty years of cellaring, we will see. BTW, the wood for the 04 Monfortino case is one of the most beautiful ones that I have ever seen.
What IS the modern Monfortino style, and how does it differ from the older style? I have been so out of the loop on these things the last 7 or 8 years or so.