TN: 2009 Produttori del Barbaresco Langhe Nebbiolo (Italy, Piedmont, Langhe, Langhe DOC)

WINE TALK
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Our appetizer wine by the fire. We felt it was ready to drink, once given an hour of air.

  • 2009 Produttori del Barbaresco Langhe Nebbiolo - Italy, Piedmont, Langhe, Langhe DOC (12/24/2011)
    Light, clear ruby color. Interesting nose of dried cherries, cinnamon, toasted bread, and rose petals. Very intense on the palate, medium bodied with good balancing acidity, a touch of earth, dried cherries and cranberries, a spritzy/citric quality. Finish is moderately long with mostly tart cherries and balancing acidity. . Really nice, light, complex and lively wine. Seems ready to drink (89 pts.)

Posted from CellarTracker

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I had a glass of this wine in a wine bar several months ago and found it fascinating. I bought a bottle later and have it lined up to drink soon. I know very little about Nebbiolo but it makes me want to find out more. It has a combination of lightness and structure that I have not found in any other wine. I recently ate at a restaurant in Japan where they garnished the plate with a leaf that had most of its material dissolved, leaving only the structural framework, which was incredibly complex and intricate. This Langhe makes me think of examining the leaf.

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What a wonderful metaphor!

I managed to sneak away to the Langhe for three days in June and came away quite excited about 2009. I didn’t taste any Barolo, but the dolcetto, barbera and nebbiolos were terrific – lots of fruit and well balanced. Vajra’s nebbiolo is very impressive, and I found it for less than $20 at my corner store in NYC.

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This wine was $17 on sale, forgot to mention that in my tasting note. Very good value.

Craig, I also don’t know too much about Nebbiolo, but based on some recent bottles that I’ve had I really should get into it more. I also found your metaphor to be excellent, kudos!

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I opened my bottle tonight, shortly and not intentionally after getting tickets to Italy - figured that out partway through the first glass.

It’s really a fascinating wine with a little more muscle than I remembered, but the texture and structure just set it apart from the wines I’m familiar with. This is probably obvious for lovers of Nebbiolo but it’s very interesting to me. Really fine nose as well. This is a lot of character for under $20.

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Produttori has to be one of the best -run wine cooperatives in the world. If you want to take a small step up their qualitative ladder, the Barbaresco Normale from 2006 (sometimes referred to as their “Torre” bottling) is a fine wine that should be available for around $25+ a bottle. And of course their vineyard or cru bottlings, usually for around $50+ a bottle, are legitimate and serious expressions of nebbiolo from some of the best vineyards in Barbaresco.

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You’re not a fan are you? [wink.gif]

Cheers and happy holidays Roberto. [cheers.gif]

RT

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Thanks for the Vajra tip…reminded me to check out my local supplier’s current list to discover that they released their stock recently for the holidays. I surely would have missed the opportunity considering I am traveling for Christmas…but I managed to get in an order for 6 bottles.

Not to lead to further thread drift but Giuseppe Rinaldi’s 2009 is spellbinding, I pulled the cork on the first of my 6 bottles back in November, I am tempted to add more to the cellar but I struggle to know “how much is enough” when it comes to Rinaldi’s wines. He is one of my leading candidates for “if you could only drink wine from one producer the rest of your life who would it be?”.

2009 certainly produced some wonderfully rich examples of Nebbiolo and the best producers managed to preserve freshness, acidity and transparency of the terroir. Produttori included.

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Not that much actually. I think most people would agree it is THE best. neener

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Do you disagree with the statement?

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Only if it would crank Bob up. I suspect he owns about as many Produttori as I own Oregon PNs.

Not sure how the place is “run”, but I’d gladly vouch for the quality. [wink.gif]

RT

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Well, to be linguistically correct, I am inferring “best-run” by the results of what is in the bottle - I’ve not actually visited the winemaking facilities, so for all I know they could be incredibly poorly-run from a business standpoint and have just been on one hell of a lucky streak for the past couple of decades with respect to the wine they have produced [cheers.gif] .

I was going to say THE best initially (as Ken subsequently posted), but decided that at least from my experience there are too many other areas of the globe where I drink little to no wine from for me to make that claim - for all I know, the world’s best wine co-op might be in Chile or Argentina, but I would never know as those wines never make it to my cellar. And while more a negociant than a co-op, I think that in the late 90’s George DuBoeuf’s work in Beaujolais would certainly be comparable in terms of “spreading the good word” about an area’s wine quality.

BTW, Rich, I only have about 200 bottles of Produttori, so I’m thinking that should be much less than your stash of Oregon pinot, correct? I do feel comfortable in saying that I have more Piemonte nebbiolo than you have Oregon pinot, though [wink.gif] .

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If not for the '08 OR splurges, you’d be nearly equal. You’ve had the advantage of seeing my cellar! I expect your Piemonte collection would require 3 - 4 years of bottle/day consumption to even put a dent in it.

RT

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Coincidentally had this same wine a night earlier. This was a random $17 purchase from WineX earlier in the day, so that I could see what all the fuss was about re: Produttori Barbaresco. My impressions were similar, and I can’t remember a sub-$20 wine outside of Pepiere Briords that was both structured and delicate. Interesting stuff, and I plan to explore this co-op further. Although I typically ignore Italian wines for no other reason than budget and time constraints, after this bottle I will likely attempt to make room.