Tag Archives: Asili

Ready or not: 07 Produttori del Barbaresco Asili vs. 07 Chiarlo Tortoniano

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Unfortunately, it happens all the time: you find yourself at dinner with a good friend (in this case, a best childhood friend) who is new to the wine world and who insists on tasting you on a wine that they’ve discovered with no regard for your personal tastes or palate (how could she or he know?).

It’s exactly what happened when Yele and I visited a restaurant in La Jolla the other night with a close high school friend of ours (a Hebrew school friend for me; that’s how far we go back). I had a bottle of 2007 Produttori del Barbaresco Asili in my bag: however young in its evolution, I wanted to taste a bottle from my allocation just to check in with the wine, see where it’s at in its development, and indulge in one of my favorite wines of all time.

Said friend, who had eaten at said restaurant a few nights earlier, wouldn’t listen to our gentle admonitions and he insisted that he allow him to buy our table a bottle of Chiarlo 2007 Barolo Tortoniano in 375ml.

The 2007 Asili was extreme in its tannic expression and frugal with its fruit. California, where I maintain my cellar, gets a smaller allocation of Produttori del Barbaresco crus and I’m thrilled that I was able to get a case of this wine. I probably won’t revisit it for another few years but there’s no doubt in my mind that it’s going to become one of the gems of my collection. The practically winterless 2007 vintage in Langa has delivered some of the most muscular, opulent expressions of Barbaresco that I have ever tasted (remember when Tracie P and I tasted the 07 Asili with Bruno Giacosa on our honeymoon?).

My experience with Langaroli wines from 2007 was a stark counterpoint to the bright cherry cough-syrup fruit of the 2007 Tortoniano by Chiarlo. There’s no doubt that this is a well made wine but it’s just “not my speed,” as I like to tell folks when I politely decline to taste a given wine. The tannin was well-balanced in the wine but I just couldn’t get past its yeasted quality and its softness. It wasn’t bad (in fact it was very elegant). But it simply didn’t reflect the appellation or the vintage. It tasted more like a high-end Russian River Pinot Noir than it did Langa Nebbiolo — at least to me.

Having grown up in San Diego, I often find that my peers took paths in life widely divergent from mine — in wine tastes and ideology. Actually, I should say the opposite: I spent my entire adolescence leaving Las Vegas La Jolla, heading to Mexico, to Italy, to New York, and now Texas.

It’s often hard to taste wine with them. But ready or not, I love them just the same.

One last note on Giacosa Asili 07 from Antonio Galloni (and the complete wedding album online)

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From the department of “wine geekery”…

Above: I wish words could convey Bruno’s bright smile that day and the pleasure he seemed to take in tasting and talking about his wines with Franco, Tracie P, and me. Photo by my better half.

One last note that I wanted to share, for the record, culled from emails I traded yesterday with one of the wine writers I admire most and one of the greatest English-language authorities on the wines and winemakers of Piedmont, Antonio Galloni (who also happens to be an extremely nice guy).

His comments speak to Bruno’s observation that you could “smell Asili” in the 2007 Asili white label bottling (even in the light of the fact that the wine was made predominantly from grapes sourced from a parcel previously classified as Rabajà).

“Because of the freakish growing season in 2007 that you describe,” i.e., with an extremely mild winter and consequently anticipated vegetative cycle, wrote Antonio, “the 2007 Asili white label does actually reflect a lot of that vineyard’s characteristics, even if it is 80% juice from Rabajà.”

He also pointed me to this passage, lifted from his October 2009 tasting notes: “Curiously, the 2007 Asili is a very soft wine, considering it is made mostly from vines that informed such majestic Rabajas as the 2001 and 2004.”

All of us present at the tasting a week ago Sunday were impressed with how approachable the wine was. And Bruno’s observation, “you can smell Asili in this wine,” was significant, indeed, especially in the light of the unusual vintage and the reclassification of the Barbaresco cru system. Antonio noted that in the wake of the reclassification, “you will soon see a host of new, single-vineyard bottlings from places you probably never knew existed.”

Food — or grapes, as the case may be — for thought.

Thanks again to Ken for asking me to look more carefully at Bruno’s observation and thanks to Antonio for his truly invaluable insights.

In other news…

It will remain one of the great mysteries in the history of humankind: how did a schlub like me end up with a beauty like Tracie P née B?

The complete wedding album is online here. Thanks again to Jennifer and CJ for an amazing job!

And thanks to my gorgeous bride Tracie P: words could never express the happiness and joy that you have brought into my life, an endless Valentine, every night when I kiss your sweet lips good night and when they greet me in the morning. I love you so very much… What a miracle you are!

Giacosa tasting, clarifications

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Asili

Photos by Tracie P.

Wow, heartfelt thanks to everyone for all the comments and messages in the wake of the Bruno Giacosa tasting post Friday! It was an unforgettable experience.

Ken Vastola, author of an excellent “bibliography” of Giacosa’s wines, asked me to clarify a few points. So, yesterday, I called Giacosa’s enologist Giorgio Lavagna to get some answers.

Ken wrote:

    Antonio Galloni wrote in his review: “In 2007, the white label Asili is roughly 80% juice from the old ‘Rabaja’ parcel and 20% Asili from the vines Giacosa has always used for his [Barbaresco] Asili.”

    That doesn’t seem to fit with Bruno’s comment in your article about this wine “You can smell Asili in this wine.”

    You wrote “The only difference between the white and red (reserve) labels is the additional cask aging.” Does this imply (seemingly contrary to Antonio’s comment) that all the juice from the 2 parcels was blended, then separated for aging? I have to say this is the type of question that Bruno and the winery have been either coy or forgetful about over the years.

Asili

Giorgio confirmed the percentages that Antonio reported in his previously published notes on the wines. As has been widely reported, Giacosa did not bottle his 2006 (because of a hail storm that damaged the vineyards, said Giorgio yesterday [!!!]). 2006 was also the year that certain adjacent rows of Rabajà were reclassified as Asili, including the rows that Giacosa had used historically to make his Barbaresco Rabajà bottling.

The fruit for the 2007 Barbaresco Asili “white label,” said Giorgio, is sourced primarily from the parcel previously called Rabajà, roughly 80%, and roughly 20% from Asili. In the light of this information, Bruno’s comment that “you can smell Asili in this wine” is significant. It seems to suggest that he agrees with the reclassification.

The fruit sourced from the Rabajà parcel and Asili were vinified together in 2007, said Giorgio.

But he was quick to point out that the fruit for the 2007 Barbaresco Asili Riserva (“red label”), which will be released in 2012, was sourced exclusively from the top part of Asili, the sorì as the best parcel is called in the wine parlance and dialect of Langa.

Barolo

    Is Bruno really making a 2007 Rocche white label? I assumed (or read?) he would make a red label in 07. So far he has not made both a red and white label in the same vintage from Rocche. Though I guess if it’s still in barrel then red or white label is still only a guess. He can change his mind.

Giorgio confirmed that the 2007 Barolo Rocche del Falletto will be a “red label” riserva and that there will be no “white label” 2007 Barolo Rocche del Falletto (and, indeed, as Ken points out rightly, this keeps with tradition at Giacosa: when a red label Barolo Rocche del Falletto is produced, no white label is produced). The 2007 Barolo Rocche del Falletto has not been bottled yet and we tasted a barrel sample (in the unlabeled 375ml bottle above).

    You mention a Bruno Giacosa 2004 Barolo Rocche del Falletto (white label). In 2004, I’m pretty sure he made a white label Falletto and a red label Rocche, but no white label Rocche. Was this from a finished bottle with a label on it or could it be the red label? I have not seen a white label Rocche on the market, only a red label on futures.

We did taste a 2005 “white label” Barolo Rocche del Falletto in the tasting room and we drank a 2004 white label Barolo Falletto at lunch at Enoclub in Alba. In our conversation, Giorgio reiterated that in 2005 no red label Barolo Rocche was bottled as such. He said that he “nearly regretted” this and when we asked him if they had bottled the parcel as white label in response to the economic crisis, he didn’t answer. The bottom line is that 2005 Rocche del Falletto probably could have bottled as red label and that the white label bottling represents all the more value for the price point. The winery did, indeed, produce a 2004 Barolo Rocche del Falletto red label (and consequently no white label for that parcel for that vintage).

N.B.: Historically, Giacosa has made Barolo Falletto (sourced from his Falletto estate in Serralunga d’Alba) and Barolo Rocche del Falletto (sourced from the top parcels on the Falletto estate). In excellent years, Barolo Rocche del Falletto is aged longer in cask and released as “red label” riserva. In superlative years, Barolo Falletto has also been released as a “red label” riserva. 1996 was the last occurrence, according to Ken’s bibliography.

To learn more about the history of Giacosa’s labeling and bottling, be sure to check out Ken’s site.

Thanks, Ken, for such great questions and thanks, everyone, for reading!

Now, ENOUGH with this wine geekery! I promise something sappy and romantic for tomorrow… ;-)

On deck: tasting current releases of G. (Mauro) Mascarello: a man “you cannot help but love.”