2019 Pio Cesare Barolo

The nebbiolo grapes for Barolo come from the most beautiful slopes of the region. The majority, about 70%, comes from the family's own vineyards in Serralunga d'Alba. The rest comes from producers in Castiglione Falletto and Monfort, who have been supplying grapes to the family for more than a hundred years. The grapes from Serralunga provide strength, those from Castiglione Falletto fragrance and seduction, and those from Monforte refinement and subtlety. The grapes are harvested and selected by hand, and are only harvested when they are perfectly ripe, from mid-October to even early November. The grapes ferment at about 25 degrees and they remain in contact with the fermenting wine for between three and four weeks, just like with Barbaresco. The maturation is also the same, in barriques, partly new French oak barrels, partly in new Slavonian oak barrels. Here too, long wood maturation was chosen, up to three years for part of the wine, to give it more complexity and to further emphasize the beauty of the wine. It produces a special, monumental Barolo.

The Barolo from Pio Cesare is broad and complex, powerful, herbal, rose, earthy, truffle and laurel, the taste beautifully powerful, but also velvety and soft, beautifully balanced, with lots of finesse and with beautiful tannins. Beautiful with venison steak or hare pepper, mature cheeses, but of course also delicious as a wine after a nice meal

The Pio Cesare house is one of the classic producers of the region. Located in Alba, the 'wine capital' of this region, and founded in 1881 by Cesare Pio. His name has been retained in reverse order as the name of this trading house and family business. It is still in family hands, because it is headed by Pio Boffa, the great-grandson of the founder. He continues the family's work in an excellent manner and is now also responsible for a number of modernizations and changes at this beautiful, traditional company. For example, Pio Cesare has always been a trading house that purchased grapes under contract from wine growers in the region. This is also a common practice in this region, which has many small wine growers with small plots of vineyards, who are always willing to sell their grapes to one of the trading houses. In that respect, the region is a bit like Burgundy, with all those different vineyards, each with its own name, subdivided into small pieces of vineyard, all of which are owned by a different winegrower.

Pio Boffa has decided that it is a good thing for the quality of the wines to also own vineyards. Over the years he has purchased a number of vineyards, especially in the famous Barolo and Barbaresco areas. The vineyard property now covers 45 hectares and produces some of the house's most beautiful wines, including a few special vineyard cuvées. These are only marketed in the good years.

The necessary changes have also been made in winemaking. A very restrained vinification was chosen, in which the wine is left alone as much as possible, i.e. with as few interventions as possible. Each wine receives the individual treatment that best suits the wine in question, with a shorter or longer fermentation on the skins, whether or not followed by classical maturation on Slavonian oak, the traditional wood of the region. It produces wines with a classic finesse, balanced and complex, worthy representatives of this special wine region.