Tenuta Grillo is destined to be the Fass Selections wine geek winery of Italy. The wines are delicious so everyone will like them but they are so darned well made they are really master classes in winemaking in a bottle. Our winemaker clients have already snapped up the early offers and this will be no different, I'm sure. The winemaker sells most of his production in bulk to pay his bills and as such can afford to hold his best wines until they are ready to drink. In this case, a brief 13 years. These wines are all over the hot wine bars in Italy but have never been properly sold here (until I started to offer them).
Freisa is one of my favorite geek grapes in all of Italy and actually all of the world. I learned about it when I was working in Boston at The Wine Bottega and my old boss, Peter N. was smiling when I walked into work that day. He showed me magnums of the 1997 Freisa "Kye" by G.D. Varja and said what he always would say when a wine was so good, so crazy, so distinctive, which is the wine is a "freak show," which is a term I still proudly as an homage to him and also as it truly is the perfect description of this wine. But it not only describes the great '97 Kye which I would love to taste today, but all Freisa are freak shows, refreshing and can be challenging. I think most people don't get Freisa because they have not had an aged one. It demands age. Young it can be bitter and have tannins even fiercer than Barolo. But once ages it transitions into a unique wine of great beauty.
Today, I am thrilled to offer the 2003 Teunta Grillo Freisa for $32.99 each on a 4 pack. This wine was started as an experiment with only 300 bottles made. It is a labor of love for Guido Zampaglione the winemaker. The aromatics on this wine are absolutely gorgeous. At first, you get a flirtation of licorice and some spice and then some hints of light fruit. The palate is just a swirling melange of spice and perfectly integrated strawberry fruit with some lingering licorice on the finish. I know that I've emphasized the floral and complex aspects of this wine but make no mistake, it has tremendous power and pure fruit impact. It is hugely juicy and really makes you salivate. You can really spend an evening just drinking this wine with some bread and be totally satisfied. It's that good and that interesting. I know that this is 13 years old but it is still early in its drinking window. It has the tannic structure to age for decades. This is a wine that you add as much as you can to your cellar because it is the ultimate ringer to bring to a Piedmont tasting. It will hold up against Barolos many times its price. Unlike many old Barolo, we know it's drinking well today. And, obviously, it's a fraction of the price of a 13 year old Barolo.
I also have a very small amount of the last of a fantastic wine from the personal cellar of the winemaker of another wine. The 2007 Tenuta Grillo Baccabianca ($27.99 each for a 4 pack). We offered the 2009 of this wine which is more a wine of contemplation. The 2007 is more on the side of being incredibly delicious (although not without complexity, of course). The aromatics are really just soaring on this. Lemon peel, some cream and a hint of tea. The palate is incredibly fresh which is amazing for a wine that is this old. Citrus fruits, mostly lemon with a tinge of orange wine taste which is really nice. Incredible juiciness with a nice spine of minerality. The bottle I had had been opened for 3 days and still tasted incredibly fresh. This is an orange wine but doesn't taste like most orange wines. Guido believes that many orange wines are picked late and are aged in wood which gives them the particular taste that they have. He avoids that by picking when the grapes become ripe and ageing in steel. In any case, if you are a winemaker (or just a wine lover) this is a wine that you really have to try to comprehend this new experience.
Guido Zampaglione lives with his wife and children about an hour Northeast of Barolo in a little town called Gamalero. He has an absolutely beautiful farm with lots of gorgeous furniture from his family in Calabria. His grandmother made wine and he bought the farm about a decade ago and works it with one assistant. He has 17 hectares but sells most of the fruit so he can focus on the 5-6 hectares that produce really special fruit. I assume that the cash from selling the grapes allows him to hold back his wines until they are ready to drink, often a decade or more after they are bottled. He is 100% natural and organic. He's a quality and approach zealot. He and his wife are really incredibly, incredibly nice people. Oh, his wines are also served at Turin's coolest natural wine bar, Banco, as well as its sister restaurant.
2003 Tenuta Grillo Freisa - $34.99 ($131.96 4-pack) (VERY LIMITED)
2007 Tenuta Grillo Baccabianca - $29.99 ($111.96 4-pack)
(VERY LIMITED)
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