- (e.g. Ledy, Cruchandeau, Girard, Bouley)
Small, Family Run Winery - Only 3,300 Cases Made
The Wines Are Truly Wonderful, Elegant and Distinctive
A New Fass Selections Core Producer
Barbaresco and Barbera Were Spared Hail in 2014 (Unlike Parts of Barolo) and Made Some Great Wines See The Sidebar"It (2014) is a vintage that will especially appeal to classically leaning palates." Antonio Galloni
The wines I am offering today are so fantastically exactly what they should be it's not even funny. So
terroir-driven, vivid, expressive and unique, I am so incredibly excited to offer them you can't imagine. These are going to be another one of those Fass Selections discoveries that comes out of nowhere and everyone absolutely loves.
So I had a feeling that these wines were going to be great from the first E-Mail with the winemaker. Davide, who makes the wines with his brother Igor, has a very straightforward, non salesy approach to selling his wines and they re almost all sold locally. Generally these are the winerues where you find the best values and oh boy, that sure as heck was true in this case.
This is another Fass Selections discovery where the winemaker spends no money on marketing and the wines are incredible values as a result.
The first wine is the Tomasso Gianolio Barbera Superiore 2014 for $19.99 on a 4 pack purchase. I am starting with this because the Barbaresco is so great that I want to make sure you read this. The newsflash of the year is that Barbaresco is "better" than the Barbera. But, like all more complex wines, it is not always the better wine to have with every dish or in every occasion. Winemakers have been trying to make more "serious" Barbera in recent years. Some of them are very good and some are just either oakier or just more serious. This Barbera is a beautiful example of what traditional Barbera should be. A wine that is gorgeously delicious and fruity and wonderful to have with simple fare ike pizza or just to guzzle with close friends. It's a very, very good bottle of wine and really well made. The nose just has that leap out of the glass grapey Barbera freshness that just makes you almost cry with happiness almost like say, great entry level Riesling. Really, really bright. The palate is just beautiful soft, sweet, delicious fruit with, of course, balancing Fass Selections acidity and juiciness. You really need to watch how much you drink of this - it's that good. The finish is just delicious with the barest hint of bitterness that balances the fruit. While the wines have that fantastic Barbera fruit, there is an elegance that belies their simplicity. Everything is just in place as it should be. These are aged 12 months in large old casks.
And now for the main event, Tomasso Gianolio Barberaresco 2014 for $29.99 each on a 4 pack purchase. This is just a wow wine that is drinking really well now but will be incredible in 3-4 years. I know that it sounds borderline cheesy but you can taste the hand of the winemakers and the effort put into the bottle. The nose just has that beautiful, pure fresh cherry, licorice thing going on. Really fine and aromatic. Like enjoyable as a perfume aside from its value as a beverage. The palate is really fresh cherry fruit with absolutely perfect balancing acidity. The really great winemakers in the Langhe just do a great job of getting that razor's edge fruit/acid balance and with higher temperatures in the Langhe, let me assure you that this is not easy. Some serious, serious juiciness here with lovely anise internal aromatics. Really, really elegant. I had this only 15 days after bottling so the aromatics were muted compared to what they are now, but it was already really, really pretty. There are some serious silky tannins that provide the structure for at least 10-15 years of ageing. This tastes like if really good single vineyard 1er Cru Burgundy were made from Nebbiolo. Just a wonderful, well made, terroir-driven, aromatic wine. Aged 20 months in large Slavonian oak casks.
Tomaso Gianolio is a really small winery. I mean really small. They make 3,300 cases per year split among 9 bottlings. So under 400 cases per wine per year. The more I do this, the more I realize that these small production bottlings allow the winemaker to really focus on making wine that is highly respectful of its terroir. The winery was founded in 1930 by the winemakers' grandfather. The brothers took over from their father Tomaso. They are a micro-negociant and work very closely with the growers to ensure the best crops (reducing yields when necessary) and carefully monitoring ripeness to pick at the right time. This producer is going to be a very important core producer for us.
2014 Vintage Notes
"Promising grapes: Nebbiolo, especially in Barbaresco, where there was no hail."The Wine Spectator
"Although the 2014 vintage did not seem cut out to make any really memorable wines, my impressions from this Barbaresco tasting are quite the opposite. I found plenty of fresh, complex and wonderfully transparent expressions of Nebbiolo that you will want to drink again and again...I found the 2014 Barbarescos overall hugely original. So original, in fact, it should be considered on its own, without comparison to anything else. You call it light? I call it elegant, and definitely not a lighter version of anything else. " Walter Speller for Jancis Robinson
"The 2014 vintage has been maligned throughout much of Italy, but Barbaresco may very well turn out to be a bright spot. Even though there was quite a bit of rain, Barbaresco did not get the three hailstorms that wreaked havoc in Barolo. Even so, I expect to see quite a bit of variability when all of the 2014s are released because the gap between the top producers and the next levels down is quite wide and not all growers had the resources to do the work that was necessary in the vineyards. That said, the wines I have tasted so far, both from bottle and barrel, are exciting. The finest 2014 Barbarescos are bright and medium in body, with lively acidity, striking aromatics and tons of energy. It is a vintage that will especially appeal to classically leaning palates."Antonio Galloni
2014 Tomaso Gianolio Barbera d'Alba Superiore - $21.99
($99.96 4-pack)
2014 Tomaso Gianolio Barbaresco - $31.99
($119.96 4-pack)
No comments:
Post a Comment