Showing posts with label Liberty. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Liberty. Show all posts

Sunday, April 19, 2020

Barolo 2016 is something rare!

Barolo 2016 is something rare!
Franco Massolino (with a map of the Barolo area in background).

“Barolo 2016 is something rare! An outstanding vintage. Unique.” So said Franco Massolino during a Liberty Wines organised online masterclass last Friday. Fellow Barolo winemaker Giuseppe Vajra was our other speaker, both introduced by Tim Platt (Sales Director Liberty). Dennis Drazan Sunjic coordinated the speakers and also the question and answer session at the end.

So what made 2016 so good? Franco pointed to the weather during the year that gave them “the longest cycle of vegetation”. “The winter was relatively warm, and dry. Spring came early. A lot of rain at the right time. “We never had temperature too high and it was never too dry. September unusually warm, but not crazy.” Following the warm days and cool nights of September,  “complete ripeness was achieved in our harvest”.

He said the wine has the identity of the village, it is complete, elegant, powerful. “With longevity, 30 or 40 years no problem. The different wines underlined the identity of our various vineyards. The Barolo has achieved an outstanding level of expression, a really classical expression.”
Giuseppe

Giuseppe confirmed Franco’s assessment. “He is really spot-on, it is a killer vintage, a textbook classico vintage that expresses a sense of place and highlights the differences in the various terroirs.”

It was the first year that Giuseppe had kept a diary of the season. And the first benign sign he noticed was the “abundant flowering”. In the wine, there is a promise of longevity, the tannins are not in your face, ”so you can already enjoy it and I think that the flowerings is key in this”.

Dennis asked him to talk about recent vintages and Giuseppe said the 2015 is very good and the 2017 is excellent and interesting. But 2014 was challenging because of rain and hail. Franco though was more optimistic about the 2014, perhaps because they were able to salvage some “small quantities with outstanding qualities”. Obviously the hail didn’t hit every vineyard equally. “We have some small quantities and are extremely proud of it”. Seems to be the classic case of a good winemaker producing an excellent wine in a bad year.

Dennis then posed a tough question for the duo. “Which is your best cru from 2016?” Very hard for Giuseppe to answer as they had invested so much hard work into each. He didn’t really want to pick one but, under gentle pressure, went for the Barolo Bricco delle Viole for “its flair and elegance”. 

Franco agreed that it was a tough question and he picked the Barolo Parussi. “I got great satisfaction from that as it is the youngest of our vineyards.” He quickly added that the Marghleria “is also very good.”. Both men agreed that 2016 was similar to 2008.

Franco admitted to “still trying to understand more”..”to take care of each plant in the best possible way.” You can gather that the improvement in the fortunes of Barolo over recent decades owes much to men like these. He continued: “There is a big difference to what happened in the 70s and 80s when the goal was to produce as much as possible. There was attention too to quality but not like today.”
The soil - like lasagna

Franco’s family have been in the wine business here for 120 years. “Our range of wines represent the historic style of Barolo, a unique wine in this micro-climate, the right place to show Nebiolo’s potential. We try to balance all our wines, to respect the identity and delicate notes of the variety. We don’t change a lot in the winery.”
Franco

Giuseppe was dragged away from his soccer games (he was playing too much of it - well he was just 15) to plant his first vineyard. He and his current team are still youthful and he is proud of their work. “We hope we get wiser as we go on. We started organically and our first vintage in 1972 was not a good one, not worth ageing!” The whole extended family are at work here in this “multicultural team” near the village of Barolo.

Franco’s family are in the area of Serralunga d’Alba “where every hill can be different” and that results “in great variety” in the wines around here. The family is involved here too and they “always look for the best expression.. while looking after our vineyard”. In fact, most of them are out and about in the vines these days, staying away from the offices due to Covid19.

The virus was also on Giuseppe’s mind. “We think of all you hospitality people these days. Stay strong!” He talked about the soil of the area, “basically sedimentary”, layers laid down over the years ”like lasagna”. And he reckoned that tiny variations in the ph readings (a measurement of acidity and alkalinity) for the two areas may account for the differences between wines from the two villages.

Check out the Barolo producers below:







Thursday, February 27, 2020

The Oldest Papal Vineyard in France. And it’s not where I thought.

The Oldest Papal Vineyard in France
And it’s not where I thought.

The oldest papal vineyard in France is not where I thought*. Not in Châteauneuf but near Malaucene in the Vaucluse département of Provence, about 40 minutes to the north-east of the former papal city of Avignon. 

Pope Clement V was elected pope in 1305 and his coronation was in Lyons, not in Rome. In 1309, he moved the papal throne to Avignon (on the Rhone) and also planted this vineyard in the Abbey of Le Barroux under the stern gaze of Mont Ventoux, not too far from the famous Dentelles, in an area where you’ll also find the more famous vines of Beaumes de Venise.

The entire vineyard is, as you might expect, mountainous in nature. Lots of hard work on the slopes including the vintage by hand. On their estate, the monks and nuns have raised their cultivation methods to high levels. “More than a motto, Garde et Service (custody and service) of nature are the two main lines of our conscientious cultural approach, in order to make it possible for our vineyards, for Provençal agriculture and the the heart of men to bear their fruit in due course - today and tomorrow.”

And, thanks to the presence of Gabriel Teissier, Directeur du Developpment at Via Caritatis, at last week’s Liberty Wines Portfolio tasting in Dublin, I got a brief history and also got to taste three of the wines: the Vox Domini Blanc, the Vox Caritas Rouge and the Lux in Domino Rouge.
Gabriel Teissier at Liberty Wines Tasting

The Vox Blanc is a blend of Clairette (90%) with Roussanne and Grenache blanc. They have two Clairette plots, one 40 years old, the other just 11 and it is from this second that the outstanding freshness comes. Soft pressing in the winery is followed by a slow fermentation, and the wine is “then rested on lees for six months, giving a lovely texture to the finished wine.” Very impressive, with excellent acidity as well.


The Grenache (90%) led Vox Rouge is expressive with ripe raspberry and blackberry fruit. On the palate, the wine is ample, powerful and well balanced. Again you’ll note the acidity. The flavours are concentrated and layered with notes of spice and liquorice which linger on the finish.

The grapes were hand harvested and subject to a rigorous sorting process upon arrival at the winery. Fermentation took place in concrete vats which are also used for the Lux rouge below. After malolactic fermentation, the wine rested in concrete tanks for nine months before bottling. Another impressive wine.

The outstanding Lux Rouge comes in a deep red. The nose boasts aromas of ripe black fruits  and a touch of liquorice from the oak hint at excellence to come. And it comes. On the palate, the wine has a rich mouth feel, with silky and opulent tannins, powerful but well-balanced with bright acidity. 

This is one to lay down as the concentration of flavours as well as the excellent structure of the Lux Rouge, along with the “thousand and one skills of the art of wine making” will see it age and develop over the next ten years. Fermentation takes place in concrete tanks and then the wine is aged for 18 months, 80% in concrete tanks and 20% in 500L new oak barrels before blending and bottling.
The day I got to the top of Ventoux! But it was warm and sunny down below.

The history of wine in Europe is deeply connected with monastic life. In 2015, united by a wish to revive their region’s winemaking history and support local winemakers, the monks of the Abbey Sainte-Madeleine du Barroux and the local cooperative, Beaumont de Ventoux, joined forces to create a range of wines from their combined 30 hectares of vineyards. The quality of the grapes and the impressive community partnership attracted the attention of illustrious Rhône oenologist Philippe Cambie, who has since become consultant winemaker for Via Caritatis.
The Dentelles. Sunny here, having come down from foggy Ventoux earlier

The men and women of Via Caritatis (the way of charity) are determined that their terroir will produce beautiful wines for hundreds of years to come. Lots of stirring stiff in their brochure but I’ll leave you with just one line by Max Philipe Delavouët. 

“.. We just need to plant trees, in turn: one day they will bear plenty of fruit for those hands already raised in the mists of time…. Let us go, we will never be rich enough, we who are passing, like those who are coming, to let anything be lost.” Garde et Service!

Read all about the excellent Liberty Wine Portfolio Tasting here

* The first pontifical vineyard  was exactly settled in the place-name "Groseau" (https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chapelle_Notre-Dame-du-Groseau) which used to be a benedictine monastery at the time of Pope Clement V and was given by the monks to the pope. This place-name is located on the land of the municipality of Malaucène, neighboring Le Barroux village. When the benedictine monks resettled in the region, they built their new monastery on the municipality land of Le Barroux. Nowadays the place-name of Chapelle du Groseau is in the heart of Via Caritatis vineyard which spreads on the tree municipality of Le Barroux, Malaucène and Beaumont-du-Ventoux.