Hello everyone. I fervently hope that everyone is doing very well.
After having been mildly berated recently for not showing up in forums for a while, I feel that perhaps I should post some observations that I sent to Luca. I had spent an afternoon with him in the Valtellina early in June. He mentioned that he had fond memories of Nebbiolos from Barboursville Vineyards in Virginia. I was in western Virginia recently and took advantage of the opportunity to drop by the vineyard and taste wine.
So...
Hi Luca. I stopped by Barboursville Vineyards on Monday. I was in western Virginia for the weekend. I was not thrilled with the Nebbiolos that I tasted, 2020, 2011, 1998. They seemed too marked by the barrique. Not in the obvious way with toasty oak flavors, but in the more pernicious way of higher surface to volume ratio for oxygen contact through the barrel. That's a personal observation related to my evolving personal preference for large wood vessels for aging Nebbiolo.
OTOH, I was quite pleasantly surprised by the convincing performance of their Vermintino and Sangiovese bottlings. The Fiano and Barbera were also admirable, if not exciting. I bought the 2011 and 2020 Nebbiolo to see if spending time with a whole bottle will change my impression for the better. The local Virginia Sangiovese will no longer be made, as the vines were replaced with Petit Verdot (a new villian for me, ala Franchetti Rosso, WTF?)
I also bought a bottle of the Fiano to try it alongside recent Ciro Picariello and Colli di Lapio vintages. And I bought a Vermintino, because it ran circles around the Vermintinos I had last month in Sardinia, though, admittedly, the visits were not chosen by me.
Oh, I didn't buy the 1998 Nebbiolo because the price was $450 for a 750ml bottle. The only bottle of wine that I've spent that much money for was a 1.88 liter bottle of 1958 Bartolo Mascarello Barolo, my birth year, from the cellar in Barolo in 2004.
Chutzpah!!
After having been mildly berated recently for not showing up in forums for a while, I feel that perhaps I should post some observations that I sent to Luca. I had spent an afternoon with him in the Valtellina early in June. He mentioned that he had fond memories of Nebbiolos from Barboursville Vineyards in Virginia. I was in western Virginia recently and took advantage of the opportunity to drop by the vineyard and taste wine.
So...
Hi Luca. I stopped by Barboursville Vineyards on Monday. I was in western Virginia for the weekend. I was not thrilled with the Nebbiolos that I tasted, 2020, 2011, 1998. They seemed too marked by the barrique. Not in the obvious way with toasty oak flavors, but in the more pernicious way of higher surface to volume ratio for oxygen contact through the barrel. That's a personal observation related to my evolving personal preference for large wood vessels for aging Nebbiolo.
OTOH, I was quite pleasantly surprised by the convincing performance of their Vermintino and Sangiovese bottlings. The Fiano and Barbera were also admirable, if not exciting. I bought the 2011 and 2020 Nebbiolo to see if spending time with a whole bottle will change my impression for the better. The local Virginia Sangiovese will no longer be made, as the vines were replaced with Petit Verdot (a new villian for me, ala Franchetti Rosso, WTF?)
I also bought a bottle of the Fiano to try it alongside recent Ciro Picariello and Colli di Lapio vintages. And I bought a Vermintino, because it ran circles around the Vermintinos I had last month in Sardinia, though, admittedly, the visits were not chosen by me.
Oh, I didn't buy the 1998 Nebbiolo because the price was $450 for a 750ml bottle. The only bottle of wine that I've spent that much money for was a 1.88 liter bottle of 1958 Bartolo Mascarello Barolo, my birth year, from the cellar in Barolo in 2004.
Chutzpah!!