TN: Italian wine trade tasting at the Kaufleuten

[David from Switzerland]

Boucherville tasting at the Kaufleuten in Zürich on the 24th of January.

Ceretto Barbaresco Bernadot 2006
Medium ruby-red. Soft marzipan and spice, rose water and licorice. Softly orangey acids, sufficiently finely-grained tannin, not too flavourful but nice medium-weight. Medium-plus length. Rating: 88+/89

Ceretto Barolo Bricco Rocche Brunate 2004
A bit more evolved garnet-tinged ruby-red, mild watery-orange rim. Already throws minor sediment. Aromatically more heavy-handed than the Bernadot. Drier rose petal. Faintest cured meat/dried beefiness. A bit more body and/or alcohol perhaps. About as long, if more diffuse on the aftertaste. Rating: 88+/89?

Fattoria di Fèlsina Chianti Classico Berardenga 2006
Quite full ruby-black. Lightly nutty oak, a bit more evolved. Good, warm, darkly chocolate- and mocha-tinged fruit. Fair body and length. Rating consistent with that of a bottle half a year earlier. Rating: 88+/89

Fattoria di Fèlsina Chianti Classico Berardenga 2008
From magnum. Fresher ruby-black than that of the 2006. More subtlety, juiciness and precision, crisper, fresher so to speak, livelier for sure. Smaller berry type wine. Morello. Came across as a fraction less modernistic than the 2006, maybe merely thanks to the vintage. No better, if more to my taste at this early stage. Rating: 88(+/-?)

Fattoria di Fèlsina Chianti Riserva Berardenga Rancia 2006
Aged 18 months in French oak, 60% of which new. A bit denser-looking ruby-black colour. Quite well-integrated oak, extremely finely-grained if still fractionally dry and firm (but not at all hard or rustic) tannin. Quite good length. Another vintage of Rancia with upwards potential. Rating: 91+/92?

Fattoria di Fèlsina IGT Fontalloro 2005
Lightly evolved but still fresh and shiny ruby-black. Walnutty oak and spice. Fair enough fruit, reasonably concentrated but could be fresher and livelier. Medium length. Rating: 89+/~90?

San Leonardo San Leonardo Trentino Terre di San Leonardo 2005
Aged in cement vats? Nonetheless seemed to reek of nutty oak. Medium if not mixed/diverse ripeness level. Medium-plus concentration. Easy to drink if modern in style as well as simplistic. Rating: 85+/86

San Leonardo Trentino San Leonardo 2004
Ca. 30% new oak. Quite firm, good intensity, nice body. Mildly hazelnutty oak. Well-balanced vintage, my favourite of this bottling thus far, good potential for harmony and elegance. Fair enough acidity. Good warmth of fruit and alcohol. Longer than the Terre. Rating: ~90

Roberto Voerzio Barbera d’Alba Vigneti Ceretto 2007
Quite deep ruby-black. Good fruit, quite firm. Nice tannin. Integrated acidity. Some, if nice oak. Medium-plus body. Good length. Rating: 89+/90?

Roberto Voerzio Langhe Nebbiolo Vigneti San Francesco 2008
Quite sweet and full for a “generic” Nebbiolo, plump ripeness backed by faintly bitter and ever so faintly powdery-grainy tannin. Good body. Fairly long. Rating: 90+/91?

Roberto Voerzio Barolo Rocche dell’Annunziata Torriglione 2006
Warm garnet-ruby-red, orange at the rim. Warm fruit, broth cube spice, mace, some blood orange, soft rose hip tea. Nice body. Lightly dry tannin but finely-grained and flavourful. Long finish. Rating: 93+/94(+?)

Roberto Voerzio Barolo Cerequio 2006
Fractionally lighter colour than the Rocche. Complex, spicy, tender yet concentrated and quite dense. Still lightly hard and firm tannin, rose petal, even longer than the Rocche. A beauty of a wine with no excess fat or weight, but sharply delineated and very intense, the kind one remembers more vividly and thinks of more often than most. Rating: 94+/95

Roberto Voerzio Barolo Brunate 2006
Similar colour to that of the Cerequio. More closed, darker, more powerful, just as promising, marginally oakier. Less finesse and complexity, less “pretty” than the more Burgundian Cerequio. A bit more powdery/grainy tannin. Should grow longer as it evolves and opens up, but may take a few years longer than the Cerequio to reach maturity. Rating: 93+/94(+?)

Greetings from Switzerland, David.
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"J'ai gaché vingt ans de mes plus belles années au billard. Si c'était à refaire, je recommencerais.“ Roger Conti

 

[Yule Kim]

The Felsina Rancia sounds very oaky and amped...I always thought it specifically and Felsina in general were supposed to be more representative of traditional winemaking. Is this the norm for the Rancia cuvee or is Felsina transitioning to modernist wine making at this point?

Also, for your palate David, would you drink the Rancia again or is it to oaky and modernist for you?

 

[David from Switzerland]

originally posted by Yule Kim:
RanciaThe Felsina Rancia sounds very oaky and amped...I always thought it specifically and Felsina in general were supposed to be more representative of traditional winemaking. Is this the norm for the Rancia cuvee or is Felsina transitioning to modernist wine making at this point?

Also, for your palate David, would you drink the Rancia again or is it to oaky and modernist for you?

Rancia has always been their special all-Sangiovese, single-parcel, barrique-aged cuvée, like it or not. It tends to age well, and usually into something I appreciate significantly more in its maturity. The plumpness of the 2006 vintage may bring out those "modernistic" characteristics in way that makes it hard for me to tell if indeed the style has changed as much as for the standard "Classico" bottling - that certainly has become much more modern.

My favourite Rancia thus far has been the 1990, followed by the 1988 - we do not tend to drink this bottling young. For example, we opened a bottle of the 1999 a year ago, which qualitatively falls in-between the aforementioned 1988 and 1990, and thought it pointless to open another before it's going to have reached the age of 15 at least. Mind you, the wine never becomes oak-free, but then, most Bordeaux doesn't. It tends to keep that mildly tarry touch, enough so that some old-timey people like my mom could never fully warm up to either unless it's an exceptional vintage and knocks one over with its superior quality (as in the case of Rancia, the 1990).

Thus, the question to me is not how oaky the bottling is per se (it is), but whether in a given vintage it is good and ageworthy enough that one will turn a blind eye to the (by then residual) oak once it reaches maturity.

As far as "style" is concerned, the relative modernity of the standard "Classico" seems more of a problem in this respect - it also seems to have become less ageworthy in recent years, so that on balance, it barely stands a realistic chance of living its oak "off" (even if less to start with than in the Rancia).

Greetings from Switzerland, David.
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"J'ai gaché vingt ans de mes plus belles années au billard. Si c'était à refaire, je recommencerais.“ Roger Conti