Blind tasting - Barbaresco 2008

Surprise blind tasting: Emilio disoriented me the other day, pulling out a bottle from the basement, heavily disguised with kitchen foil, asking me to taste and guess its country of origin, age and type of grape. Que? It's an almost impossible task under normal circumstances, an outright unmanageable feat with a nose and taste bud that had not entirely recovered from the flu. The best I could do was to offer a kind of description. It looked old-ish (the wine was a shade of red closer to amber than dark ruby at the rim), smelled of fruits and flowers (even with a semi-blocked nose) and tasted moderate on many levels: acidity, level of tannin and body. A nice medium length finish. An 'OK' taste which improved after some rest. (edit: I thought it was Spanish). It turned out to be a 6 year old Barbaresco. One of the many bottles that Emilio had ordered online last July to diversify a little bit away from Spain and expand our Italian collection. 

Barbaresco DOCG (Denominazione di Origine Controllata e Garantita, the best classification for Italian wine), is exclusively made from the Nebbiolo grape harvested not only from the village of Barberesco, but also in the neighbouring ones of Treiso, Neive and Alba. Located in the north west of Italy, in the wine region of Piedmont (also home to my favourite Barolo and the sparkling white wines of Astic), it is about 2 hours drive from Milan and an hour and a half from the French border. Nebbiolo grapes, also used to create Barolo, are finicky to grow and very sensitive to frosts and soil. For this reason, they do not thrive outside their hometown. 

The bottle Emilio wrapped up was named "Riserva Ovella 2008". It is produced by Produttori del Barbaresco.  Riservas from Barberesco DOCG are required to age for 4 years, one of which has to be in an oak barrel (Note: a Barolo Riserva has to age for a minimum of 5 years). Barbaresco typically ages well and needs at least 10 years to flourish and showcase its complex flavour, so in all likelihood we had opened the bottle 4 years too soon. Produttori del Barbaresco was founded in 1958 by the priest of the Barbaresco village, who pooled together 19 small growers to survive economically. The first three vintages were made in the church basement. It has grown since then - they have moved out from the basement and there are now 56 Nebbiolo vineyards in the group, accounting for 1/6 of the vineyards in the Barbaresco wine region.