Barolo

Barolo is a red wine from Piedmont in north-west Italy, made entirely from Nebbiolo. Expect a pale, garnet-coloured wine with formidable tannin and high acidity, tasting of sour cherry, rose, tar and dried herbs — famously demanding, and famously long-lived.

Where Barolo is

Barolo sits in the Langhe hills south of Alba, in Piedmont, at the foot of the Alps. It is a small area: eleven communes, of which Barolo, La Morra, Serralunga d'Alba, Castiglione Falletto and Monforte d'Alba account for most of what you will see.

The climate is continental — cold winters, warm summers — and autumn fog rolls through the valleys at harvest. Nebbiolo ripens very late, often into late October, and that long hang time is what builds its aromatic complexity while retaining acidity.

Two broad soil types divide the region. The western communes, including La Morra and Barolo itself, sit on younger, marl-rich soils that give more perfumed, softer, earlier-drinking wines. The eastern communes, notably Serralunga d'Alba and Monforte, have older, sandier and more compacted soils that produce more structured, tannic wines needing longer.

Nebbiolo, and why the wine looks so pale

Nebbiolo is the only permitted grape. Barolo is always 100% Nebbiolo.

The first thing that surprises people is the colour. Nebbiolo is low in the pigments that make other reds dark, so even a young Barolo is pale ruby and turns brick-orange at the rim within a few years. It looks like a delicate wine and tastes like anything but.

What Nebbiolo lacks in colour it makes up for in tannin and acidity — it is high in both, an unusual combination that makes young Barolo genuinely astringent. Those same two components are what allow the wine to age for decades.

The aromatics are the reason people fall for it: rose petal and violet, sour red cherry, and with age a set of savoury notes usually described as tar, leather, dried herbs, truffle and dried orange peel.

Reading the label

• Barolo — aged a minimum of three years before release, at least some of it in wood.
• Barolo Riserva — a minimum of five years.
• A named vineyard — many labels carry a specific site (a menzione geografica aggiuntiva), such as Cannubi, Brunate or Bussia. These are Barolo's equivalent of a Burgundian cru, and the best sites command serious prices.

Note that the minimum ageing means Barolo is never released young. A bottle on the shelf is already several years past vintage, and often still too young to drink.

Traditional and modern

Barolo has its own version of the old-versus-new argument. Traditionalists use long macerations and large, neutral Slavonian oak casks, producing pale, aromatic, austere wines that demand patience. Modernists use shorter macerations and small French barriques, giving darker, softer, oakier wines that are approachable sooner.

The gap has narrowed considerably, and most good producers now sit somewhere between. But it still explains why two bottles of the same appellation and vintage can taste so different.

What it tastes like, and when to open it

Full-bodied in structure but light in colour and weight, with high tannin, high acidity and moderate to high alcohol. Young, it is tight and gripping, with sour cherry and rose fighting through the tannin. With ten years or more, the tannin resolves into something silky and the tertiary notes — truffle, tar, dried flowers, leather — take over.

If you open a Barolo under about eight years old, decant it for an hour or two and serve it with rich food. It is not a wine that flatters you on its own when young.

Food pairings

Barolo's tannin and acidity need fat and protein. This is not a versatile wine, and it is not meant to be.

• Brasato al Barolo — beef braised in the wine itself, the local answer.
• Risotto with butter and Parmesan — richness against the acidity.
• Truffle dishes — the classic Piedmontese pairing; aged Barolo has truffle notes of its own.
• Aged hard cheeses — Parmigiano, aged pecorino.
• Roast game and rich meat stews.

Avoid anything light, delicate, or heavily spiced.

What to buy

Barolo is expensive, and there is no cheap entry point that tastes like the real thing. If the budget will not stretch, the honest alternatives are Barbaresco (the same grape, generally a little softer and released earlier), Nebbiolo d'Alba or Langhe Nebbiolo — the last of these is often declassified fruit from Barolo vineyards and is the single best way to learn what Nebbiolo tastes like without the outlay.

When you do buy Barolo, producer matters more than vintage, and commune matters more than most people expect. If you want approachability, look to La Morra. If you want power and longevity, look to Serralunga d'Alba.

Serve at 16 to 18°C in a large glass. Decant young bottles; be gentler with old ones, which can fade quickly once opened.