Our Visit to Bartolo Mascarello, May 2023

Date of visit: May 31, 2023

Rué: Left is Dolcetto & right is Nebbiolo

This past May we were very lucky to have visited Bartolo Mascarello, and took a tour of their vineyards with our generous host, Emanuele. Despite the heavy rain Langhe was experiencing that day, Emmanuele agreed to show us around. We jumped in his Fiat Panda, and began our tour. Our first stop was Rué.

*To read about our previous visits to Bartolo Mascarello, and for our full write up on this outstanding producer, visit our Producer Visits page here.

Rué

Looking downwards, from the top of the vineyards, you can see Dolcetto on the left and Nebbiolo on the right. Emmanuele explained that some of the Nebbiolo from Rué is used for their Langhe Nebbiolo, and some for Barolo. The Nebbiolo plantings are approximately 35 years old, and Dolcetto is a bit older than that. He explained that the soil is primarily silt, but there’s also some sand and clay. We quickly took some pictures and piled back into the Panda, careful to not waste any time as it looked like the rain was going to pick up any moment.

Cannubi

San Lorenzo

Our next stop was San Lorenzo. Looking up from the bottom of the hill, you’ll see Nebbiolo planted on the left, and Barbera on the right. Nebbiolo vines are seven years old, and were planted from massal selection. Beginning with the 2020 vintage these vines are used in Mascarello’s Barolo. The rain was gaining momentum, so we skipped visiting Torriglione which is the vineyard that Maria Teresa owns in Rocche dell’Annunziata, and set off to see Cannubi.

Cannubi visited a few days later on a sunny day

Cannubi

Looking up from the bottom of the hill, the front section of the vineyard just in front of the small house is 15 years old, to the left of this section vines are 20 years old, and behind the house towards the left vines are 70 years old. At this point it was raining quite hard. The soil in the vineyards began soaking up the rain, and had turned it into a mushy and VERY slippery wet clay-like substance. We all agreed it was best for us to head back to the cellar and tasting room. 

Nebbiolo growing in Canubbi

Before our tasting, Emmanuele gave us a quick tour around the cellar, which we hadn’t seen in a couple of years. He showed us their cement tanks which have been in use since the 1950s, and explained that they were once lined with fiberglass, but have since been refinished, and are now lined with an epoxy resin instead. It’s pretty incredible to think that these have been in use for roughly 70 vintages. He explained that a portion of the fruit destined for Barolo is fermented in cement, and a portion in tine. All other wines are fermented exclusively in cement. 

We made our way into the second portion of the cellar which is filled exclusively with large Garbellotto barrels used for aging. Freisa is the only wine which sees slightly smaller Gabellotto barrels, as compared to their other wines. The decision to use a smaller barrel for Freisa is simply because there is such a miniscule quantity of fruit that there wouldn’t be enough juice to fill a larger barrel. In any given year, only approximately 1500 liters of Freisa are produced. After aging, all wines are bottled at the same time in July. Emmanuele noted that sadly for 2022 production was down by a staggering 40%.

Our next stop was a room filled with a library of past vintages. One of the walls is lined with bottles all of which have Bartolo Mascarello’s hand drawn artist labels on them. Opposite this wall, there are shelves filled with labeless wines in all different formats going back many many decades. As we looked around the room, we asked Emmanuele a question which we’d been curious about for a long time. “Why is it that older bottles are 720ml, rather than 750ml”? Emmanuel explained that before the DOCG a standard size bottle was 720ml, and a magnum was 1.88L.

We made our way back over to the tasting room to taste the 2019 vintage of Barolo, a wine which we’d anxiously been looking forward to tasting. 

As explained in previous posts, Bartolo Mascarello’s wines are produced in very small quantities. As a result, we were unable to taste the other wines, but we have no doubt that they were nothing short of spectacular, given our past experience with these wines.

Our Tasting Notes

2019 Barolo: Deeply captivating beautiful floral aromas, along with very classic notes of tar, leather roses, and anise. The palate delivers flavors of cherries, cranberries, and leather, with silky tannins that are already beautifully integrated, backed by mouthwatering, lively acidity, and a persistent finish. Very clean, and direct. Extremely approachable and enjoyable now, but will no doubt reveal even greater drinking pleasure in many years to come. A truly outstanding Barolo.  

Thank You

Thank you Emmanuele and Maria Teresa for once again welcoming us to your amazing and historic estate, and for generously showing us around the vineyards, even when weather conditions weren’t ideal. We greatly appreciate this. Your 2019 Barolo is truly outstanding! Grazie mille! We hope to see you again very soon!