ARPEPE
Grumello Rocca de Piro 2019
Lombardy, Italy
The Grumello cru has a little more topsoil above the granite than neighbouring vineyards in Sassella and Inferno and tends to produce wines that are a little less angular, a little softer and fuller. Here, fifty year old vines sit between 350 to 500 metres above sea level and the wine spends four months on skins in tini, before being pressed off to old chestnut botti to rest for a year a half. A generous take on Mountain Nebbiolo that offers great pleasure in its youth.
Nebbiolo
ABOUT THE PRODUCER
The Perego family has been growing grapes on the granite terraces of Valtellina since 1860.
They work only with Nebbiolo, or Chiavennasca as it is called in these parts, growing the grapes up to seven hundred metres above sea level on sheer, south-facing, sunlit vines that dig straight into rock. The vines are so far north into the alps they are practically in Switzerland and the resulting fruit is intensely mineral.
Production is very much of the old-school and labour is intense, the hills making it very difficult to reach the fruit at all. Everything across their thirteen hectares of vines is done by hand and in the cantina the family exercises a soft touch with famous patience. Favouring long, gentle macerations, the wines are left to rest in large, old chestnut casks until they are deemed ready for release.
The transparency of the grape, the singular landscape and the Peregos’ gentle hand in the cantina make for wines that are up there with Italy’s greats.