2023 Olek Bondonio “Grignleo” Grignolino, AOC Piemonte, Italy.
The absolutely delicious, fun and nicely rounded “Grignleo” AOC Piemonte Grignolino is made at the highly regarded Olek Bondonio winery in Asti by his assistant winemaker Sindi Mandiqi and, as I understand it, named after her dog and in his memory. Lightly garnet/ruby in the glass, this fresh Grignolino is a bit Nebbiolo like with sour cherry, strawberry, burnt orange and tart plum fruits, along with a pop of peppery spice, mineral tones, dried rose petals and a hint of earthy leather. This vibrant red wine can be served with a slight chill and be enjoyed as an aperitif with a meat board. Bondonio, now famous for cult Barbaresco, was late getting into wine, despite his noted ancestry with 200 years of grape growing and highly-regarded vines, including his holding of Roncagliette cru parcels in Barbaresco, which is just down his driveway, immediately abutting Gaja’s famous Sorì Tildin! Olek only began his foray into wine in 2005 with the encouragement of his Polish mother, hence his first name, who told him if he was interested in making wine off the family vineyards, he should do it. Bondonio is not ego driven and relies on natural, minimum intervention winemaking, based in the family’s 200 year-old farmhouse called ‘La Berchialla,’ where keeps his botti wine barrels, once where cattle were kept. It’s noted that one of Olek’s ancestors of the farm La Berchialla, a General Guglielmo Como, was a key founder of the famous Produttori del Barbaresco. I believe, this 2023 Bondonio Grignolino “Grignleo” is Sindi Mandiqi’s first vintage, and is an admirable effort and a great quaffable wine to enjoy over the next year or two.
The Grignolino grape, which has a mixed reputation, is as most experts believe to native to the Monferrato hills, located between the towns of Asti and Casale, and is a red Italian wine grape variety almost exclusively found in the Piemonte region of northwestern Italy, not to far from Torino. Grignolino makes for typically light colored wines and rosés with very fruity and floral aromas, and it can have strong acidity and rustic tannins, though modern styles have more gentle macerations and show the grape in a more silky way that had been the case in older times. The name Grignolino derives from the word grignole which means “many pips” in the local Piedmontese dialect of the Asti region, which had been the reason for bitterness and harsh flavors. Grignolino has now found its way to the new world, once a curiosity it has found a happy home in California and Australia with even famous Napa producer Heitz Cellars being long time makers of Grignolino. But, the younger generation of Piemonte winemakers has turned up the quality and the number of delicious versions is on the rise, as this wine shows. The Grignolino wine is fermented in large cement tanks with native yeasts and aged in large Botti, with Slavonian Gamba and Stockinger (Austrian oak) used. Everything at Bondonio is raw and transparent in style and every grape is organic and there’s only the very minimum use of sulfur, with the wines being vastly different to his legendary neighbor. While best known for the Barbarescos, like his Starderi and signature Roncagiette, Bondonio does a set of Barbera, Dolcetto and Nebbiolo offerings, as well as this Grignolino and the rare Pelaverga, all of which are tasty and I recommend chasing them down.
($26 Est.) 90 Points, grapelive