2019 Giulia Nergi, Barolo DOCG “Serradenari” Piemonte, Italy.
I was great to meet Giulia Negri and taste her wines at the Kermit Lynch 50th Anniversary Portfolio tasting in San Francisco, with her talents really showing in her set of Nebbiolo wines, especially her gorgeous 2019 Serradenari cru Barolo, a wine that was one of my favorites of the Kermit celebration and clearly a very serious effort that possesses beautiful aromatics, terroir driven character and stunning depth. The medium/full palate is obviously taut and youthful at this stage, highlighting its aging potential, but it is still generous and like Grand Cru Burgundy in class and style with crushed red berry, damson plum, black cherry and burnt orange fruits leading the way, plus subtle earthiness, perfumed rose petal, cedar, anise and a fine sense of mineral and stony details. There’s a lot going on here and it made me wish I had to pleasure to enjoy this fabulous dark ruby hued wine with a long hearty meal to get every nuance of Giulia’s Signature Serradenari Barolo, even so I can tell this is going to mature fantastically well and think it should go another decade plus with ease. I look forward to following this outstanding winery in the years to come, I was incredibly impressed with the set of new releases from Negri from her Langhe Nebbiolo to her single parcel Marassio Barolo, and I highly recommend this very gifted winegrower.
Giulia Negri, who took over her family’s winery at just 24, is a rising star in the Langhe and deserves some healthy respect for what she’s achieved so far, but she’s far from done yet and the potential is off the charts for her label, especially after tasting her latest set of Barolo bottlings. Practicing organic since 2014, Negri puts a lot attention to her vines, which are mostly at high elevation, like here at her Serradenari vineyard that is up at about 1,700 feet, which is now certified organic and set on clay, loam and marl (limestone) soils. The Serradenari cru, facing Southwest, is all hand tended and hand harvested and this Barolo’s grapes saw a long, 40 day maceration and fermentation in large conical wood vats. After fermentation, the wine was pressed off and racked to big Slavonian oak barrels where it was matured for 30 months, after which it was bottled unfiltered and rested in cellar before release. Giulia, who is according to Kermit Lynch, Berkeley’s famous importer, is known as Barologirl, as she has become known, is the new kid on the block in La Morra, but tasting her wines reveals a fine touch and devout respect for tradition that already places her wines among the region’s classics, which is high praise indeed. Negri, who started with the use of French barriques, quickly learned that her best expression of Barolo were ones aged in the old school Slavonian Botti and we are greatly rewarded by that change with her authentic and transparent wines.
($113 Est.) 96 Points, grapelive