A Deep Dive into Elio Grasso Barolo Gavarini Chiniera 2022
Elio Grasso is one of our go-to Piedmont producers, year in and year out. The Barolos the Grasso family produces are consistently some of the top wines we taste every year. Incredibly age worthy but also approachable in their youth, let’s take an in-depth look at what makes these wines so special and in particular, the 2022 Barolo from Gavarini Chiniera in the Ginestra Cru in the village of Monforte d’Alba!
The Producer: Like many producers in Piedmont, Italy and Europe in general, the Grasso family grew grapes but sold them off to be made into wine by co-ops or other wineries. The vintages in Barolo were too varied, with only a couple every decade making great wine, to take the risk to bottle and try to sell the wine under their own label. However, it was Elio, in the late 70s, who decided to take that risk and bottle wines under his own name. Elio’s son, Gianluca took over in the mid-2000s, carrying on his father’s legacy of traditional but innovative winegrowing and winemaking.
The Vineyard: The Grasso vineyards were part of Lorenzo Fantini’s early 20th century maps of the top vineyards in Barolo, so the quality of their holdings are no secret. With a high proportion of Limestone in the soils in their top vineyards in the Ginestra Cru, their wines are naturally structured with well formed tannin and great freshness. If you look at the picture above, you can see how the vineyards form a natural amphitheater under a white cliff face, giving away the calcareous identity of the soil under the vines. The Chiniera Monopole (outlined in blue) sits within the Ginestra Cru and is just to the southwest of the winery at the top of the slope, giving it an optimal southeast exposition. The surrounding forests are incredibly important to the health and vitality of the vineyard, so much so that the Grassos purchased a swath of it to protect it from another buyer taking out the forest to plant more vines in an attempt to replicate what the Grassos have accomplished.
The Vintage: 2022 was an incredibly tough vintage in Barolo, something that used to be the norm, but is now relatively rare, only happening a couple of times every decade. Between spring frost and a drought with intense heat in the summer and into harvest, it took everything growers had to combat the conditions to bring in healthy grapes. Great vineyard sites, good farming practices and extreme diligence all combine to make great wine in a bad vintage, which, luckily, is what we have here!
The Winemaking: All of the grapes are hand harvested and destemmed before a lengthy, 2-month cold maceration where the juice sits on the skins, absorbing color and tannin. During this period, the juice is pumped over the skins once daily to gently aid in this absorption. Once the fermentation is complete, the wine is moved to Slavonian Oak Botti, traditional large aging casks made from oak from Slavonia in eastern Croatia. The wine spends 2 years there before being bottled, where it will age almost another year before release to the market.
The Wine: Clearly, making this wine is quite the process, but the results speak for themselves. Compact, firm tannins reveal this is a young wine that can age for 15+ years but doesn’t preclude near term enjoyment. There’s a density in the wine but also a balancing mineral finesse and freshness. Bright cherry, mocha, baking spice, blood orange, rose petal, fresh and dried herbs all come together here to make this a complex, food friendly wine that will live for quite some time.
Come on in and grab yourself a bottle or three, drink it now, drink it in ten years... up to you!
