Category Archives: wines

2006 GD Vajra Barolo ‘Bricco Delle Viole’

    My friend a talented actor Tony Curran described this wine ‘like an angel weeping on your tongue’. When I went to Barolo for the first time I was attracted to the wine as it forms fragile droplets in your mouth, something like droplets of water floating about the space shuttle whilst in orbit. The droplets literally float around in your mouth and the flavors are exceptional. The Bricco Delle Viole is roughly 450 meters above sea level, a microclimate which neither gets too hot in summer nor too cold in winter. The Alps sit behind this plot and on a clear day, it is one of the most impressive sights I have ever seen. The soils that make up this terroir are rich in clay and calcium with high concentrations of minerals such as magnesium and manganese. These ingredients provide for an amazing wine of sheer quality...

2009 GD Vajra Kye DOC Langhe ‘Freisa’

    I went for a tasting with Giuseppe Vajra at the winery in Barolo. We were sitting along side some young Norwegians whom I might add are great lovers of wines. Whilst tasting this wine I asked the man from Oslo to my left what he felt about this particular 2009 Freisa. He started by telling a story; In Norway military service is obligatory; he had been assigned to the Tank regiment for his military service. His description of what lay before him was fixating, revealing the intricacies of firing a shell from a tank for the first time, detailing the sheer concentration involved. Glancing at the Kye Freisa, we had tasted that morning he equated the stimulation and concentration levels to those whilst firing off rounds in a tank. I laughed, but you know what? He was right. I am sure he was extrapolating his sensations, however,...

2007 Oddero DOCG Barolo

    The grapes used to make this wine come from two different plots; La Morra, Santa Maria Bricco Chiesa where the vines are situated approximately two hundred meters above sea level with southeastern sunshine exposure. The average age of the vines is thirty years, and this plot is no more that five acres. The second plot is in Castiglione-Falletto Bricco Fiasco. Bricco means the peak of the hillside. This plot has southwestern exposure to the sun with forty-year-old vines and measures roughly five acres. The annual production is no more than twenty-five hundred cases. A Rigorous manual selection of the finest quality grapes is undergone followed by the fermentation and maceration in stainless steel tanks for twenty days under temperature control of twenty-eight degrees Celsius. The grapes from the two different plots are kept separate throughout the process. The ageing process in forty, sixty, and seventy hectoliter Slavonian...

2006 Oddero DOCG Barolo ‘Villero’

    From Giacomo Oddero How can I really express what I feel about Barolo? It is alongside Burgundy the most delicate of wines. Linear in structure, composed of one varietal, yet so generous in its myriad of flavors. Bordeaux can have four different varietals in the blend and Chateauneuf du Pape can have up to thirteen. Barolo is not big in your mouth; it is very soft and small. It takes its time to cover every square cubic millimeter of the tongue, once completed, you will understand the definition of finesse in fine winemaking. One hundred percent Nebbiolo, this Villero wine comes from the village of Castiglione Falletto. This plot has southwestern sunshine exposure. The average age of the vines is fifty years old. The plot is no more that two acres. The harvesting period is usually around the first ten days of October. There is great care taken...