The organic 2018 Barolo Brunate is angular and firm. Despite the softer character of the vintage, you still feel the tannins and the structure of this celebrated MGA site. There is balsam herb, dried lavender, rose and candied cherry. The wine is generous and round.
The 2015 Barolo Brunate is yet another silky and fine red wine with perhaps a tiny bit more structure and firmness at the back than the other single-vineyard offerings from Ceretto. It is beautifully accessible and oh so fine and elegant. The wine is aged in 300-liter French oak (with 10% new oak) for 12 months, followed by 24 months in Austrian oak casks. I absolutely love this wine. It's a cru that will impress at any wine-tasting party, or I can picture it at dinner with a deliciously rare steak au poivre.
Robust and opulent, the 2012 Barolo Brunate lives up to the reputation of this celebrated vineyard site. Brunate wines are known for their deeper color, aromatic intensity and hefty structure. You get all those qualities here packaged neatly into an elegant and age-worthy expression. Ceretto has made the best of the vintage thanks to careful fruit selection and you can taste those results here. This wine should be set aside for at least ten more years.
It's hard not to fall in love with the 2011 Barolo Brunate. The wine boasts broad shoulders and a full bouquet of ripe fruit aromas. This Barolo is deeply aromatic and expressive, two characteristics that are forever linked to this warm vintage. Barolo Brunate is rich and pervasive in terms of mouthfeel with dark fruit flavors, spice, blackberry, tar, licorice and barbecue smoke that last many long minutes. The wine also offers ample freshness to counter that opulence.
The 2010 Barolo Brunate takes Nebbiolo intensity up a notch thanks to the utter purity and generosity of the bouquet. The wine is aged in French oak, of which 20% is new and 80% is neutral. Always a powerhouse cru, fruit from Brunate tends to be darker and thicker in concentration. This is certainly the case here and you can feel that extra tannic bite on the close. Evolving aromas include white peppercorn, liquorice, chopped mint and crushed granite or flint.
Ceretto's 2013 Barolo Brunate shows dark garnet luminosity with subtle hues of cooked brick at the rims. By appearance alone, this is a very inviting Barolo. The bouquet is a bit softer and more delicate in this vintage. The wine shows a beautiful side of the usually more potent and austere Brunate cru.
Following in a similar theme, the mouthfeel is lightly layered and nuanced. The yielding tannins make this wine slightly more accessible, although it is also built for long aging should that be your preference. The wine is versatile and approachable in the medium term as well.
