1998 Barolo Riserva Vigna Rionda

1998 has always been an interesting vintage for Barolo. Caught between the more hyped 1996 and 1997 on one end, and 2000 and 2001 on the other, the 1998s have often been overlooked. It also didn't help that the wines were first released during a period global economic malaise. While 1998 is not a truly iconic, legendary vintage, these Barolos are great choices for medium-term drinking as a number of wines are entering their early maturity, making them great choices for readers who are cellaring wines from Piedmont's sturdier vintages such as 1996, 1999 and 2001.

Piedmont experienced mostly warm weather in 1998 with spells of drought, though nowhere near the extremes seen in 1997. The wines have always been perfumed and accessible, with an attractive softness to the fruit. Even better, the vast majority of the wines have never shut down to the extent that wines from cooler vintages often do. The 1998s are extremely consistent across the board, and that level of outstanding quality may very well end up being the vintage's strongest attribute. As is typically the case, the Barolos of La Morra and Barolo are the most forward, while those of Serralunga are the freshest. Most of these wines were from my cellar, purchased and cellared since release, although I tasted a few of the wines a second time with the producers.

Franco and Roberto Massolino put together a remarkable tasting when I visited their small estate in Serralunga earlier this year. Massolino makes a number of outstanding wines but their flagship Barolo Riserva Vigna Rionda is particularly noteworthy. All 14 vintages of the Rionda were represented, including the legendary Barolo vintages of the last 20 years – 1982, 1985, 1989 and 1990 – as well as the more recent wines from the 1990s. As this tasting demonstrated, Massolino's Vigna Rionda is capable of developing extraordinary complexity in bottle. With the exception of the warmest, most precocious years, it is a wine that starts coming into its own around age ten, but that really blossoms between ages 15-20. Even with extended bottle age, it remains a classically structured Barolo with a firm tannic spine. One of the most fascinating aspects of a tasting like this is that provenance is completely removed from the equation. Because the bottles had never been moved, almost all the wines came across as youthful and fresh. The gently-sloping Vigna Rionda, which can be seen from the Massolino winery, is one of Barolo's most iconic vineyards. It was Bruno Giacosa who first made the site famous with his towering Barolos of the 1970s and 1980s. Massolino owns two adjacent plots in Vigna Rionda. The first piece of land was purchased in the early 1960s, the second in the mid-1980s. Like most other traditionally-minded estates, for many years Massolino produced a single Barolo made from a blend of their various holdings. The winery first bottled Vigna Rionda as a single-vineyard Barolo in 1982. The 1980s wines are very traditional in style and are also quite representative of their respective vintages. The 1990s have brought more elegance and finesse to the wines, but without sacrificing the house style.

Massolino makes four Barolos from some of the most important crus in Serralunga. Fermentation and maceration are done in stainless steel and glass-lined cement, and on average, range from 10 days for the normale, to 15 days for the Margheria and 20 days for its signature wine, the Riserva Vigna Rionda. The wines undergo malolactic fermentation in steel and cement and then the normale and Margheria age for 2 to 2 1⁄2 years in Slavonian oak casks of various sizes before being bottled, while Vigna Rionda is aged for 3 1⁄2 to 4 years in oak. The Parafada is the estate's more modern-styled Barolo. For this wine the house uses rotary fermenters and fermentation lasts 5-6 days, with higher temperatures than those used for the other Barolos, which allow a greater extraction of color and fruit. The wine does malolactic in Allier barriques, where it is aged for 2 to 2 1⁄2 years. The Parafada bottling has been a source of confusion among consumers in recent years as stylistically it has been much more modern than the other wines. To their credit the Massolinos have acknowledged this and are moving the Parafada to be more consistent with the other Barolos in the lineup.