1997 Barolo

This wine was tasted as part of a vertical tasting held in London in April 2016. The wines were arranged in five thematic flights. Our second flight looks at four vintages in the late 1990s and early 2000s that are also in their prime drinking windows, with the possible exception of the 1999, which is still quite young.

Ultra-traditionalist Bartolo Mascarello produces 18,000 to 20,000 bottles of Barolo in "a good typical year like 1998," but offered just 12,000 from '96, a vintage that began with a problematic flowering. His sole Barolo bottling is a classic blend of fruit from multiple sites. (On an earlier visit, Mascarello told me: "I don't make wine with fantasy names. I don't make crus I don't make wine in barriques My wines don't have perfume of vanilla and Limousin oak. I'm the last of the Mohicans.") Mascarello prunes short, and has green harvested for many years. "Now it the mode," he notes. Mascarello still vinifies his Barolos in concrete tanks without benefit of temperature control.

Mascarello describes 1996 as a classic vintage. 1997, he says, was characterized by a very early harvest and therefore much less typical. Mascarello is able to pick his Barolo parcels in 10 days, and in '97 he finished by the end of September. 1995, he adds, offers finesse but is "less important"; he rates it about equal in quality to 1993. Both '95 and '96 featured short crops due to hail and problems during the flowering. Mascarello humid old cellar was almost empty at the time of my visit, as he had just bottled the '97 light wines and the '95 Barolo, the latter almost a year ahead of his normal schedule so that he would have a Barolo to sell next March. (Mascarello sold off his '94 last spring because he felt it did not have enough body.) x000D x000D x000D x000D x000D x000D x000D x000D x000D x000D x000D x000D x000D x000D x000D x000D x000D x000D Mascarello, who describes himself as "the last of the Mohicans," is one of the few remaining strict traditionalists: he uses no barriques and offers no cru bottlings (his single Barolo is a blend of his holdings, with old vines in Cannubi and a large parcel in Rocche di Torriglione in the Annunziata district of La Morra the most important components. The wines remain on their skins for about 25 days, but sometimes longer if ambient temperatures are low. x000D x000D x000D x000D x000D x000D x000D x000D x000D x000D x000D x000D x000D x000D x000D x000D x000D x000D x000D x000D On my recent visit, I had the chance to taste Mascarello great '64 from magnum. This reddish orange wine offered a fabulous nose of plum, red currant, dried rose, underbrush and Graves like leather and hot stones; lovely penetrating sweetness and exotic fruit notes in the middle palate; and terrific follow through, with fairly soft tannins. It rated a solid 95, and was still full of life.