Elio Altare’s 1989 Barolo shows wonderful integrity in its fruit. A note of French oak remains, but it is beautifully woven into a fabric of ripe red fruit, spices and flowers. This is classic La Morra Barolo, with bright, floral red berries and a delicate, perfumed personality. The 1989 is drinking well, and only perfectly stored bottles have any further upside at this point. Anticipated maturity: 2010-2012.
Elio Altare was (and continues to be) one of the leading figures of the modernist movement in Barolo. Not only did Altare make some of the most groundbreaking wines in Piedmont, he also inspired a whole generation of younger producers to estate-bottle their wines rather than selling their fruit and/or wine to the region’s large bottlers. By the late 1980s Altare’s approach was already well-defined. Fermentations were a then-shocking three and half to five days long, with manual pumpovers and punchdowns. The Barolos were racked into steel for the malolactic fermentations and then aged in French oak barrels, of which roughly 30% were new. One of the distinguishing aspects of Altare’s approach compared to that of his contemporaries is his preference for carrying out the malolactic fermentations in steel for his Barolos (as is common in Bordeaux) rather than in oak (as is the norm in Burgundy), which Altare believes yields wines that retain freshness and age more gracefully. After having tasted Altare’s 1989 and 1990 Barolos, along with those of Roberto Voerzio and Angelo Gaja (two producers who share the same approach to malolactic fermentation) it is awfully hard to argue with that view. It was indeed fascinating to taste two of Altare’s 1990 from the same vineyard, the Vigna Arborina, which underwent malolactic fermentation in 100% new oak, followed by another 12 months in the same French oak barrels, and the Barolo Arborina, which underwent malo in stainless steel and was subsequently aged in French oak. Altare was harshly criticized for his outspoken advocacy of green harvesting, short (often radically short) fermentations and use of French oak. The critics claimed the wines would not age. They could not have been more wrong.
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