Made with air-dried fruit, the Ricossa 2021 Piemonte Barbera Appassimento has sweet spots and a relatively contained 14% alcohol content. That sweetness cedes to raspberry confit, dried fig, raisin and tarry smoke. This is a simple wine with a very easy and lean approach that could be paired with classic fried chicken.

An 82,000-bottle production made with air-dried fruit, the Ricossa 2019 Piemonte Barbera Appassimento has a lot of everything going on in the glass. It offers some bitter rosemary or bramble-like notes, and it also shows ripe fruit and blackberry. There is sweetness and extra concentration, but the wine is also tart and sharp. I get a clear note of black olive. I found this whole experiment to be slightly disjointed overall.