2020 Massolino Barolo Parussi
WINEMAKER: Franco & Roberto Massolino and Giovanni Angeli
REGION: Piedmont, IT
VARIETY: Nebbiolo
VITICULTURE: Organic
This is the only Barolo vineyard Massolino owns beyond Serralunga—‘the egg outside the nest’ as an old Piemonte saying goes. On the crest of the ridge, Parussi sits right next to the Serralunga border on the Castiglione Falletto side. The blue, iron-rich Sant'Agata marls here are a little lighter and more oxygenated, with more silt and less clay than in Serralunga. This makes for more vigour in the vines and a completely different style of wine. The Massolino family were attracted to the excellent southeast-to-southwest exposure, combined with the age of the vines (45 years) and the vineyard’s situation at 290 metres above sea level. To this day, Massolino is the only Barolo producer to bottle a single-vineyard wine from this Cru.
As always, this is quite different from the Serralunga wines, with more pungent depth and firmer tannins. It is an outstanding example of Castiglione Falletto, showing the depth of the place and the class of Massolino. Again, it fermented and aged in large oak, with around three weeks on skins, and is one of the best examples of this wine to date.
The high-altitude chalky hillsides of Serrralunga d’Alba, on the eastern edge of the Barolo DOCG, produce some of the most profound and long-lived Barolo wines. It is the home of great names such as Giacomo Conterno and Bruno Giacosa’s Falletto vineyard. The wines often have an extra stuffing of intense Nebbiolo fruit as well as a remarkable minerality that plays on both the freshness of the tannins and gives the wines a certain ferrous edge when young. Massolino’s Barolos sit comfortably among the finest of the region—they are wines of wonderful purity and elegance. The wines have earned an immaculate reputation in Australia, and deservedly so.