Vino Rosso "Lozio"

Italy
Piedmont
2016

80% Nebbiolo/20% Vespolina. These 40+-year-old vines grow on a hill of sandy, mineral-rich volcanic soils overlooking the sanctuary ("santuario") for which the winery is named. The farming is organic and the harvest by hand. Only the most perfect bunches go into Lozio, with the rest going into the regular "Santuvario" red.

The fruit is destemmed and fermented with native yeasts in stainless steel tank. Since the Vespolina ripens earlier, it and the Nebbiolo are vinified separately; the Nebbiolo is macerated for about a month with an occasional punchdown by hand. The wines are gently pressed by hand with a small torchio press and then blended and aged, in the case of the 2016, for 3 years in a 500-liter Stockinger foudre. The wine was then bottled without filtration for another year of aging. Sulfur is used very sparingly.

The wine is classified as a Vino Rosso--with the vintage represented in Roman numerals--due mainly to vignaiolo Ivano Barbaglia's lack of faith in the oversight of the official DOC Boca's standards.  "Lozio" has a double meaning: in slang it means "lazy" and in proper Italian "uncle" (Ivano is a proud one). The label is simply a photograph of the graffitied road-side sign announcing one's crossing the line into the hamlet of Santuario.

SKU/Code: 
DB8839-16
Product Line: 
Wine
Red
Varietal: 
Nebbiolo
Farming Type: 
Organic