This historic family-owned estate is named after its founder Cesare Pio, who established the business in 1881. The winery is based in Alba, in the heart of Piemonte and is now run by Federica Boffa and Cesare Benvenuto, the fifth generation of the family. Pio Cesare developed Barolo’s reputation overseas in the 1950s by being one of the first producers to export the wine to the UK. The founder’s great grandson Pio Boffa was deeply convinced of the importance of cultivating and growing owned land to produce high quality wines and played a key role in the acquisition of vineyards in the same locations where Cesare Pio used to buy his grapes from. Today Pio Cesare owns 70 hectares in the hills of Barolo and Barbaresco and makes wines in a style that manages to balance the best of the old with the best of the new. The estate includes most of the municipalities in the Barolo and Barbaresco areas.
This wine comes from the “Il Bricco” vineyard in Treiso, one of the highest altitude sites in the entire Barbaresco region, reaching 400 mts asl. The 40 years old Nebbiolo vines are located on the south facing side of the hill where soils are characterised by high limestone and clay content giving wines of great structure and complexity, with long ageing potential. For this reason, Pio Cesare Barbaresco is aged for as long as Barolo.
After pressing, the grape juice was fermented in stainless steel tanks and was left in contact with the skins for around 30 days. The majority of the wine was then aged in French oak traditional “botti” for around 30 months, while a small proportion is aged in barriques for the first 12 months.
The 2019 vintage, thanks to good weather conditions across a long growing season with no major temperature peaks and good water reserves in the soil allowed the Nebbiolo grapes to achieve perfect ripening without any stress, and to express the typical features of each vineyard, and revealing the great diversity that characterises every vineyard within the Pio Cesare estate.
A very cold and dry winter was followed by high rainfall in March and April ensuring abundant water reserves in the soil. May was characterised by unstable weather and cooler than average temperatures, leading to a delay in the vegetative growth of about 15 days compared to recent years, in line, however, with a more traditional trend for the Langhe region. The summer was warm with isolated heat peaks during late June and July and intense but not damaging thunderstorms in the second half of July and August. The final part of the summer was marked by mild temperatures with sporadic rainfall and significant temperature fluctuations at night, particularly favourable for the perfect ripening of the grapes. The weather was then very stable and sunny until harvest with sporadic rainfall and cool night temperatures that allowed Nebbiolo to achieve gradual perfect ripeining. The Nebbiolo harvest began in the Barbaresco area on 10th October.
The 2019 vintage has a very traditional character, with wines that show great structure but retain great fruit concentration and floral character at the same time, along with balanced acidity, soft tannin and extraordinary aromatic complexity, all typical characteristics of great Barbaresco vintages.
A solid and powerful Barbaresco with fantastic depth of fruit and layers of tannins. Full and so deep and focused, with great length and structure. Bark, berry, mineral and deep terroir and gravitas..(James Suckling)
Serve with red meat dishes, game or seasonal truffle, mature cheeses.
Serve at 16-18°C.
97 pts James Suckling
A solid and powerful Barbaresco with fantastic depth of fruit and layers of tannins. Full and so deep and focused, with great length and structure. Bark, berry, mineral and deep terroir and gravitas. Try after 2027.
Barbaresco DOCG, Piemonte
100% Nebbiolo
Natural Cork
Yes
Yes
