It’s not a boast to say that PMW has the most expansive selection of nebbiolo in the Bay Area: entire shelves devoted to Barolo and Barbaresco and many boxes and another shelf for the more modest nebbiolos from the Langhe. But vital as it is, the Langhe doesn’t have a monopoly on great nebbiolo. The variety grows all over Piemonte and even in the lower part of the Valle d’Aosta / Vallée d’Aoste, an Italian//French bi-lingual and bi-cultural region in the northwest corner of Italy. Here we have an old-school nebbiolo from vines planted on terraces carved into impossibly steep granite cliffs at 400-500 meters (1,300-1,700 feet) of altitude an hour east of Mont Blanc / Monte Bianco in the Alps. The soils, altitude, and latitude lend freshness and limit alcohol (13.5%). Two years of aging in giant, old Slavonian oak barrels maintain nebbiolo’s beautiful ruby color and develop its yin-and-yang delicate-yet-powerful character. (Granite) sandiness, olives, small berries. Try it with veggie or meat stews, or one of Market Hall Foods’ remarkable single-village cheeses from Switzerland.
