Barbaresco Riserva Boito, Cantina Rizzi 2018

The “Vigna Boito” Riserva from Enrico Dellapiana is crafted from an upper section of the Cru vineyard of Rizzi, where the soils have more clay and less chalk than in the lower portions of the Cru. The Vigna Boito is aged solely in botti for twenty months prior to bottling and is then given bottle aging in the Rizzi cellars to allow at least four years of aging prior to release. The 2018 Vigna Boito is the new release of this lovely Riserva Barbaresco. It delivers a deep, complex and very refined bouquet of red and black cherries, licorice, a touch of road tar, woodsmoke, spiced meats, fresh oregano, curry, cedar and the first hints of the autumnal shadings of soil that will come with bottle age. On the palate the wine is deep, full-bodied, complex and loaded with ripe fruit at the core, with excellent soil undertow and grip, ripe, firm tannins, excellent focus and balance and a long, pure and fairly powerful finish. This wine landed at a full fifteen percent octane in the hot summer of 2018 (though “cool” examples of Barbaresco are routinely 14.5 percent alcohol these days, so it is not a dramatic uptick in ripeness), but shows no signs whatsoever of heat on the backend. It is just a bit more powerful than most vintages as a result of the hot summer of 2018. Fine juice.