For the last few years in our calendar, Autumn is marked with the arrival of new wines from our friend Francesco at Tenuta Foresto in Nizza Monferrato, Piedmont.
Perfect wines for this time of year, we're pleased to have back a whole brace of cuvees, both from Francesco's 2020 vintage- a year hammered by four separate huge hailstorms, leading to rigorous selection at harvest- and 2021, by contrast a much warmer, drier year necessitating a much earlier pick. As always, Francesco's hard work has paid off.
From 2020, we have La IDEAle, and La Comedie. Both an expression of his favourite grape: Barbera, planted over clay and chalky limestone, farming inspired by the zero-input method as pioneered by Masunobu Fukuoka.
La Comedie is picked first, from the younger vines (15 years old) macerated for 24 hours and fermented in stainless steel. Sparkling by the ancestral method, bottled over winter with the yeasts dormant, and fermentation continuing in bottle once spring rolls around.
La IDEAle is picked from the next oldest vines, averaging 25 years old, a beautifully supple example of what's possible up here in Nizza. A 20 day maceration in concrete with regular, gentle punchdowns, and eight months in large barrels.
From 2019 we have Acru , from the oldest Barbera vineyard, with vines up to 70 years old. De-stemmed and macerated in conical oak vats for 30 days, and aged in smaller barrels for a year before bottling with no additions.
Favonio 2021 is back to the 1 week maceration of Muscat (Francesco halved the maceration times in 2020). Macerated and fermented in concrete, before ageing in a combination of oak and acacia barrels, bottled with no additions.
With Paupau 2021, Francesco has stuck with the 20 day carbonic maceration, pleased to have landed on a style that brings out a different side to the Dolcetto that his neighbours might make. Aged in concrete fro 8 months, bottled with no additions.
Each elegantly walks the line between Francesco's meticulous attention to detail, and intent to not interfere with the vines, the fruit, or the wines.
