The Other Piedmont
2008 Rovellotti Ghemme Chioso dei Pomi
Alto Piemonte, the area north of Barolo and Barbaresco, is a region we've found ourselves fascinated with.
Nebbiolo is Italy's noble grape, which means it's incredibly sensitive to the terroir. The nuances of each site really jump out.
Nebbiolo in these northern areas achieves something truly fascinating: perfume, clarity and energy with great precision.
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We've been obsessed with the northern parts of Piedmont since the store opened. The area turns out captivating wines that boast an ageabilty and value that's rarely found.
Chioso dei Pomi is a very well situated south-southwest facing vineyard in Ghemme. In the 2008 vintage, the bottling has a finesse, purity and drive that's impossible to overlook.
We're enormous fans of 2008 in Piedmont. The vintage produced utterly classical wines with refined length and vivid terroir imprints. The 2008 Chioso dei Pomi dramatizes these qualities, weaving them into something beautifully harmonious.
Along with Gattinara, Ghemme produces the most muscular wines of Northern Piedmont. It occupies a middle ground between the tannic intensity of Barolo and the brisker, more feather weight examples that come from Carema and Lessona. Ghemme produces some of the the most powerful, longest lived Nebbiolos of Alto Piemonte. We've been fortunate enough to taste old bottles from Cantalupo with a few decades of age that have really impressed us.
The Rovellotti family has deep roots in Ghemme, but they are fairly new to the U.S. The Ferrando family, who produces two cult wines from Carema, introduced importer Neal Rosenthal to Rovellotti. It seems that their traditional methods immediately spoke to Rosenthal, and Rovellottii quickly became a linchpin of his strong group of Northern Piedmont producers.
We've worked with Rovellottii in the past, but the 2008 Chioso dei Pomi is our first offering. It was the stand out among a tasting of twenty wines. There's no doubt that this bottle deserves the spotlight. We expect it to age well for the next decade plus, and created special 4-packs for that reason.
To order, email offers@crushwineco.com or call the store at (212) 980-9463.
Joe Salamone
Wine Buyer
Crush Wine & Spirits