MARIO MARENGO

This is a unique estate: it was established by the Marengo family in 1899 and now Marco and his son Stefano manage it, very successfully, totally on their own after his father Mario passed away in 2001. The vineyard extension is just 9 hectares, but 1 hectare is in Le Brunate, a grand cru of La Morra (and one of the greatest crus of the Langhe area) and 1 hectare is in Bricco delle Viole, one of the main crus of the town of Barolo. These two plots have belonged to the Marengo family for three generations. The first vintage of Barolo to be bottled with Le Brunate on the label was 1974 while Barolo Bricco Viole was labelled as such starting from the 1997 vintage. The philosophy of Marco and Stefano is to respect what the vineyards give him as much as possible, the work in the vines is more important to them than the work in the cellar. In fact they follow natural agricultural practices: spontaneous grass cover is left on the aisles, only sulphur and copper base products are sprayed, the vineyards are tended by hand (except for topping of the vines which is done with a machine). In the cellar only SO2, and very little of it, is added to the wines, wild yeasts are responsible for the alcoholic fermentation, no selected strains of bacteria are used to start up malolactic, the wines are not clarified nor filtered. The wines age in French oak barriques of which only 10% are new so as to maintain the fruit. Apart from the wonderful Barolo Brunate and the Barolo Bricco Viole, they also make a Barolo “classico” from 4 small plots in La Morra (Serradenari, Boiolo, Fossati and Roncaglia), a Dolcetto and a Barbera . A very interesting Nebbiolo d’Alba “Valmaggiore” is made from an old vineyard in the Roero zone, the soil of which makes this wine fruity and extremely complex. Since 2004 only 1,000 bottles of Barolo “Vecchie Vigne Brunate” are produced from two rows of over 90 year old vines and starting from the 2009 vintage this wine will be bottled as a Barolo Riserva and released after six years from the harvest.