Elio Altare Barolo Unoperuno 2011

The 2011 Barolo Unoperuno is an excruciating labor of love. Uno per uno means "one for one" in Italian and that's how each grape is removed from its cluster. With such a labor-intensive regime, only five barriques of this wine are produced. This manual destemming means that the wine does not show any of the bitter astringency you can get with stem inclusion or even mechanical destemming. The tannins come from the seeds. The Arborina vineyard is the source of fruit and this is the second year that Barolo Unoperuno is produced. It shows a lighter garnet color and pure aromas of wild berry, dried blueberries and cassis. This ensemble is finely textured and elegant. The tannins are silky and lightweight. It takes ten days and ten people to execute the destemming process.