The Curticellas
– Highly Limited Italian Cult Sparkling Wines
– Barbaglia Has Been One of the Leaders in Artisanal Italian Méthode Champenoise
– Erbaluce Is the Perfect Grape for White Sparkling Wine
– And Uva Rara Makes Brilliant Rose
– Colder Climate Perfect for Sparkling Wines
– VERY Small Production from One of Italy’s Most Talented Winemakers
– The Perfect Wines to Bring to a Wine Dinner
– No One Else Will Have Had These and They Are Brilliant and Distinctive
NV Vini Barbaglia (2024 Release) Curticella Dosaggio Zero 48 Months
– Can Go Toe to Toe with Any Champagne up to $75-$85 no Problem
– Nose: Utterly Magical
– White flowers
– Bee Pollen
– Dried Fruit
– Yellow Mirabelle Plum
– Mountain Essence
– Forest Sap
– Super Fragrant, Detailed and Multi-Faceted
– A Stunning Minerality Pierces
– Palate Brilliant with the Taught Straightness of Great Champagne
– Purity on This Wine is Top, Top Notch
– Exquisite Fruit
– intense Sappy Minerals
– A Wonderful Leesy Yeasty Character
Vini Barbaglia Curticella Brut Rose (Uva Rara) 96 Months! (Brand New And 1st Ever 96 Month Release)
– Among My Favorite Sparkling Roses from Anyone, Anywhere
– I Gave a Recent Bottle 96 Points on Delectable – It’s That Good
– Very, Very Serious Sparkling Rose
– If You Drink Rose Champagne You Sort of Have to Try This
– Rose Champagne’s Brilliant Geeky Cousin
– Has That Nebbiolo DNA Even Though It’s Made From Uva Rara
– Huge Nose of Grape Skin, Freshly Powdered Rocks, Yeast
– Gorgeously Refined and Vivid White Cherries
– Very Elegant
– So Delicate
– Palate: Amazing Complexity
– A Wine of Stunning Purity, Elegance and Finessse
– Incredibly Detailed Minerality
– Precise Raspberries Perfectly Blended with Minerals
– Lovely Citrus Fruit and Nice Sap
– Stunning Juiciness
– Crazy Value for 7 Year Old “Vintage Alto”
– Only 36 Bottles!
A Unicorn of Unicorns
There are a small number of top sparkling wine producers in Alto Piedmonte. But the name spoken in revered tones is Sergio Barbaglia. He’s been making these wines for a couple of decades in very small quantities. Everything is done by hand by one of the best producers of sparkling wines in Italy. If you ask anyone who drinks Italian sparkling wines in Italy, they know these wines and speak of Sergio with reverence.
Sergio has passed on many duties at Barbaglia to his daughter Silvia. But he continues to make the sparkling wines. And he is not expanding production (even though there is significant excess demand). So these wines are highly allocated.
The Style
These wines have the mineral and acidic backbone that I crave in great Champagne. They took a big risk investing in racking these for 5-10 years. But the end result is stupendous. You are getting very good Champagne quality wines that have that added complexity from that ageing on the lees.
It’s easy to buy $150+ Champagne and you will generally get a decent product if you do a bit of research. But the sparkling wine world is much bigger than Champagne. And today’s producer makes some of the best non Champagne sparkling wines I’ve ever had. If everyone knew about them, they’d be 2-3 the price and hipster somms would be instagramming about them. Who knows, Jay Z and Brad Pitt might have vastly inferior $400 versions of them.
But today, we just have a small number of bottles of one of the best and most interesting sparklers (not widely) available. It’s why we created Fass Selections. To bring you all new things that are different and as good (if not better) for 1-2 – 1/3 the price.
If you can, enjoy these at a dinner with people who appreciate new things. Sharing new discoveries with friends makes them all the more memorable.
The Wines
Up first is NV Vini Barbaglia (2024 Release) Curticella Dosaggio Zero 48 Months for $43.99 a bottle on a 4-Pack. Yes, zero dosage Erbaluce has arrived. This wine is profound. My partner wanted to buy cases for his daughter’s Bat Mitzvah. It is insane. This was aged for 48 months on the lees, thus the wait. It was worth the wait. This wine needs an hour+ to open up and then once it opens it is easily one of the most profound sparkling wines for under $50 from anywhere. It can go toe to toe with any Champagne up to $75-$85 no problem. This wine would be my #1 choice to take to a ringer to an elite Champagne tasting. Once it gets going it has that magical cut that only elite Champagne has. But one has to give this air for it to go from very very good to profound.
The nose is magical. White flowers, bee pollen, dried fruit, yellow mirabelle plum, mountain essence, forest sap, super fragrant, detailed and multi-faceted nose. Simply beautiful. A stunning minerality pierces all of these aromas. After air it’s so stanky and yeasty with all minerals and gorgeous yeast, ocean air, airy smokey minerals, saline, iodine and just so so smokey.
The palate is brilliant and has the taught straightness of great Champagne. Intense bubbles yet also delicate and also caress your palate. The purity on this wine is top top notch. It is amazing to achieve these bubbles and that mouthfeel with ZERO DOSAGE. Usually sugar helps with texture. You don’t need it if your fruit is fully ripened.
The fruit is exquisite on the palate with intense sappy minerals on the crescendo of the finish. It leaves your palate very mineral and gives a sense of the place. So rich and energetic and gets into every nook and cranny of the palate. It is so so salty and utterly brilliant. This is like puligny montrachet with an edge. Huge inner mouth iodine coming out with air and such fine mousse and finesse. Wow so so pure. Incredibly fresh vibrant and pure and such a wonderful leesy yeasty character from the long aging on the lees. VERY LIMITED.
Wine #2
The second wine is the The genius NV Vini Barbaglia (2024 Release) Curticella Brut Rose 96 Months (Uva Rara) for $49.99 a bottle on a 4-pack.
This is among my favorite sparkling roses from anyone anywhere. And it’s made from Uva Rara. What is Uva Rara? It’s primarily a blending grape but its name is a bit of a misnomer in that it is not that rare. There are over 600 hectares planted and the style is typically soft and fruity but wonderfully perfumed.
The color is gorgeous. It’s got a brilliant pink color like onion skin and with hints of coral. What is so spectacular about this wine is that is really smells like a spectacular old school Uva Rara but has Nebbiolo DNA. Yet it’s rose and sparkling. It’s ridiculous. Gorgeous nose. This is insane. Huge nose of grape skin, minerals and yeast. Freshly powdered rocks. Gorgeously refined and vivid white cherries as well. The wine is so refined.
The palate is very elegant and so delicate. The finesse and breeding of this wine is unbelievable. But one only has to taste Silvia’s stunningly elegant and achingly beautiful Colline Novarese Uva Rara from 2014 to get why this sparkler is so delicate and refined. That’s her style. The wines are all like the softest satin but sacrificing no structural integrity. This will age for a long time. THis is, above all, a wine of elegance and precision. The palate has just amazing complexity. That’s what intrigues you and the delicacy and texture are what keep you sipping more and more. The mousse is so delicate and fine and really incredibly impressive. Really great acidity and just incredibly detailed minerality. Honestly, my note says that the “minerality rocks the palate to every corner” which makes no sense because your palate has no corners, but you get the idea. Precise raspberries but perfectly blended with minerals. A hint of red currant. Really incredibly stunning juiciness. There is not a lot of autolytic tastes or aromas as the terror shines through in the form of a very low dosage and incredible minerality. Terrific concentration and purity. So dense and yet so elegant. This is brilliant. Sappy. So long. The persistent mineral, citrus/sap finish is incredible and the little bit of tannin buffering it all is so cool. Silvia was so happy I loved it as this is a unique and interesting wine and she has never really tasted it with many people. Only 36 bottles!
Please call Cheryl at 949 378 5251 after emailing with your firstorder if you are a first time customer (we prefer not to receive credit card numbers over E-Mail).
OFFICE HOURS 4-7 PM
I love drinking and selecting wines – but my passion for teaching people about wine is almost as big. I’m happy to announce a block of time each day where people can call me just to chat about wine in general. These blocks are NOT intended to sell wine (I do that all day). This is to talk to me about wine pairings or great producers or how long to age wines or styles of wine making or the latest wine controversy. My goal is to help people learn more about wine and enjoy it more. Call me at 917-912-4355 from 4-7EST Monday – Friday.
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