Tenuta Mazzolino Terrazze Pinot Nero 2024
Tenuta Mazzolino Terrazze Pinot Nero
Region: Lombardia, Italy
Vintage: 2024
Bottle size: 75cl
Grape: Pinot Nero
ABV: 13%
The wine displays aromas of fresh red fruit married with spiced notes of black pepper and a touch of balsamic. The palate displays a lovely purity of fruit and has a good balance of acidity and well-ripened tannins. The finish stays fruit led with some soft white pepper aromas.
The Terrazze is Mazzolino’s ‘village’ Pinot Nero, made with fruit sourced from four of their single vineyards: Fontana, Aurora, Rocca and Corvino Alto. The clayey-loamy topsoil is intermixed with veins of sand sits atop a chalky bedrock. The vines are densely planted at 5,500 plants per hectare using the Guyot training system. The first vintage was produced in 1995.
\Upon arrival at the winery, the hand-harvested grapes were destemmed before being fermented in traditional vats. Throughout fermentation, a technique called follatura (punching down) was used to gently submerge the grape skins, ensuring optimal extraction of tannins and flavour. After fermentation, the wine aged in vats for further 6 months.
This fine estate is making some of the best – and most exciting – wines in the Oltrepò Pavese. The house and winery are perched atop a rounded hill, and the vineyards flow down the hill in every direction. The site, known locally as the ‘hill of Pinot Nero’, was abandoned when Francesca Seralvo’s grandfather arrived from France in the 1970s for work. He was a banker in Milan and bought the house as a weekend retreat. He soon caught the wine bug and invited the likes of Luigi Veronelli and Giacomo Bologna to visit. They became great friends and urged him to make wines with the Pinot Nero. His first attempt was a bianco frizzante, but in 1985 he decided to get serious and made his first Pinot Nero, on which Veronelli lavished praise. If Pinot Nero worked, he reasoned, why not try Chardonnay?