2015 Barbaresco Rabaja

Sweeping, broad and succulent, the 2015 Barbaresco Rabajà is a child of a warm vintage, no doubt about it. The wine's fruit is soft and rich with black cherry, plum and candied orange peel. Equally important are those background tones of spice, smoke and tar. This Barbaresco has soft, yielding tannins that suggest a near or medium-term drinking window.

Barbaresco. Tasted blind. Mid ruby. Pretty nose of ripe, sweet red fruits. Tea leaf and nutmeg. Very restrained on the palate but with aromatic depth. Elegant and long with firm tannins. Perhaps not as substantially fruity as the rest, for that the more elegant. (WS)

Cortese's 2015 Barbaresco Rabajà offers lovely depth and radiance, in the mid-weight, classic style that is one of the house signatures. The 2015 fleshes out nicely in the glass. Bright, red-toned fruit, sweet tobacco, mint and leather overtones add considerable nuance. I expect the 2015 will be even better in another few years, once it has fully bounced back from its very recent bottling. The early appeal of the vintage are very much on display, even at this early stage. In 2015, Cortese will not bottle their flagship Barbaresco Riserva Rabajà.