2017 Gaja Barbaresco Costa Russi

Falling in between the Sori Tildin and Sori San Lorenzo stylistically, the 2017 Barbaresco Costa Russi offers a ripe bouquet of mulled cherry and blackberry fruits intermixed with lots of balsamic, licorice, loamy soil, dried spices, and a touch of asphalt. This carries to a medium to full-bodied, elegant Barbaresco with broad, mouth-coating tannins, a solid core of acidity, and a great finish. As with all of these wines, it need lots of air to shed some austerity and pick up more sweetness in its tannins (which can be common for hot vintages) and is going to benefit from 4-6 years of bottle age and have two decades of prime drinking.

The 2017 Barbaresco Costa Russi is gorgeous. Dark, layered and wonderfully inviting, the Costa Russi expresses the restrained style of the vintage and yet has terrific depth. Black cherry, plum, mocha, spice, leather and star anise build as this sumptuous, classically mid-weight Barbaresco shows of all of its pedigree. The 2017 is a lighter Costa Russi, there is no doubt about that, but this is also the most complete of the three single vineyard Barbarescos.

In terms of production numbers, this is one of the smallest vintages we've seen from the Costa Russi vineyard. Thanks to replanting efforts, about half of the old vines were ripped out in 2017 (compared to the 2016 vintage that made 10,000 bottles with the whole vineyard in production). The Gaja 2017 Barbaresco Costa Russi offers a warmer and softer character compared to Sorì San Lorenzo and Sorì Tildìn. Overall, the wine is richer and more textured. I definitely taste the vintage heat with its slightly sweeter and more accessible tones of cherry, cassis and fragrant blue flower. Costa Russi is usually defined by lifted notes of aniseed and sambuco, and you get those here too, although they are a less pronounced in this vintage. This is a balanced and carefully assembled Barbaresco with a lean approach backed by fine tannins and bright acidity.