Poderi Aldo Conterno, “Il Favot” Langhe Nebbiolo on Sale

Poderi Aldo Conterno, “Il Favot” Langhe Nebbiolo

By now, Italian wine fans should be well-versed on what wines labeled “Langhe Nebbiolo” are going to be like. These are Piedmont’s answers to “Bourgogne Pinot Noir,” serving as the earlier-release, less-expensive siblings to their Barolo big brothers. Except there are certain Langhe Nebbiolos which break that mold, often in spectacular fashion—and, other than Vietti’s “Perbacco,” I can’t think of a more famous example than Aldo Conterno’s iconic “Il Favot.” 

Could Il Favot pass for an elite-level Barolo? Absolutely. But this is Aldo Conterno we’re talking about. This estate is known for some of the longest-lived, most profound Barolos of all, so on the Aldo Conterno scale, Il Favot is indeed the easier, earlier-drinking wine; it’s just when you compare it to most other Langhe Nebbiolos that things get confusing. The way I always describe it is like this: The “second” wines of the very best estates are going to outperform the “first” wines of most of their competition. And there’s no doubt that Aldo Conterno is one of Barolo’s very best. “Il Favot” has its own cult following at this point, and for good reason: For about half the price of the estate’s base-level Barolo, you get all the Nebbiolo you can handle, without the 20-year wait. It’s a no-brainer!

The story of the legendary Aldo Conterno property is familiar to many: The Conterno family’s winemaking roots in the Barolo village of Monforte d’Alba go back to the 19th century, and it was Aldo’s father, Giacomo, who was among the first to commercialize bottled Barolo back in the 1920s and ‘30s. The Giacomo Conterno estate, still one of Barolo’s most iconic, is where Aldo and his brother, Giovanni, cut their wine teeth in the ‘50s and ‘60s—but in 1969 Aldo struck out on his own, purchasing a farm called “Il Favot” in Monforte and leaving Giovanni to run Giacomo Conterno. While the Giacomo Conterno winery was/is based in Monforte, its legendary ‘Francia’ vineyard was/is in the neighboring village of Serralunga; Aldo’s vineyards were/are in the ‘Bussia’ hamlet of Monforte, with a little more of a full-south exposure than the west-facing Francia. Traditionally, the Aldo Conterno Barolos are perhaps a little burlier and darkly fruited than the earthy, ethereal Giacomo Conterno wines, though both produce some of the longest-lived wine in the zone.

It could be said that the Aldo Conterno wines skewed more “modern” than the resolutely old school Giacomo wines, but what does all this modern-vs.-traditional talk really mean, anyway? The Barolo of the 1960s and ‘70s was an extremely austere, tannic wine, usually left to macerate on its skins for a good 40 days or more during fermentation and aged in very large, old barrels called botti. The color of the already lightly pigmented Nebbiolo grape destabilized in these larger, usually open-topped, vessels, giving the wine a brickish, orange-y cast even in its youth. Some wines were plagued by funky, bacterial notes from perennially re-used barrels that weren’t well-sanitized (and of course, some were glorious, aromatic wines that resembled Grand Cru red Burgundy). What a new generation of Barolo ‘modernists’ did in the 1970s and ‘80s, first and foremost, was strive to “clean up” Barolo and make it perhaps a little more accessible in its youth. Producers such as Elio Altare and Angelo Gaja sought inspiration in Burgundy and noticed, among other things, the newer, smaller French oak barrels they used for aging. Why not in Barolo?

Hailing from the younger Nebbiolo vines on the Conterno property, Il Favot is expressly designed to be a smoother, more accessible, if no-less-complex alternative to their Barolo. While the entry-level Barolo is macerated on its skins for 25-30 days, Il Favot’s maceration is only about a week, which mitigates its tannic impact. While the Barolo spends 26 months in large, used Slavonian oak casks, the Il Favot ages 18 months in small, new French barriques. Nebbiolo as presented in Il Favot is a little brighter, softer, and sweeter than its more rigid, mineral, dark-toned Barolo sibling. 

In the glass, the ’18 is a deep ruby red with a hint of bricking at the rim. As is typical of Nebbiolo the aromatics are penetrating and perfumed, here driven by red fruit flavors of cherry kirsch, cranberry, and red currant. But there’s so much more: rose petal, blood orange, tar, tobacco, and a hazelnut/vanilla kiss of new oak. The tannins are fine-grained, the texture silky and lush, the finish long, smoky, and sweetly floral. Although it is designed to drink now(ish), this is still a powerfully structured Nebbiolo, and thus a good hour in a decanter before serving in Burgundy stems is the way to go. It is luxurious, wintry juice that has an almost full-body effect, warming and woodsy and ever-evolving in the glass. It needs similarly satisfying food to tame it, preferably something beefy and braised; here’s a Piedmontese classic we’ve recommended countless times before, the ultimate in seasonal eating and drinking.