We dedicate our wines to those who love every moment, celebrate special occasions but choose to be happy today.
It really is true that in the small barrel there is good wine! If we then talk about a wine aged for 5 years in a French oak barrel, as in the case of our Pignolo we can only be sure of that.
The 'use of wooden vessels for storing wine is certainly not new; to be honest, initially it was merely a practical matter as the alternative was the easily deteriorated and unwieldy terracotta wineskin.
If it were a book it would be Alessandro Baricco's Mr Gwyn. He's a bit of a handful in the vineyard and in the cellar, but, after a long barrique maturation, Pignolo can tell the story of the Friuli of the Colli Orientali with a touch of unexpected magic and also conquers the four screws of the Guidae Vitae 2023.
At this point we can safely question why among all the types of barrels on the market the best one is the smallest one: the answer lies in simple geometry; the smaller the size of our container, the greater the surface in contact with the contained liquid. Consequently, the same amount of liters placed in several barrels rather than in a single large wooden wine barrel will allow more oxygen to pass through and lead to faster maturation and therefore better aged wines.
Aging in wood also involves the release of tannins within the barrel wine: this initiates the polymerization of the tannins in the wood with those in the wine, forming long chains of molecules. This chemical process then translates in the mouth into greater smoothness, on the nose into spicy notes of vanilla and smokiness while on the eye with a color veering toward ruby red.
From the same grape it will be possible to make barrique wines that are also very different from each other depending on the wood(although usually oak is used), where it comes from, the degree of toasting(there are three levels), how many steps have been done beforehand, how the wood has been dried(some are dried in special ovens others stay in the open air for up to 5 years); in addition, the way the wood is cut(sawn or broken) affects the aroma given to our barrique wine.
In our cellar you can find six varieties of Friulian red wines, two of which are barricaded.
The Rîul, which is the only varietal blend in our catalog, composed of 60% Merlot, 20% Cabernet Sauvignon and 20% Refosco dal Peduncolo Rosso. This wine spends about 3 years in French oak barriques and tonneaux from the Allier forest; after this time we go to test the barrels and only the best are chosen to finish aging in the bottle. The result is a smooth and balanced wine that pairs perfectly with game.
The other wine from barrels is the Pignolo: this red wine from Friuli was in danger of disappearing as it needed to spend several years in barrel to buffer its aggressive taste of tannins. The result after 5 years in wood is an intense and compact red wine with a rich and balanced nose with notes of spices, burnt wood and licorice. Both sapidity and glycerine are perceived on the palate, which keep a powerful tannin at bay; the long sip leaves an excellent persistence in the mouth: if you are a lover of barrique red wine, you cannot miss the chance to taste it!
