I recently posted a collection of wine labels from my recent Mostly Italian Experience at Prima Ristorante on my personal blog, stevepaulo.com. One of the comments I got on Twitter when the post went up was about this wine. With good reason.

The 2005 Renato Corino Barolo is a fantastic wine. Period.

I almost feel like I should end the review here, but it would do this wine no justice at all. First, a caveat: the wine runs anywhere from $30-$45 per bottle retail, and this is a bit pricier than a lot of the wine I review. At under $35, however, I would still say this 100% Nebbiolo wine is a massively good QPR buy.

In the glass, the wine is a nice dark opaque red, that turns enticingly pink at the edges. There is a big, big nose on this wine: rose petals and hanging vines of violets mix liberally with cherry jam. Really gorgeous, and really big and bold. The floral aromatics are something else in this wine.

The wine is full bodied, with a wonderfully-velvety mouthfeel. There is good tannin and balance here, lots of structure. The major fruit notes are a ripe cherry, and a cool and clean red apple skin. Let me explain the last one: some appleness, but simultaneously bitter and sweet and sour, all kind of mixing together. It’s something special, and when I used that term to describe the wine, my wife didn’t believe me and wanted to try it herself.

Now she believes me. So will you if you come across this Barolo. Good, good, good stuff.

Verdict: 96/100

2005 Renato Corino Barolo

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