Castello di Spessa and the bunker wines

In the bunker under the castle courtyard rest the estate wines for decades. Constancy of temperature and humidity have allowed building a historical archive of which we tested some goodies.

Loretto Pali, owner of Castello di Spessa since 1987, invited a group of expert tasters to an afternoon-evening in which they wanted to understand how some of the bottles that had been shelved in the bunker under the castle courtyard since the 1990s behaved. The bunker had been built in 1939 by the Italian army to house military commands in an unassailable structure. 

It is a concrete structure some fifteen meters below the courtyard floor, 60 meters long, 7 meters wide and 5 meters high. It was Italian command until 1943, then German until '45, then for a few weeks occupied by the Cetnics, allies of the Nazis, and in rapid succession used by the British, New Zealanders and finally the Americans. 

Later acquired by the Stavro Santarosa family, owners of the castle and surrounding estates, it was used by Pali as a cellar for aging wines in barriques and connected by a long staircase and freight elevator to the ancient cellar that forms the base of the castle and probably dates back to the 15th century. Constancy of temperature and humidity also made it possible to build a historical archive of the castle's wines.

I will just mention the wines that performed best and start with the Collio Pinot Bianco 2001 of exceptional harmony and elegance and bright yellow color with golden highlights. Of absolute value is the magnum of Collio Pinot Bianco di Santarosa 2003: nose with elegant memories of vanilla, custard and apricot, in the mouth also apricot, banana, white currant.

The 2005 and 2006 Collio Sauvignon Segrè are amazing (think 96 and 97 scores), where one can catch the hand of the then consultant Gianni Menotti, always joined in the cellar by Pali's historical collaborator Domenico Lovat.

To complete the picture of whites, it is necessary to mention the recent experience that Loretto firmly wanted: to create white and red wines to market after so many years. Here then is the Collio Bianco SanSerff 2013, from Friulano, Sauvignon and Pinot Bianco grapes, elevated partly in stainless steel and partly in barrique, bottled since 2015 and on the market only since this year: freshness and complexity on the nose, rich, savory, enveloping structure on the palate. Blindly, it would be difficult to assign it more than three years from harvest.

Less convincing were the reds, because they are too often marred by Cabernet Franc (which is actually Carmenère). In this sense, however, the Collio Rosso SanSerff 2007, almost a pure Merlot, is very promising, hinting at an evolutionary prospect of great interest, even though it is already ready.

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