Barbera d’Alba, “Axilium”

Roberto owns a tiny sliver of Barbera in the highly regarded cru of Asili (“Axilium” is a play on the name of the cru), in the commune of Barbaresco, and from it he produces a wine that showcases in eye-popping fashion the variety’s ability to deliver enormous complexity when planted in a vaunted terroir and raised respectfully. Fermented in cement like the Barbaresco and aged two years in Stockinger demi-muids, “Axilium” epitomizes the finesse for which Asili is known, offering dense, tightly reined-in red fruits, blossoming minerality, and a lengthy finish of impeccably rendered tannins. It should age effortlessly well into a second decade.