Nebbiolo Before It Was Cool
I’m going to level with you: I don’t usually get misty-eyed about wine. But the first time I tasted the wines of Cantine Garrone, I genuinely thought someone had slipped a time machine into my glass.
These come from Val d’Ossola—which sounds like a made-up fantasy realm but is, in fact, a very real, very wild valley in the far north of Piemonte, just a stone’s throw from the Swiss border. It’s the kind of place where grapes cling to steep mountainsides like they’re trying not to fall off the planet, and the winemakers seem equal parts farmer, mountaineer, and philosopher.
Let’s start with the 2021 Valli Ossolane Nebbiolo Superiore Prünent. This is not your polished, Barolo-boardroom Nebbiolo. This is Nebbiolo’s ancient, mist-loving ancestor—Prünent—a variety so old that Pliny the Elder was name-dropping it before Nero ever picked up a fiddle. DNA confirms it’s the original Nebbiolo, and these vines, some of them centuries old, are planted so high up they practically get altitude sickness. It’s nervy, mineral, hauntingly aromatic, and somehow still graceful.
Then there’s the Munaloss Vino Rosso—a name born out of a bureaucratic headache when “Ossolanum” got the boot from the DOC for being too similar to the appellation name (ironic, considering it was the original name). The Garrones flipped the word backwards, lopped off a letter, and carried on. A field blend of mostly Croatina with some Barbera and Merlot, it’s fermented with native yeasts and aged in stainless steel, preserving every ounce of its mountain-born brightness and wild-berry soul. It’s rustic, honest, and charming as hell.
The whole thing feels like a secret. Fewer than 5,000 cases made annually between the two wines. A forgotten Alpine valley. Ancient vines clinging to gneiss and granite. And a family—four generations deep—who have made it their life’s work to save these vineyards from extinction.
These wines are not just off the beaten path—they never even knew the path existed. And yet, they’re some of the most compelling bottles I’ve tasted all year.
Let me know how many cases you want before the fog swallows them back up.
