Red Grape · Piedmont
Piedmont's noble grape: pale as garnet, fierce as iron. Nebbiolo trades colour for structure, ageing a decade or more into tar, dried roses and truffle, and giving Barolo and Barbaresco their name as Italy's longest-lived reds.
Nebbiolo (Nay-bee-OH-lo) is a native Italian grape variety grown in the northern regions. Its name comes from “Nebbia”, the Italian word for fog. It makes exceptional wines, with great finesse and an extraordinary ability to age. It is at its best in the southern part of Piedmont. There it gives some of the finest and most prestigious Italian wines: Barolo and Barbaresco.
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Setting it straight
The anchor fact: Nebbiolo ripens late under the autumn fog, the nebbia that gives it its name, yet that thin-skinned, pale grape carries some of the firmest tannin in all of Italy.
Taste · Where it sits
Forget scores out of five. Here’s Nebbiolo described against grapes you already know.
Less weighty on the tongue than its reputation suggests: closer to Pinot Noir in frame than to a broad Primitivo, with the drama coming from structure, not sheer mass.
Among the most tannic reds in Italy, drying and architectural in youth like a young Barolo, yet the grain is fine rather than coarse and resolves to silk over a decade.
A racing, mouth-watering acidity that keeps a firm, tannic wine feeling tense and alive, the backbone that lets Barolo age twenty years and more.
Never sweet: dried cherry and raspberry sit beside tar, rose and truffle, an autumnal, savoury profile a world from fruit-forward southern reds like Nero d'Avola.
Key flavours
The map
Nebbiolo is full-bodied, firm tannin, mapped against other red grapes you can buy. The closer a grape sits, the more its weight and grip resemble Nebbiolo.
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Serving guide
Serve at
14-15°C
A slightly cool serve keeps Nebbiolo's rose and tar aromatics precise; too warm and its high alcohol and tannin turn hot and hard.
Decant
1 hour
Young Barolo and Barbaresco are tightly wound; an hour or two of air, or a full decant, coaxes the tar, rose and cherry out from behind the tannin.
Glass
Burgundy Glass
A wide Burgundy bowl is the traditional choice: it gathers Nebbiolo's delicate, Pinot-like perfume the way a narrow glass never could.
Drink within
3-5 days
Re-corked and cool it holds for three to five days; a mature bottle fades faster, so pour that one the day you open it.
Cellar
Up to 10 years
A grape built for the cellar: top Barolo and Barbaresco gain for a decade or two, trading primary fruit for truffle, leather and dried flowers.
On the table
Start with the home-table matches that made the grape, then browse the full cuisine library.
The Langhe classic
Beef braised for hours in Nebbiolo itself: the wine's tannin cuts the rich meat while the sauce mirrors its dried-cherry depth.
The Sunday plate
Thin egg tajarin under shaved Alba truffle, echoing the truffle note that aged Nebbiolo develops all on its own.
The home table
Piedmont's pinched, meat-stuffed pasta has the savoury richness to stand up to firm young tannin.
The feast-day dish
Mixed boiled meats and salsa verde find their traditional partner in a bright, tannic Nebbiolo that scrubs the palate clean.
Browse every pairing
Buy it · three to start with
A curated trio across the price range, then every Nebbiolo on sale in the UK right now.
Entry · everyday
2 retailers
Langhe
2 retailers
£15.20
Why this one: Barolo's little brother from a beloved Langhe house: the same rose-and-cherry perfume and fine tannin, ready to drink years sooner and for under twenty pounds.
The sweet spot
8 retailers
Barbaresco
8 retailers
£30.80
£34.22
Why this one: The benchmark for value in serious Nebbiolo: cru-quality Barbaresco from the legendary growers' co-op, perfumed and structured enough to age a decade.
Special occasion
4 retailers
Barolo
4 retailers
£171.00
Why this one: A traditionalist icon: Bartolo Mascarello blends the great Barolo crus into one uncompromising, botti-aged wine made for a very special table.
12 of 809 bottles
8 retailers
Barbaresco
8 retailers
£30.80
£34.22
8 retailers
Barolo
8 retailers
£77.00
8 retailers
Barbaresco
8 retailers
£258.00
7 retailers
Barolo
7 retailers
£55.00
7 retailers
Barolo
7 retailers
£58.00
£61.05
6 retailers
Langhe
6 retailers
£19.00
6 retailers
Nebbiolo d'Alba
6 retailers
£24.50
£27.22
6 retailers
Barolo
6 retailers
£32.18
6 retailers
Barolo
6 retailers
£42.11
6 retailers
Barolo
6 retailers
£46.90
£52.11
6 retailers
Barolo
6 retailers
£56.00
£64.00
6 retailers
Barolo
6 retailers
£67.96
£84.95
Denominations
The appellations where Nebbiolo plays a starring role.
Where it grows
From Barolo's tannic spine to Asti's gentle fizz, Piedmont turns Nebbiolo, Barbera, Moscato, and Cortese into Italy's most cru-mapped wine country. Read more
From Franciacorta classic-method bubbles to Valtellina mountain Nebbiolo and Lugana lake-cool whites, Lombardy spans 5 DOCGs across roughly 25,000 hectares of Read more
Italy's smallest wine region clings to terraces between 500 and 1,200 metres, where Prie Blanc, Petit Rouge and Picotener (Nebbiolo) catch the alpine sun. Read more
The terroir
One grape, three homelands. Nebbiolo changes character as sharply as the ground beneath it, from the fog-filled Langhe to the terraced Alps, and even changes its name along the way.
Barolo
Langhe, Piedmont
The fullest, firmest expression: tar, dried rose and a tannic frame built to age for decades.
Barbaresco
Langhe, Piedmont
Nebbiolo's more perfumed, silkier side, approachable a few years sooner than neighbouring Barolo.
Valtellina
Lombardy Alps
High-altitude terraced Nebbiolo, called Chiavennasca here: leaner, brighter and more red-fruited, plus the raisined, powerful Sfursat.
Producers
16 estates on the site work with Nebbiolo. Eight at a time, and the line-up changes every week.
Editorial
Nebbiolo is a very sensitive grape, and it makes different types of wine depending on the terroir.
In the 1800s Barolo turned from a sweetish, half-sparkling country wine into the dry, age-worthy red poured at the Savoy court, winning its title: the wine of kings, and the king of wines.
The making of BaroloProbably the most approachable and immediate Nebbiolo wine. It has fresh, fruity scents of raspberry and wild strawberry, with delicate spicy notes of cinnamon and vanilla.
The “King of wines and wine for Kings” is made on the hills around the village of the same name in Piedmont. It is harmonious and elegant. Its light, airy bouquet of red fruit turns to spice, leather and liquorice with time. It can age almost forever!
Slightly less popular and less refined than Barolo, but somehow more gentle and feminine. It is full bodied, with a dry finish of mature tannins. It ages brilliantly, but not as long as Barolo!
Its name comes from the traditional practice of ‘forcing’ (prolonging) the ripening of selected grapes. The grapes are left to dry on racks in well ventilated rooms, straight after the harvest.
Nebbiolo has been recognised as a noble vine variety since the 16th century. It has always been one of the main reference points for Italian wine.
In the last decades, two schools of thought have grown up about ageing in wood.
Traditionalists say Nebbiolo wines should follow the traditional method: a long fermentation, then three or four years in large Slavonian oak or chestnut barrels.
Modernists prefer to age these wines in French oak barrels instead. That rounds off the sharp edges and gives a more approachable wine that keeps its fruity character.
Nebbiolo produces incredibly good wines. They stand out for the elegance of their colour and the finesse of their aromas. Their structure and tannic texture are just as striking. Above all, they hold up over very long periods of ageing.
Good to know
Nebbiolo wines are strong and characterful reds with good structure and tannins. They can be a bit difficult and rough to unfamiliar mouths, but surprisingly seductive and capable of ageing for decades.
It is extremely difficult to generalise the taste of all Nebbiolo based wines. This grape can create wines of incomparable character with complex notes of leather, tobacco and earth such as the Barolo or Barbaresco, as well as more approachable and fruity ones such as the Langhe Nebbiolo or Nebbiolo d’Alba or the Roero.
Nebbiolo wines are generally dry. There is one exception though, that is the Barolo Chinato, a flavored wine, such as vermouth, obtained by mixing Barolo with a solution of sugar in ethyl alcohol, to which various spices were previously put in slow maceration.
Nebbiolo is widespread all over Piedmont producing plenty of both DOCG and DOC wines. In Lombardy, it produces excellent red wines entering for a 90% in the blend of the red Valtellina Rosso DOC, Superiore and Sfursat DOCG.
Nebbiolo wines are perfect in combination with dishes based on beef and game. They are also excellent with cold cuts and aged cheeses, but also with delicate first courses such as mushrooms risotto or rich ones such as lasagna.
Explore by style
Jump to the editorial guide for each style this grape turns up in.
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