Barbera Wine for Delivery or Pickup

There's so much to discover in the classic red wine scene, and a bottle of Barbera is a good place to start getting to know an ancient red grape from Italy. Its origins can be traced back to 1246 church records indicating where land was leased to grow Barbera in Monferrato. Count Giuseppe Nuvolone-Pergamo of Scandaluzzo wrote about it in an official document in 1798. He was a director of the Turin Agrarian Society, and he was the first to document a list of Piedmont's wine grape varieties.

Barbera was loved even back then as soldiers drank it to gain courage in battle. The grape works well in Piedmont because the soil there is calcareous. This results in lower yields which in turn raise the sugar in the grape and balance its acidity. The grape is a deep violet and gives the wine a blackish hue. The hard-working grape is mostly used to blend or as a varietal. It's often blended with a wine that has lower acidity to give a balanced flavor.

Winemakers do a couple of tricks to reduce the acidity of Barbera, like harvesting during the autumn when the grapes are ripe and fermenting it in oak barrels to give it a soft oak flavor. The Barbera has high acidity and a medium-to-full body with a berry taste. The ABV of the Barbera ranges from 13-15%, and it is quite a dry wine.