Ettore Germano, Barolo DOCG (Piedmont, Italy) 2016

 This is an already-superb house that still seems to get stronger with each passing vintage, and here’s a fabulous case in point.  Fresh and pretty in line with the vintage, but also with prodigious depth and power as expected from Serralunga, this is an obviously great 2016 Barolo.  It isn’t weighty, but the depth of flavor seems almost bottomless.  Similarly, it is quite expressive and complex, but there’s really nothing “showy” about it.  Rather, its excellence seems “effortless,” a term that reappears frequently in my raw notes from blind tasting the top 2016s.  A wine of great beauty, but of the classiest sort… as in Grace Kelly beauty.