Monchiero Carbone, Roero Riserva (Piedmont, Italy) 2018

 This is as beautiful, interesting, and well-run a winery as you can find anywhere in Italy, and also a premier producer that excels with everything vinous associated with Roero (which is to say, the top bottlings of Arneis, Barbera and Nebbiolo are all marvelous).  This Riserva from 2018 is a very serious wine from a relatively soft vintage that sees 22 months in 25-30% new oak in its aging regimen, yet the fruit shines through, with wood lending some spice notes and a whiff of toast but no vanilla or any wood notes that distract from the wine’s solid core (which is fruit sourced from a single plot within the “Srü” MGA or Cru).  To be sure, there’s plenty of Nebbiolo “grip” in the finish, and this wine is built to last, but the tannins aren’t coarse or astringent, and they show up late in the wine’s sensory progression rather than terminating the finish prematurely.  I’ve tasted multiple vintages of this wine in Italy or when home in the USA, and it never fails to impress; a 2016 that I showed in a wine class this summer was marvelous, and a 2006 tasted with lunch at the winery in May was spectacular.  On that occasion, tasting “blind,” I was able to guess both the wine and the vintage correctly, though my pride in that was very short-lived, as I then guessed that the 2003 Barbera “MonBirone” was much younger (which is very impressive regarding the wine from that ultra-hot vintage, if unimpressive regarding my guess!).