L’Altro or ‘the other’ is Pio’s second Chardonnay. It is nevertheless full of character and intensity with lovely citrus and apple pie notes. It is full-bodied, rounded with pleasant acidity on the finish.

This historic family-owned estate is named after its founder Cesare Pio, who established the business in 1881. The winery is based in Alba, in the heart of Piemonte and is now run by Federica Boffa and Cesare Benvenuto, the fifth generation of the family. Pio Cesare developed Barolo’s reputation overseas in the 1950s by being one of the first producers to export the wine to the UK. The founder’s great grandson Pio Boffa was deeply convinced of the importance of cultivating and growing owned land to produce high quality wines and played a key role in the acquisition of vineyards in the same locations where Cesare Pio used to buy his grapes from. Today Pio Cesare owns 70 hectares in the hills of Barolo and Barbaresco and makes wines in a style that manages to balance the best of the old with the best of the new. The estate includes most of the municipalities in the Barolo and Barbaresco areas.

The grapes for this wine come exclusively from the family’s vineyards; in the Barbaresco region in Treiso (Cascina Il Bricco), in the Barolo area in Serralunga d’Alba (Colombaro Vineyards) and in Trezzo Tinella (Bossania Vineyards).

The grapes are picked by hand and then gently pressed. 75% is fermented in stainless steel tanks and the remaining 25%, on its lees in new French oak barriques where the wine remains for five months. The wine is bottled the March following harvest.

The 2021 vintage was characterised by a cold winter, but temperatures above average in February led to an early budding season in the best-exposed vineyards. The vegetative growth was slowed down by a drop in temperature in April and a rainly May. The hot and dry summer allowed flowering and fruit set within average and the ripening of the grapes was in line with previous vintage. There was a slight quantitive drop compared to 2020 but the quality of the crop was very good.

Try with salmon, pork, butternut squash ravioli or risotto, roast chicken.