Barbaresco - Pajè - Boffa

The Barbaresco DOCG Pajè by Boffa Carlo e Luigi is the wine that reveals the full depth and ambition of this artisan family from the Asti area — the same family that produces the powerfully structured Barbera Superiore, but that with the Pajè reaches the absolute pinnacle of Piedmontese winemaking: Nebbiolo from one of the most respected and gifted Menzioni Geografiche Aggiuntive in the entire Barbaresco denomination.

Pajè is one of the historic MGAs of the municipality of Neive — the second most important municipality in the Barbaresco appellation after the eponymous one, and the one that generally produces Barbaresco of greater robustness and longevity compared to the others. The Pajè designation indicates a specific vineyard on Tufo di Sant'Agata Fossili soils — the calcareous-clay marls that characterise some of the most elegant crus of Neive — with an exposure and pedological composition that guarantee slow, uniform and phenologically high-quality ripening for the Nebbiolo. The Boffa Pajè is born from a vineyard the family knows intimately, worked with the same generational artisan care that defines all the estate's production.

Barbaresco Nebbiolo — identical variety to Barolo but on different soils and generally at lower altitude — expresses in this Neive terroir a finesse and elegance that clearly distinguishes it from the more powerful and austere Barolos. Boffa's chosen ageing is precise and respectful: 18 months in 25-hectolitre French oak barrels — intermediate-sized containers that guarantee a progressive oxygenation and a more elegant wood integration than small barriques, without the aromatic disruption of large 50-hectolitre barrels — followed by 12 months of bottle ageing before release. In total almost three years from the 2022 harvest to the customer.

The 2022 vintage in Piedmont was one of the warmest and driest in recent decades — conditions that produced Nebbiolo of great concentration and exceptional phenolic ripeness, with softer and more accessible tannins than cooler vintages, but with a structure and depth that guarantee decade-long longevity. A vintage to cellar and to wait for.

On the nose it is elegant and layered — all the fascination of Neive Nebbiolo: dried rose and violet, cherry and morello, raspberry, rhubarb, pipe tobacco, leather, oriental spice and a precise calcareous minerality that recalls directly the tuffaceous soils of the Pajè. On the palate it is structured and long — present and already well-polished tannins from the large barrel ageing, a vibrant natural acidity that is Nebbiolo's genetic signature and that guarantees vertical drive and longevity, a harmonious glyceric sweetness and an exceptionally long and persistent finish with notes of red fruit, spice, tobacco and minerality that evolve for minutes. Serve at 18-20°C with at least one hour of decanting. Expresses its best between 5 and 15 years from the harvest.