Tasting Notes For Nardini Grappa Bianca 60
Nose: Chocolate and cacao with forest ferns, rain freshness, and white peppery spirity spice.
Taste: Powerful and strangely sweet with woody grape notes and white peppery spirity spice, chocolate drinking powder and faint cherry. Surprisingly enjoyable, and indeed best enjoyed neat at it's full brawny 60%.
Finish: White pepper spice, chocolate truffles and grassy grape notes.
Serving Suggestion: Ideal for convivial moments: served at room temperature; its important alcoholic content exalts and complements the ingredients in many cocktails.
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Bortolo Nardini opened his distillery and grapperia, which is still used today, back in 1779. This makes it the oldest operating distillery in Italy! In 1964 a second distillery was opened in Monastier which, unlike it's older brother, practised continuous, vacuum distillation (pretty fancy for the '60s!).
To this day, the distillates from both sites are blended together to create Nardini's distinctive character, with this Bianca having been subsequently refined in stainless steel tanks for 12 months prior to bottling. It's Italy's best-selling premium grappa.
Part of Nardini's attempt to make Grappa more accessible, they have produced a version of their fabulous Grappa Bianca which has been bottled at 60% abv, titled the Mighty 60. Much spicier than its lower abv counterparts, it sure is mightily tasty! -
The son of Bortolo Nardini and Maria Maddalena Giacomuzzi, Bortolo Nardini was born on May 25, 1739 in Segonzano, in the Cembra Valley, near Trent. In a country where wine is a tradition, it was a widespread practice to distill wine pomace as a source of income and livelihood. At that time, distillers moved from house to house with a mobile still, working as third-party distillers of the pomace deriving from the production of wine. Bortolo Nardini took up this craft, and traveled all the way to Bassano del Grappa, at the end of the valley.
Arriving in Bassano del Grappa, Bortolo Nardini was involved in an accident that forced him to stop in the city. During his convalescence, he had the opportunity to learn more about Bassano and to understand its strategic importance as a commercial crossroads between the Valsugana Valley and Venice. With farsightedness and the tenacious will to turn his vision into reality, he bought the Osteria al Ponte, today called the Grapperia Nardini, to produce grappa with a permanent still and sell it to the public. For the first time it was no longer the distiller with a mobile still going to the farmers, but the winegrowers themselves bringing in the pomace for the production of grappa. Bortolo called his grappa “Aquavite di Vinaccia” (eau-de-vie from grape pomace) spelled in the Latin way without the "c", playing on the etymology that could mean both "water of life" and "water from the vine". The first grappa of Italy was born, Nardini Grappa.
The Nardini family have always been on the forefront of innovation and In the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries the distillation of Nardini Grappa took place in 1860 the family introduced a great novelty in the process of distilling the grappa: the steam still. The adoption of steam significantly improved the quality of the grappa compared to stills with a direct flame, preserving the quality of the pomace without burning it. Today it is one of the most common methods used to produce grappa. Further innovations spurred by Nardini have largely shaped the entire Grappa industry, such as the introduction of Grappa Riserva, "Aged in oak casks in the manner of cognac", double rectification which ensures superior purity to the product because it allows a more precise selection of alcohols, thus improving the quality of the final result, vacuum steam distillation and most recently, Single Cask Grappa.
Since 1779, Nardini has always been a family-run company, a member of the exclusive Les Henokiens club of bicentenary family companies. A life dedicated to exalting the territory, the birthplace of a product treasured even today, more than two centuries later. Today, the 7th generation continues the family tradition and spreads the culture of an Italian icon in the world: Nardini Grappa. -
Producer Nardini Volume 70cl ABV 60%