Noah, Rosso "Dellamesola", Coste della Sesia,

Allow me to skip the lengthy preamble and cut to the chase today: If you share my love of exceptional, handmade Italian reds, especially Nebbiolo-based ones, DO NOT miss out on today’s wine. If I could offer Nebbiolo this expressive and memorable every day, I would. Not much of this limited wine enters the US, and I can’t stress enough how the long, generous 2023 growing season has elevated this vintage into something truly special. This is a superb wine.

The defining fact of Alto Piemonte is not simply that Nebbiolo grows there, but that it behaves there according to an entirely different geological and climatic logic than it does in the Langhe. In Bramaterra, on the low, wooded foothills between the Alps and the plains of the Sesia, Nebbiolo is rooted in ancient, highly acidic volcanic porphyry rather than the calcareous marls associated with Barolo and Barbaresco. The resulting wines are rarely broad or voluptuous. Their authority comes instead from tensile acidity, aromatic precision, and an almost ferrous mineral force that seems to propel the fruit through the palate. The 2023 Coste della Sesia Rosso “Dellamesola” from NOAH is an unusually lucid introduction to this landscape: vividly fruited, floral, and immediately delicious, yet unmistakably marked by the stony thrust and nervous energy of the Bramaterra hills.

NOAH is the project of Andrea Mosca, a former architect who established the estate after acquiring vineyards in and around Brusnengo, in the province of Biella, and released his first wines with the 2011 vintage. Brusnengo lies within the broader Coste della Sesia zone and contains vineyards both inside and immediately outside the Bramaterra delimitation. Mosca’s holdings are concentrated principally in the Mesola and Forte sectors, with Mesola itself divided into several distinct sites. This is an important distinction: “Dellamesola” is not an imitation of Bramaterra assembled from unrelated regional fruit, but a wine grown in the same immediate viticultural landscape, separated from the appellation by a regulatory boundary rather than by a meaningful change in geology or climate.

“Dellamesola” takes its name directly from Mosca’s Mesola zone in Brusnengo and functions as a remarkably concise study of that terroir. The 2023 is composed of 80% Nebbiolo, with 10% Vespolina and 10% Croatina, sourced from parcels situated just outside the official Bramaterra boundary. Its varietal composition is entirely classical for the area: Nebbiolo supplies the wine’s aromatic architecture and fine tannic spine; Vespolina contributes floral lift and peppery spice; and Croatina broadens the dark-red fruit while adding a modestly rustic, savory dimension. Following vinification, the wine spends one year in large Slavonian oak casks and is bottled with minimal sulfur. The élevage is therefore intended not to mark the wine with oak, but to allow the varieties to integrate while preserving the clarity and urgency of the fruit.

Served at 62°F in a large Burgundy stem, “Dellamesola” offers lifted aromas of sour cherry, wild strawberry, rose petal, violet, peppery herbs, and iron-rich stone. The palate is open-knit and immediately expressive, but its generosity is organized around a core of pert acidity that gives the wine both momentum and definition. Dark-red fruit remains vivid and precisely articulated from beginning to end, while the tannins are fine, lightly grippy, and already approachable. This is the essential achievement of the wine: it communicates the volcanic thrust, mineral austerity, and aromatic complexity associated with Bramaterra, but on a friendlier and more immediately luscious frame. Alongside tajarin with a slow-cooked rabbit ragù, its acidity cuts through the richness of the egg pasta and braised meat, while the wine’s floral, peppery, and earthy notes engage naturally with the herbs and savory depth of the sauce. The pairing succeeds because neither component overwhelms the other; both are built upon fragrance, restraint, and a distinctly Piedmontese preference for intensity without heaviness.