2024 Cieck Erbaluce di Caluso Piedmont 750 ml

There’s a tiny pocket of Piedmont, tucked up near the Alps, where a nearly forgotten white grape called Erbaluce has been quietly clinging to existence for centuries. The soils here are glacial and cool, the hills steep, and the wines—when made right—have a chiseled, mineral clarity that makes them unlike anything else in Italy.

Cieck was one of the original five producers to champion the grape when most of Piedmont had written it off. Founded in 1985 by Remo Falconieri, the winery helped raise Erbaluce’s profile to the point that the zone earned its own DOCG designation in 2010. His daughter Lia and Domenico Caretto now run the estate, farming 50-year-old vines trained on the ancient pergola trellises unique to the Canavese region.

The name Erbaluce translates loosely to “light grass”—a nod to the grape’s leafy complexity and the slow, sun-drenched ripening that gives it such bright, sustained acidity. Records of the variety date back to the 1600s, and it grows nowhere in the world outside this narrow band of alpine foothills. It’s a wine of place in the most literal sense.

In the glass, the 2024 is a vibrant copper-tinged straw, with aromas of crushed limestone, grapefruit peel, lime leaf, and honeysuckle. The palate is clean and precise, with mineral-rich layers and the kind of piercing acidity that makes you reach for another sip before the first one is finished.

We’ve been offering Cieck for years now, and it has become one of our most consistently celebrated Italian whites. Members return to it vintage after vintage—and for good reason. At this price, it remains one of the most quietly astonishing values in our portfolio.