The Western Slope & the Dolcetto Doctrine

The story of Poderi Cellario begins in Carrù — a village on the western outskirts of the Langhe, in the southern reaches of Piedmont's most celebrated wine region. Here, the Cellario family has been making wine for three generations, accumulating an intimate knowledge of the local varieties, the river-influenced microclimates, and the specific character of each vineyard site. Fausto and Cinzia Cellario now lead the estate, representing the third generation to work these hills, and their project is defined by a paradox that animates the best traditionalist winemakers: they are fierce defenders of local winemaking customs in both vineyard and cellar, yet they are equally radical in their embrace of natural processes, minimal sulfur, and experimental cuvées that test the boundaries of what the Langhe can produce.

The family holds approximately 30 hectares across five different vineyard sites spanning the southern Langhe — a significant holding that includes not only vines but also woods and hazelnut fields, creating a biodiverse agricultural ecosystem rather than a monocultural vineyard. Their most prestigious land lies in the Dogliani zone, and they are widely recognised as Dolcetto specialists — a title they wear with pride, even as their portfolio extends far beyond that variety. Holdings in Novello and Monforte give them access to the full range of southern Langhe terroirs, from the white calcareous marls of the Tanaro's right bank to the reddish clay-sand soils of the left bank.

The turning point in the estate's philosophy came from a personal source: Cinzia Cellario developed an allergy to sulfites. This health imperative transformed the family's approach from conventional to natural — not through ideology but through necessity. They eliminated or drastically reduced sulfur additions, relying instead on pristine organic fruit, indigenous yeasts, and meticulous cellar hygiene to achieve stability. The result is a portfolio in which most wines contain either zero added sulfur or minimal levels (~10ppm), a remarkable achievement for a winery of this scale and a testament to the family's technical skill. As one importer noted, this is "very difficult to achieve in bigger size wineries."

The spiritual patriarch of the estate is Cinzia's father, known affectionately as "Baffone" — the moustached man whose portrait graces the labels of the family's pét-nat wines. He was the one who initiated the production of sparkling wines in the old natural way, passing down the knowledge of bottle fermentation and ancestral-method winemaking to Fausto and Cinzia. The Baffone line — including the Il Baffone pét-nat and the Frei-zzante — is dedicated to his memory and to the tradition of unfiltered, undisgorged, naturally sparkling wine that he pioneered in the family cellar. This is not merely branding; it is a living lineage, a grandfather's craft transmitted through generations and bottled with his face on the label.

The winemaking philosophy at Poderi Cellario is governed by a single, overriding commitment: to let the wine express naturally, without the winemaker interfering. Fausto Cellario describes himself as "simply a spectator who watches a miracle of nature happen" — a humility that belies the technical precision required to achieve it. All fermentations are spontaneous, driven by indigenous yeasts that inhabit the vineyard and the cellar. There is no commercial inoculation, no enzymatic correction, no tannin addition, no acid adjustment. The family's decades of organic viticulture have created a healthy microbial ecosystem that initiates fermentation naturally and reliably, year after year.

The cellar practices are deliberately low-intervention yet technologically precise. Fermentation takes place primarily in temperature-controlled stainless steel tanks — a modern necessity for preserving the primary aromatics of the white varieties and the fresh fruit character of the reds and pét-nats. For the serious reds — Nebbiolo, Barbera, selected Dolcetto — ageing occurs in large-format neutral oak barrels or 100-hectolitre cement tanks. The family uses exhausted barrels purposefully, ensuring that the flavour of the wood does not alter the wine's natural aromas. This is a crucial distinction: Cellario does not seek oak influence; he seeks the slow oxygen exchange and textural integration that large, neutral vessels provide.

The pét-nat programme is one of the estate's most distinctive achievements and a direct inheritance from the Baffone. Il Baffone (Nascetta and Moscato Giallo, skin-contact, refermented with conserved passito must), Frei-zzante (100% Freisa, direct press, finished in bottle), Barrusco (Neretta, Barbera, Dolcetto, refermented in bottle), and Grignolino pét-nat are all produced without sulfur, without disgorgement, and without filtration. The refermentation is induced by adding conserved passito must — dried grapes from the family's late-harvest production — which provides the sugar and the native yeasts necessary for secondary fermentation. This is pre-industrial technique revived with modern hygiene: ancient method, contemporary precision.

The finishing practices reflect the family's sulfite-free imperative. Bottling occurs according to lunar phases — a biodynamic practice that the family follows with conviction. Sulfur is added only when absolutely necessary, and then only at minimal levels (~10ppm). There is no sterile filtration, no fining with animal products, no chemical stabilisation. The È line — the estate's glou-glou range of light, summery wines in 1-litre bottles — is bottled with the same care as the serious cuvées, demonstrating that the Cellario family does not reserve their natural philosophy for their premium bottlings alone. Every wine, from the humblest 1-litre red to the amphora-aged Nebbiolo, is treated as a living expression of the Carrù terroir.

To understand Poderi Cellario, one must understand the concept of the Langhe defender — a viticultural identity that stands in deliberate contrast to the global fame of Barolo and Barbaresco. While the world chases Nebbiolo at premium prices, Fausto and Cinzia Cellario have built their reputation on Dolcetto — the modest, charming, often overlooked native red that is the everyday wine of Piedmontese peasants. They are Dolcetto specialists not because they cannot make great Nebbiolo (the Galli cuvée proves otherwise) but because they believe that the true measure of a wine region is not its most famous grape but its most honest one. Dolcetto is the wine that Piedmontese farmers drink with lunch; Cellario has elevated it to an art form without removing its humility.

The family's identity is also defined by their position on the western slopes of the Langhe — outside the golden triangle of Barolo, Barbaresco, and Alba, in the southern reaches where the Tanaro River divides the land and where the varieties are the same but the prices and the prestige are lower. This geographical marginality is a source of freedom rather than limitation. It allows Cellario to experiment with carbonic maceration, to plant illegal Doux d'Henry, to bottle in 1-litre formats, to co-ferment twelve varieties, and to produce pét-nats with their grandfather's face on the label — all without the regulatory scrutiny and market pressure that constrain producers in more famous zones. The western slope is not a lesser Langhe; it is a different Langhe, and Cellario is its most articulate voice.

The future of Poderi Cellario is tied to the continued organic and biodynamic cultivation of their 30 hectares, the deepening of their natural winemaking techniques, the expansion of their amphora programme, and the strengthening of their position as one of Italy's most reliable and inventive natural wine producers. The È line will continue to offer accessible, glou-glou wines in 1-litre bottles — the gateway through which thousands of drinkers discover natural wine each year. The pét-nats will continue to honour the Baffone's legacy. The serious cuvées — Galli, Il Vino che Non C'è, the amphora-aged whites — will continue to demonstrate that natural wine can age, can complexify, and can compete with the most prestigious names in Piedmont. And the experimental bottlings — carbonic macerations, field blends, lost-grape revivals — will continue to test the boundaries of what the Langhe can express.

In an age of industrial wine production, of chemical agriculture and marketing-driven branding, Poderi Cellario stands as a compelling alternative — not because it rejects tradition but because it has embraced a different tradition, one that values indigenous varieties over international clones, natural fermentation over laboratory inoculation, minimal sulfur over chemical stability, lunar bottling over industrial scheduling, amphora ageing over new-barrel toast, 1-litre sharing bottles over 750ml prestige formats, and the voice of Carrù over the standardised replication of a global style. Fausto and Cinzia Cellario are not merely making wine; they are making an argument — for Dolcetto, for the western slope, for the Baffone's moustache, for the illegal Doux d'Henry, for the carbonic breakfast juice, and for the possibility that a 30-hectare family estate can produce wines that are as authentic, as alive, and as necessary as anything from the world's most celebrated appellations. The third generation, the Tanaro breeze, the white marl and the red clay, the zero sulfur, the grandfather's pét-nat, and the name that has meant natural wine in Carrù for decades: all united in one bottle, one estate, one unanswerable argument for the lighter, truer, more joyful side of the Langhe.