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Braida Bricco dell'Uccellone Barbera d'Asti 2016
RedItaly2016
By Daniel Min · Tasted 2020-05-11 · Published 2026-09-30 · Updated 2026-09-30
At a glance
In one line
4.0/5 — lower than Vivino's 4.4 average · world avg price US$90 · My first Barbera.
Wine-Searcher aggregate of 4 critic reviews: 92. Vivino lists four critic scores of 93, 95, 96 and 97, plus two in stars and glasses (2015–2020), publication names not shown.
Market note: World average US$90 / 750ml (Wine-Searcher, ex-tax, Sep 2026). On the same basis the house's Ai Suma is US$85 (92), Bricco della Bigotta US$64 (92), Montebruna US$21 (90), and the Vigna Senza Nome Moscato d'Asti US$16 (90). On Vivino, every vintage from 1995 to 2022 with 30+ ratings scores 4.2–4.5, with 2018 highest at 4.5.
Father's note — Daniel Min
Original author of the notes“참 감칠맛 나는 와인. Barbara 품종은 처음인데 전체적 평점이 높은 이유가 있는 것 같다. 첫 느낌은 오. 좋은 와인인데 이 느낌에서 피니쉬에 민트로 확 잡아주는데 이게 참 부드럽게 잘 잡아준다.”
Show original
“leather oak vanilla chocolate plum tobacco mint licorice 참 감칠맛 나는 와인~ Barbara 품종은 첨인데 전체적 평점이 높은 이유가 있는것 같다. 첫느낌은 오~~ 좋은 와인인데 이느낌에서 피니쉬에 민트로 확 잡아주는데 이게 참 부드럽게 잘 잡아준다.”
What I learned today: the first remark can be short.
Thursday. Before the first customer came in, Master Seo handed me a glass with a rule. The first remark, one word. Explanations after.
The moment my nose reached it, something came out of my mouth first. "Oh." Master Seo asked whether that counted as a word. But that was all there was. Plum, chocolate, tobacco and leather arrived all at once. With a sip, a savoury, mouth-watering taste spread over my tongue. And at the end something cool pulled it all tight. Mint. That mint brought back a spring night.
Twenty-one, May, a Monday night with the windows open, the kitchen table. On the windowsill sat the pot of mint Mum was growing. Dad poured into my glass from a cloth-wrapped bottle; I took a sip and said "Oh." Dad laughed — he'd just done the same, he said. When I said something cool came up at the end, he got up, picked a mint leaf from the pot on the sill and laid it beside the glass. Smell them in turn, he said. The leaf was sharp; what was in the glass was soft. The same aroma, a different grain. I don't know the name of the bottle.
I opened the notebook to that date. The first line: "Such a savoury wine." He wrote that it was his first time with the grape, and he'd spelled it "Barbara", like a person's name. There seems to be a reason it's rated so highly, he wrote. And then: "First impression: oh." A good wine, and from there the finish is pulled tight with mint, and pulled tight so gently. Four stars. The bottle was Braida Bricco dell'Uccellone Barbera d'Asti. I stuck on the wine-name Post-it. Maybe that day Dad was a little pleased that, meeting a new grape, I'd made exactly the same sound he did.
Master Seo said Barbera was for a long time the farmer's everyday table wine, and the man who changed that was the owner of this house. He cut the yields hard, put it into small French oak barrels, and went all the way across the sea to learn how. 'Bricco' in the name means a hilltop and 'Uccellone' a big bird. A woman who always wore black lived on that hill, he said, and because her nose looked like a bird's beak, the village called her that. The vineyard is named after a person's nickname, and the house after a father's nickname.
After closing, I wrote the name on the sixteenth page of the new notebook. At the very end of the aroma box I wrote: "mint — softer than the leaf". What I learned today: the first remark can be short. When the nose knows first, the words follow later.
What this wine is
For a long time Barbera was Piedmont's everyday wine. If Nebbiolo, the grape of Barolo and Barbaresco, was the aristocrat, high-acid, high-yielding Barbera was the farmer's table wine. The man who changed that was Giacomo Bologna of Rocchetta Tanaro in Monferrato. According to Braida's own site, Giacomo took over the family vines and founded the house in 1961, when he first bottled his own harvest. The name 'Braida' was his father Giuseppe's nickname, earned in his ball-playing days for resembling a champion of the sport, and passed down to the son.
Giacomo travelled to California and learned barrique ageing in small French oak barrels; wine.plus names his teacher as the legendary Californian winemaker André Tchelistcheff. He cut yields hard, chose only the best sites, and put Barbera into barriques. The result, first released with the 1982 vintage, was Bricco dell'Uccellone, from a 6-hectare, steep south-facing vineyard in the hamlet of Bricco, just above Rocchetta Tanaro.
Giacomo died in 1990; his wife and children Giuseppe and Raffaella carry on. In the name, 'bricco' means a hilltop and 'uccellone' a big bird. According to Braida, L'Uccellone was the nickname of a woman who lived on the hill where the vineyard lies: her nose looked like a bird's beak and she always wore black, so the village called her that.
What the world says
The four critic reviews gathered on Wine-Searcher aggregate to 92. Vivino lists critic scores of 93, 95, 96 and 97 (publications not shown), plus two given in stars and glasses.
The community score stands out even more. On Vivino this vintage averages 4.4 from 2,139 ratings, and the label as a whole 4.3 from 22,491. There are 1,507 fours and 478 fives, and only 154 ratings of 3 or below. Every vintage from 1995 to 2022 with 30+ ratings scores 4.2–4.5 — barely any wobble from year to year.
The aroma keywords run oak, vanilla and chocolate (632 mentions), blackberry and plum (426), leather and earth (352), cherry and red fruit (226), and licorice, pepper and mint (179) — mint 38 times, eucalyptus 6. The producer's own description also names mint and vanilla alongside red berries. Structure: acidity 3.9/5, intensity 3.8, tannin 2.4, sweetness 1.9 — high acid and soft tannin, as Barbera should be.
"Scents of red berries, accompanied with notes of minty spices, vanilla and liquorice." — Vivino review, Aug 2020, 4.4
How I drank it
May 11, 2020, 4 stars. I wrote down leather, oak, vanilla, chocolate, plum, tobacco, mint and licorice.
It was my first Barbera, and in the note I misspelled the grape as 'Barbara'. The first line: 'such a savoury wine'. I wrote that there seemed to be a reason for its high overall rating. My first impression was simply 'oh'. On top of that good-wine feeling, mint pulled the finish tight — not harshly, but very gently.
My 4 is below Vivino's 4.4. Most people who rated this wine gave it 4 or more, so I'm in that crowd, just not at the top of it. It was a new grape for me, so I had no other Barbera to compare. I also drank it at the very start of Vivino's suggested window (2018–2028).
Where this wine shows up
Giacomo Bologna cut yields and aged Barbera in French barriques, releasing the first Bricco dell'Uccellone with the 1982 vintage — the bottle credited with turning Barbera from an everyday wine into a serious one.
Braida official — 1982-2022: forty vintages of Bricco dell'Uccellone · Vinotria — Braida Bricco dell'Uccellone Barbera d'Asti
Artwork and stills are not reproduced for copyright reasons; scenes are summarised.
Vivino community data
2016 vintage rating distribution (2139 ratings, average 4.4)
| 5★ | 478 (22%) | |
| 4★ | 1507 (70%) | |
| 3★ | 130 (6%) | |
| 2★ | 11 (1%) | |
| 1★ | 13 (1%) |
Most-mentioned aromas
| Family | Mentions | Top keywords |
|---|---|---|
| Oak | 632 | oak 158 · vanilla 147 · chocolate 96 · tobacco 72 · dark chocolate 28 |
| Black fruit | 426 | blackberry 108 · plum 76 · dark fruit 55 · black cherry 39 · blueberry 35 |
| Earth & leather | 352 | leather 102 · earthy 73 · smoke 31 · tar 22 · mushroom 21 |
| Red fruit | 226 | cherry 85 · red fruit 38 · raspberry 34 · red cherry 17 · sour cherry 15 |
| Spice | 179 | licorice 49 · pepper 49 · mint 38 · cinnamon 12 · eucalyptus 6 |
Structure: Acidity 3.9/5 · Intensity 3.8/5 · Tannin 2.4/5 · Sweetness 1.9/5
Average by vintage (all vintages: 22491 ratings, average 4.3)
| Vintage | Average | Ratings |
|---|---|---|
| 1995 | 4.3 | 37 |
| 1996 | 4.2 | 43 |
| 1997 | 4.4 | 83 |
| 1998 | 4.3 | 136 |
| 1999 | 4.4 | 133 |
| 2000 | 4.2 | 145 |
| 2001 | 4.3 | 131 |
| 2003 | 4.2 | 81 |
| 2004 | 4.3 | 117 |
| 2005 | 4.3 | 245 |
| 2006 | 4.3 | 301 |
| 2007 | 4.3 | 369 |
| 2008 | 4.3 | 441 |
| 2009 | 4.3 | 846 |
| 2010 | 4.2 | 860 |
| 2011 | 4.4 | 1408 |
| 2012 | 4.3 | 1153 |
| 2013 | 4.3 | 1492 |
| 2014 | 4.2 | 1738 |
| 2015 | 4.3 | 1839 |
| 2016 | 4.4 | 2139 |
| 2017 | 4.4 | 2139 |
| 2018 | 4.5 | 2017 |
| 2019 | 4.4 | 1258 |
| 2020 | 4.4 | 1094 |
| 2021 | 4.3 | 651 |
| 2022 | 4.2 | 62 |
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→Frequently asked questions
What kind of wine is Braida Bricco dell'Uccellone?
A Barbera d'Asti made from 100% Barbera by Braida of Rocchetta Tanaro in Piedmont. Giacomo Bologna first released it in 1982 with barrique ageing and put Barbera on the world stage. The 2016 scores 4.4 on Vivino (2,139 ratings), with a Wine-Searcher critic aggregate of 92.
How much does it cost?
Wine-Searcher's world average is US$90 per 750ml (ex-tax, Sep 2026). The 2016 is mostly still available abroad in large formats such as magnums and 3L, at about US$73.94–121.50 per 750ml equivalent.
What food goes with it?
The Vivino community suggests veal, pork, poultry, pasta and game. With high acidity and soft tannin, it suits tomato-sauce pasta, pizza and grilled meat.
What kind of grape is Barbera?
One of Piedmont's leading red grapes, with high acidity and soft tannin. Long considered an everyday wine, its standing changed in the 1980s with barrique-aged wines like Bricco dell'Uccellone. This bottle's Vivino structure shows acidity 3.9/5 and tannin 2.4/5.
Links & sources
View on Vivino · Prices on Wine-Searcher
- Vivino — wine page and community data
- wine.plus encyclopedia — Braida
- Vinotria — Braida Bricco dell'Uccellone Barbera d'Asti
- Braida official — 1982-2022: forty vintages of Bricco dell'Uccellone
- Braida official — A Delightful Country Tale
- Wine-Searcher — 2016 Giacomo Bologna Braida Bricco dell'Uccellone
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