Why it matters
The producer
Cascina Gentile farms three appellations from a single hilltop estate in Capriata d'Orba, where the southeastern corner of Piemonte opens toward Liguria and the landscape shifts from the Nebbiolo country of the Langhe to something lower, warmer, and less famous. The estate makes white wine from Cortese under Gavi DOCG, red wine from Dolcetto under Ovada DOCG, and a white from Timorasso under the Colli Tortonesi Derthona DOC. Three grapes, three appellations, one estate.
Daniele Oddone has run the property since 2009, when ownership passed from his family to him after he completed his studies at the Alba School of Oenology. He manages the vines and the cellar himself. The estate is certified organic through Valoritalia.
Place and vineyards
Where the wines begin
Capriata d'Orba sits in Alessandria province at the point where three wine zones meet. Gavi DOCG, built around Cortese, lies to the south. Ovada DOCG, the heartland of serious Dolcetto, begins practically at the estate boundary. The Colli Tortonesi, home to Derthona Timorasso, lies to the east. Most producers in the area work one of these appellations. Cascina Gentile works all three, which is less a marketing decision than a geographic fact: the estate is positioned where those zones converge.
The vineyards sit at around 270 metres, on soils that vary by parcel. The Ovada Dolcetto parcel recorded for Tre Passi Avanti sits at 250 metres on silt, clay, and stone, south-facing, which gives the Dolcetto full sun through the growing season and produces grapes with enough colour and tannin to carry extended maceration.
In the cellar
Vineyards and cellar
All eleven hectares are farmed organically. The inputs are copper and sulfur treatments and manure fertiliser. No synthetic herbicides, fungicides, or fertilisers are used. All wines are produced from estate-grown grapes.
In the cellar, the approach is consistent across labels: macerate for the time the variety requires, age in a combination of steel, cement, and bottle, and then bottle without fining or filtration. For Tre Passi Avanti Ovada Dolcetto, maceration runs seven to ten days, followed by six months in steel, six months in cement, and six months in bottle. For the Derthona Timorasso, maceration is 24 hours of skin contact, then 18 months in steel and 12 months in bottle. The cement vessel appears in the Dolcetto protocol but not in the Timorasso one.
Wines to know
The range in view
Three wines anchor the range.
Gavi Confine is the white wine made from Cortese, the sole grape permitted under Gavi DOCG. Cortese grown at this elevation produces lean, high-acid white wine with citrus and stone-fruit character. It is the estate's primary white label.
A useful way in
A bottle to begin with
Start with Ovada DOCG Tre Passi Avanti. It is Dolcetto from Ovada, which is the most demanding appellation for the grape, and the cellar protocol at Cascina Gentile, seven-to-ten-day maceration with no fining and no filtration, gives the wine genuine tannic density rather than the easy, soft profile that standard Dolcetto often produces. The aromas are genuinely dark and slightly savoury: plum, almond, firewood. The tannins are firm, the finish is dry, and the wine wants food. It is not a light introduction to Italian red wine. It is an introduction to what Dolcetto can do when it is taken seriously in a zone built for it.