With last night's ragù bianco di maiale con le fave, I had a hankering for Nebbiolo, so we started by opening a Ceretto 1996 Barolo Bricco Roche Prapò. This was a bottle purchased back in 2003 as part of a small mixed batch on Winebid, and results with other bottles had been decidedly variable, so I was prepared for this to be DOA, and at first we thought it was; but we decanted and waited. After an hour, it was showing a little bit of fruit but mostly muddled, indistinct "old" notes; but we went back to the it over the course of the evening, and it continued to bloom; after three hours it became brighter and more focused -- relatively speaking -- and showed pleasant, distinct tertiary aromas of leather, licorice, and bitter chocolate. I still suspect this was poorly stored at some point in its first decade of life, but it wasn't a total loss.
As we were waiting for the Ceretto to come around we also had glasses of a Ar.Pe.Pe. 2006 Valtellina Superiore, Grumello Riserva, Rocca di Piro. This, by contrast, is still in its youth. Clear ruby, medium body, vivid interplay of high-toned cherry fruit, flowers, minerals; spiky, inward, and slightly grippy at first but after time in the glass it relaxes and deepens. Delicious, with several years' potential for further development.