2012 Rioja Graciano

The 2012 Graciano from Contino is one of the few varietal wines produced with the variety, even though the number is slowly creeping up. It fermented in 10,000-liter oak vats and matured in new French and Hungarian (10%) oak barrels for 15 months. Graciano takes time to ripen and it did well in 2012, a very dry and warm vintage where the grapes were healthy. This was the second consecutive dry vintage, but somehow the vines achieved less alcohol than normal and retained quite good acidity. I've seen this in some places, where the vines seemed to get blocked and stopped producing sugar and the acidity didn't drop. The varietal character, a little herbal and balsamic, with notes of blueberries is there. This is easier to drink than the average Graciano from Contino. A gentle vintage for this bottling. 3,700 bottles were filled in April 2014.