2020 Almaviva Puente Alto Red

2020 was exceptionally dry, with 75% less rain than usual in the period between May and September, which resulted in an earlier harvest to produce a 2020 Almaviva with 68% Cabernet Sauvignon, 24% Carmenere (from Peumo), 6% Cabernet Franc and 2% Petit Verdot, so with no Merlot this time. The process was as careful as possible, without using any pumps, doing manual and optical sorting of the grapes, pressing in small vertical presses and aging of 20 months in French oak barrels, 73% of them new and the rest second use. The wine reached good ripeness with 14.9% alcohol. It still shows the effect of the élevage a bit, with abundant notes of sweet spices, a creamy touch and some smoke. I tasted it next to the 2019, and the wines have a very similar aromatic palette with a clear note of baked peppers. What was amazing in 2020 was that they harvested the Carmenere almost five weeks earlier than they normally would, and the result is not a green wine at all. As in all dry years, the wines show a little more tannic, a little in the style of the 2017—but the 2020 has more tension than the 2017, and the 2017 was more powerful and with a bigger tannic structure. The 2019 had more volume than the 2018, and the 2020 is closer to the 2019 than the 2018. 200,000 bottles produced. It was bottled during the second half of February 2022. I tasted the 2020 Almaviva for its release through the Place de Bordeaux in September 2022. I am also including the note here for context and completeness of the Chile article.

The 2020 Almaviva is two thirds Cabernet Sauvignon, a quarter Carménère, and also contains dashes of Cabernet Franc and Petit Verdot from Puente Alto in the Maipo Valley. It aged for 20 months in 73% new barrels. A rich garnet-red in hue. The ripe, complex nose is both fruity and jammy with cassis and blackberry notes, layers of herbs and ash, sweet spices, cardamom, traces of vanilla, cedar, and orange petit fours. Indulgent and broad with grippy tannins. This is a concentrated but relaxed, gently sculpted red in which the wood lends volume, with a fine balance and a long finish. Still young, it's developing nicely. Will improve in the bottle but right now leaves pleasant fruit and biscuit flavors behind in the back of the throat. The ripeness is due to the warm year.

68% Cabernet Sauvignon, 24% Carmenère, 6% Cabernet Franc, 2% Petit Verdot . Deep colour. Sweet and sour on the nose here, blackcurrant cordial, dried herbs and a mulchy bitterness. Very polished in structure, but the wood and herbs are a strong overtone to the dark-cherry and kirsch notes in the fruit. A slightly numbing, clove-like spice to the wood. Long and sweet but marred by a disjointed flavour profile. (TP)