A Cracking Chilean Carmenere

Last year I took advantage of one of our major supermarkets, buy 6 save 25% offers, and the other week I finally got around to drinking the last bottle that I’d bought, which was a 2008 Yali Three Lagoons Chilean Carmenere from Vina Ventisquero.

Having looked into Vina Ventisquero, I have to say I’m rather impressed by them. Hailing from the Maipo Valley, they have taken great care in how they produce their wine, from using sustainable farming methods in the vineyards to the extensive research they’ve done on the terrior in their vineyards; all this goes a long way towards producing a very enjoyable glass of wine.

In the glass this wine had a dark, opaque cherry colour, with wonderfully pronounced aromas of dark fruit, blackberries and cherries, then in the background you got pepper, vanilla and a touch of smoke coming through. On the palate all of these came at wave after wave, which was just stunning, to go along with this it had just enough silky smooth tannin and acidity to balance perfectly, and a beautifully long lingering finish.

Combine all of these together and you got an extremely well put together glass of wine that was perfectly balanced and extremely enjoyable. Is this a wine that I’d recommend, absolutely, and if this one is anything to go by, I’ll definitely be trying a few more of their wines!

A Very Disappointing Bordeaux

I’ve not posted a wine from Bordeaux so far on the blog, so I thought it was about time that I rectified that, unfortunately it’s not as I would have liked it to be. A little while ago I managed to come across one in my local supermarkets fine wine selection, it had been reduced as they were a bin end, which I decided to take full advantage of and bought two bottles, with the view that if I liked it I’d go back and get some more, if they had any left. I have to admit it was a good reduction, they were originally £19.99 and had been reduced to just £4.99, bargain, or so I thought.

The bottles in question were a 2005 Medoc from Chateau Le Lescot, which is a Cabernet Sauvignon and Merlot blend, which I looked forward to tasting. We had some friends round for dinner and I thought this was the ideal opportunity to bring it out.

In the glass it had a deep ruby/garnet colour, which is what I would have expected given its age, on the nose it had quite pronounced aromas of dark fruit, predominantly blackcurrants, so far so good, but that’s where it started to go downhill. On the palate you got the fruit and a good amount of ripe juicy tannins, but it had a searing acidity with it, which just did not go with the rest of the components of the wine, and made it for me an unbalanced wine and a disappointment. I thought it actually may have been slightly oxidised, so i opened the other bottle to see if that was any better, unfortunately it wasn’t. I may have been very unlucky and got two bad bottles, but I doubt it.

This unfortunately is not a wine that I would recommend, the later vintages may be better; I’d like to hope they are, but I certainly wouldn’t recommend or buy this wine myself again without tasting it first.