Señorío de San Vicente Rioja 2015

San Vicente is perhaps the Eguren family’s most well known wine, as it was the wine that first put them on the map. At a time when people were obsessed with producing classic style Rioja wines, Marcos and Miguel Angel Eguren strove to produce a Bordeaux styled single vineyard wine. They selected one of their magic vineyards, Finca La Canoca, to produce San Vicente. Located in a tiny valley at the foothills of the Sierra Cantabria, Finca La Canoca is a vineyard of the unique Tempranillo Peludo variety. They built the wine from the vineyard. In 1991, when they began working on the project, there were no single vineyard Rioja wines. After the success of San Vicente, all of the great Rioja wineries followed suit, declassifying their top, flagship wines from the typical Rioja ageing system, and focusing on specific vineyards. San Vicente is a unique wine which marries the modern intensity of fruit and concentration with classic Old-World style Rioja aromatics of mountain herbs and licorice.

"The 2015 San Vicente was produced with 18 hectares of Tempranillo Peludo, a particular strain of Tempranillo planted from a massal selection in 1985 in the village of San Vicente de la Sonsierra. The destemmed grapes fermented in French oak vats, and the wine matured in new oak barrels (90% French, 10% American) for 20 months. This really reminds me of the initial vintages of this wine, 1991 and 1994, but with the wisdom of the older vines, it feels very integrated and compact, in line with the 2005. It's a serious and balanced wine that's harmonious and has incipient complexity, with aromatic herbs and spices and a mixture of red and black fruit. It's elegant and medium-bodied, with fine-grained tannins, good grip and a remarkable finish. This has oak, but it feels quite integrated. It has the stuffing and balance to develop nicely in bottle. 2015 is behaving much better than expected." Wine Advocate 94+