Winemaker Notes
Professional Ratings
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Wine & Spirits
Concha y Toro offers three Upper Maipo cabernets, including this latest release from the warm and dry 2008 vintage. Marcelo Papa oversees the viticulture and winemaking for Marqués, grown at a vineyard on alluvial soils just east of Don Melchor’s vines. The wine is both tense and intense, the ripe flavors concentrated, almost explosive with blueberry and black cherry notes set off by a hint of menthol. It’s a big wine, even bigger than its neighbor Melchor, but with a more refined structure, built on a foundation of fine tannins that sustains the tension between fruit and texture. A wine to cellar for at least five years.
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Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
The 2008 Marques de Casa Concha Cabernet Sauvignon was blended with 6% Carmenere and 1% Petit Verdot with the grapes sourced from the Puente Alto Vineyard in Maipo. It was aged for 18 months in French oak, 39% new. Aromas of pain grille, pencil lead, spice box, violets, and black currant set the stage for an elegant, smooth-textured, spicy wine with a firm underlying structure and a lengthy, pure finish. This outstanding value may well evolve for 1-2 years but can be approached now.
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Wine Enthusiast
Stands out for its fruit quality, balance and structure. The nose is strong and piercing with charred notes, black fruit aromas and depth. Ripe and clean in the mouth, with elevated blackberry flavors and a chewy, meaty mouthfeel. Toasty and tasting of black licorice on the finish. A serious, well-made Chilean Cab to drink now through 2012.
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Wine Spectator
Rock-solid, with nicely integrated structure for the vintage, allowing the full-bodied core of loam, blackberry, fig sauce and raspberry to stretch out, with lingering mint and cocoa notes on the plush, fleshy finish. Drink now through 2011.
Founded in 1883, Vina Concha y Toro is Latin America's leading producer and occupies an outstanding position among the world’s most important wine companies, currently exporting to 135 countries worldwide. Uniquely, it owns around 9,500 hectares of prime vineyards, which allows the company to secure the highest quality grapes for its wine production. Concha y Toro's portfolio includes a wide range of successful brands at every price point, from the top of the range Don Melchor and Almaviva to the flagship brand Casillero del Diablo and innovative stand-alone brands such as Palo Alto and Maycas del Limarí. The company has 3,162 employees and is headquartered in Santiago, Chile.
A noble variety bestowed with both power and concentration, Cabernet Sauvignon enjoys success all over the globe, its best examples showing potential to age beautifully for decades. Cabernet Sauvignon flourishes in Bordeaux's Medoc where it is often blended with Merlot and smaller amounts of some combination of Cabernet Franc, Malbecand Petit Verdot. In the Napa Valley, ‘Cab’ is responsible for some of the world’s most prestigious, age-worthy and sought-after “cult” wines. Somm Secret—DNA profiling in 1997 revealed that Cabernet Sauvignon was born from a spontaneous crossing of Cabernet Franc and Sauvignon Blanc in 17th century southwest France.
Dramatic geographic and climatic changes from west to east make Chile an exciting frontier for wines of all styles. Chile’s entire western border is Pacific coastline, its center is composed of warm valleys and on its eastern border, are the soaring Andes Mountains.
Chile’s central valleys, sheltered by the costal ranges, and in some parts climbing the eastern slopes of the Andes, remain relatively warm and dry. The conditions are ideal for producing concentrated, full-bodied, aromatic reds rich in black and red fruits. The eponymous Aconcagua Valley—hot and dry—is home to intense red wines made from Cabernet Sauvignon, Syrah and Merlot.
The Maipo, Rapel, Curicó and Maule Valleys specialize in Cabernet and Bordeaux Blends as well as Carmenère, Chile’s unofficial signature grape.
Chilly breezes from the Antarctic Humboldt Current allow the coastal regions of Casablanca Valley and San Antonio Valley to focus on the cool climate loving varieties, Pinot Noir, Chardonnay and Sauvignon Blanc.
Chile’s Coquimbo region in the far north, containing the Elqui and Limari Valleys, historically focused solely on Pisco production. But here the minimal rainfall, intense sunlight and chilly ocean breezes allow success with Chardonnay and Pinot Noir. The up-and-coming southern regions of Bio Bio and Itata in the south make excellent Riesling, Chardonnay and Pinot Noir.
Spanish settlers, Juan Jufre and Diego Garcia de Cáceres, most likely brought Vitis vinifera (Europe’s wine producing vine species) to the Central Valley of Chile sometime in the 1550s. One fun fact about Chile is that its natural geographical borders have allowed it to avoid phylloxera and as a result, vines are often planted on their own rootstock rather than grafted.