Winemaker Notes
85% Tempranillo, 15% Garnacha Tinta & Graciano
Bright, vivid dark ruby color. Intense bouquet that brings to mind jelly made from fruits of the forest (bilberries) and sweet spice. Good concentration in the mouth with delicious tannins that highlight the wine's rich fruit that has become more complex following aging in barrel. On the whole, an unctuous wine with a pleasant fullness that lingers on the palate with a depth of refined toasted notes. A very elegant wine with superb potential for development.
Just like our Gran Reserva wines, the Reservas are only produced from vintages classed as "excellent" or "very good". The Reservas are matured for 22 months in oak barrels from central France and for 2 years or more in bottle, depending on the date of release.
Marries well with savory fish dishes such as fresh tuna in spicy tomato sauce, refined delicatessen products (chorizo, salami), all kinds of beef (roasted, stewed or grilled), foie gras, duck, partridge, game and mature cheese.
Professional Ratings
In 1970, Enrique Forner founded Marqués de Cáceres Unión Vitivinícola S.A., a historic alliance of growers in the village of Cenicero in the Rioja Alta subregion of Rioja. The enterprising Forner family has been devoted to the wine trade for five generations. Their search for the best vine growers and vineyards in Rioja and the introduction of a Bordeaux concept revolutionized the production and business model of the region. They work with one single objective: producing the highest quality wines. Today this obsession continues to be the leitmotif of Cristina Forner, the fifth generation of this distinguished wine family.
Hailed as the star red variety in Spain’s most celebrated wine region, Tempranillo from Rioja, or simply labeled, “Rioja,” produces elegant wines with complex notes of red and black fruit, crushed rock, leather, toast and tobacco, whose best examples are fully capable of decades of improvement in the cellar.
Rioja wines are typically a blend of fruit from its three sub-regions: Rioja Alta, Rioja Alavesa and Rioja Oriental, although specific sub-region (zonas), village (municipios) and vineyard (viñedo singular) wines can now be labeled. Rioja Alta and Alavesa, at the highest elevations, are considered to be the source of the brightest, most elegant fruit, while grapes from the warmer and drier, Rioja Oriental, produce wines with deep color, great body and richness.