Winemaker Notes
Contador 2008 is bright and deep garnet in color. Very ripe red and black fruit on the nose overlaid with mineral and herbal touches reminiscent of aromatic plants which live alongside the vines in our most select vineyards. Notes of high quality wood and dark burnt caramel. Full and smooth in the mouth at first. This is followed by a good level of tannin and a refined mouth-watering freshness. The finish is long and pleasant.
Blend: 86% Tempranillo, 14% Garnacha
Age of Vines 60-100 years
Professional Ratings
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Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
The 2008 Contador, rapidly becoming one of Rioja’s benchmark wines, is composed of 86% Tempranillo and 14% Garnacha aged for 18 months in new French oak. It is a glass-coating opaque purple color with an exceptional bouquet of sandalwood exotic spices, lavender, incense, espresso, tapenade, and blackberry. Dense and mouth-coating, it deftly combines elegance and power in a structured wine that will easily achieve its 20th birthday and well beyond.
Benjamin Romeo's winemaking credentials include over 15 years as head winemaker at Bodegas Artadi, one of Rioja's greatest producers, and two 100 point scores for his 2004 and 2005 Contador
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.