Winemaker Notes
Professional Ratings
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Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
The sensational 2009 Contador is a blend of 97% Tempranillo and 3% Garnacha from several parcels, cropped at 0.5kg per bush vine and aged for 18 months entirely in French oak. The nose is very lifted with floral notes: crushed violets and rose petals sprinkled over cassis and dark plum fruit. The palate is medium-bodied with fine tannins and a gentle, insistent grip. It has a satin-like texture, bewitching harmony and a precise, languorous finish that exhibits spine-tingling minerality. Returning to the bottle hours after opening, it evolves ever-higher degrees of harmony and sumptuousness. It almost leaves you giggling stupidly at how good it is. It is expensive, but it is also cheaper than a First Growth. Drink 2017-2030.
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.