Winemaker Notes
A marvellous companion to vegetable and smoked flavors, such as those of wild mushrooms and truffles. Combines nicely with subtly spiced dishes and unsmoked, medium-cured soft cheeses.
Professional Ratings
-
Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
The 2009 Mirto is a completely different animal, darker in color, with the smoky and toasted aromas of the oak in the foreground and the ripe red and black fruit in the background. In the palate the tannins are still taking center-stage and will require some time to get resolved, but the quality of fruit is good and it will come into balance. A good modern Rioja, at a similar quality level to other wines from the winery. It's more a matter of personal taste if you prefer the more traditional or the more modern cuvees.
-
Wine Spectator
Coffee, dark chocolate and toast notes frame currant, cranberry and orange peel flavors in this modern-style red. Offers a solid structure and slightly grippy tannins, but remains light-footed, with fresh acidity. Drink now through 2021.
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.