Winemaker Notes
Deep colored with ruby red hints and beautiful red cherries color. Expressive aromas of black spices, herbs and petrichor. Black fruit and subtle graphite and cedar come along as well. Very balanced, with lively tannins and freshness. In the mid palate, a beautiful structure with more fruit aromas and spices over a very long finish.
Blend: 64% Carmenère, 19% Cabernet Sauvignon, 17% Merlot
Professional Ratings
-
James Suckling
This is really focused and refined with fantastic dried flowers and dark berries. Dried-lavender and mint undertones. Medium-to full-bodied with refined and polished tannins that are all together and so focused. Really integrated and melted together on the palate. Compact and very linear.
-
Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
The 2016 Clos Apalta is a blend of 64% Carménère (higher than in 2015), 19% Cabernet Sauvignon and 17% Merlot hitting the scale at 15% alcohol with a pH of 3.7. The Carménère and Cabernet were planted ungrafted in 1920, and all the vineyards are organic and biodynamic (certified) and very low yielding. The hand-destemmed grapes fermented in oak vats and barriques (17%), and the wine went through malolactic and 26 months of aging in brand new French barriques. I've seen a great improvement in Carménère in Chile in the last few years, perhaps since they stopped wanting to grow it everywhere and focused on the places where it grows well, like the Apalta region. They have also learned to tame the green aromas, fierce tannins and alcohol and to produce much more harmonious reds, like this aromatic example that reveals spice, tobacco leaves, red fruit and floral notes without noticeable alcohol or excess ripeness. The oak is surprisingly well integrated for such a young wine, and there is harmony, concentration and balance to make it age in bottle for a long time. The palate is full-bodied, and the tannins are fine-grained and in balance with the rest of the components, coming through as a compact and powerful yet elegant red. This has to be one of the finest Clos Apaltas of all time.
-
Wine Spectator
Refined, with savory richness to the mineral-infused raspberry, red currant and herbal shadings. Creamy hints emerge midpalate, leading to a crisp, well-structured finish that lingers with slate and cast iron notes. Carmenère, Cabernet Sauvignon and Merlot.
-
Vinous
A few mature wines still survive from the period that Michel Rolland spent in Chile, including Clos Apalta (a blend of 64% Carménère, 19% Cabernet Sauvignon and 17% Merlot), demonstrating both the effectiveness and richness of the style. Taking an approach that suits the terroir of Apalta in Colchagua, this garnet-hued red offers ripe aromas of jam, camphor and bay leaf that guide the hints of blackberry and an elegant woodiness that encompasses notes of sandalwood and tobacco. A complex wine that reflects its oxidative aging process; after a while, black olives, musk and hazelnuts appear. It is rich on the palate with fine tannins and slightly intense woody notes. A long, mature, open and flavorsome finish.
-
Wine & Spirits
Michel Rolland developed this wine for the Marnier-Lapostolle family at its estate in Apalta, where the old vines on the valley floor date to the 1920s, and younger vines climb the horseshoe-shaped hills. Now headed up by winemaker Jacques Begarie, the team began harvest in 2016 with merlot on March 10 (17 percent of the blend), continuing with cabernet sauvignon on March 18 (19 percent) and starting in on carmenère on April 12 (accounting for 64 percent of the blend). Those varieties come together in a powerful wine with a deep crimson color and rich lavender scents layered over tart plum flavors. The fine tannins show incipient complexity in their mineral length of savor. Cellar this for ten years or more.
One of the world’s most classic and popular styles of red wine, Bordeaux-inspired blends have spread from their homeland in France to nearly every corner of the New World. Typically based on either Cabernet Sauvignon or Merlot and supported by Cabernet Franc, Malbec and Petit Verdot, the best of these are densely hued, fragrant, full of fruit and boast a structure that begs for cellar time. Somm Secret—Blends from Bordeaux are generally earthier compared to those from the New World, which tend to be fruit-dominant.
Well-regarded for intense and exceptionally high quality red wines, the Colchagua Valley is situated in the southern part of Chile’s Rapel Valley, with many of the best vineyards lying in the foothills of the Coastal Range.
Heavy French investment and cutting-edge technology in both the vineyard and the winery has been a boon to the local viticultural industry, which already laid claim to ancient vines and a textbook Mediterranean climate.
The warm, dry growing season in the Colchagua Valley favors robust reds made from Cabernet Sauvignon, Carmenère, Malbec and Syrah—in fact, some of Chile’s very best are made here. A small amount of good white wine is produced from Chardonnay and Sauvignon Blanc.