Winemaker Notes
Professional Ratings
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Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
One of the best vintages of the grand vin here has to be the eponymous 2016 Montsecano, produced 100% with Pinot Noir from the zone of Las Dichas in Casablanca. The vines were planted in 2006 on red clay and granite soils and, as all the wines here, sees no oak whatsoever; it fermented in stainless steel with indigenous yeasts and was kept in egg-shaped cement vats until bottling in February 2017. This is simply delicious. This is not a Burgundy Pinot Noir, there is always a touch of rusticity here, an earthy touch. This is a pure Pinot Noir; it slowly opens up in the glass to an intoxicating mixture of wild flowers and herbs, with that rustic touch. The palate has very fine-grained tannins, tasty and long. I think this captures the intensity of the people that work here. 8,000 bottles produced.
Rating: 94+
Thin-skinned, finicky and temperamental, Pinot Noir is also one of the most rewarding grapes to grow and remains a labor of love for some of the greatest vignerons in Burgundy. Fairly adaptable but highly reflective of the environment in which it is grown, Pinot Noir prefers a cool climate and requires low yields to achieve high quality. Outside of France, outstanding examples come from in Oregon, California and throughout specific locations in wine-producing world. Somm Secret—André Tchelistcheff, California’s most influential post-Prohibition winemaker decidedly stayed away from the grape, claiming “God made Cabernet. The Devil made Pinot Noir.”
A region that has become synonymous with some of the best whites of Chile, the Casablanca Valley is full of dozens of bodegas who either grow fruit here or come from outside to source from local growers for their own white wine programs. The valley runs from east to west, which means that its westernmost vineyards receive the most cooling influence from the reliable afternoon sea breezes. The soils also tend to be heavier in clay in the west, whereas the eastern end of the valley is warmer and its soils are predominantly granitic. Sauvignon blanc thrives here, Chardonnay does well and Pinot noir is not uncommon.