Winemaker Notes
Alabaster is the Eguren family’s representation of the elegance that can be achieved in wines made from the oldest Tinta de Toro vineyards. Profound balance, silky texture, and maximum expression of terroir.
Professional Ratings
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Jeb Dunnuck
The 2019 Alabaster is another 100% Tempranillo cuvée from a tiny parcel in Toro. Cassis, graphite, spicy oak, roasted herbs, and a kiss of chocolate all define the bouquet, and it's pure and full-bodied, with gorgeous tannins and a great finish. Enjoy this thrilling, seamless, flawlessly balanced beauty over the coming 10-15 years. Best After 2022
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Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
They got even lower yields in 2019 than in 2018, and the centenary vines used for the 2019 Alabaster produced only 11.2 hectoliters per hectare. This wine was produced with hand-destemmed grapes that fermented for 23 days at 26 degrees Celsius and matured in brand-new French oak barrels, including malolactic, for 18 months. This is quite nuanced and harmonious, and the oak feels very integrated already. It must be the quality of the fruit that year that was able to absorb the oak so early on. In fact, it's a very showy, aromatic, floral and open, elegant and harmonious wine. It's nuanced and complex, with lots of elegance, among the finest vintages for this bottling. It's both powerful and elegant, floral and nuanced. This feels very approachable already but should also be long lived in bottle. 4,000 bottles produced. It was bottled in May 2021.
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Wine Enthusiast
Aromas of cassis, Mission fig and violet pave the way for blackberry, purple plum, cocoa powder and lavender flavors. Velvety tannins and a soft touch of mint make for a gorgeous finish on this wine. Fine Estates From Spain.
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Wine Spectator
A rich, concentrated red, with an expressive range of blackberry tart, fig cake, licorice twist, cola and dark chocolate flavors. Suave yet dense, with a core of fine-grained tannins and a subtle, aromatic thread of medicinal herbs and spice box lingering on the finish. Drink now.
Spanish red wine is known for being bold, heady, rustic and age-worthy, Spain is truly a one-of-a-kind wine-producing nation. A great majority of the country is hot, arid and drought-ridden, and since irrigation has only been recently introduced and (controversially) accepted, viticulture has sustained—and flourished—only through a great understanding of Spain’s particular conditions. Large spacing between vines allows each enough resources to survive and as a result, the country has the most acreage under vine compared to any other country, but is usually third in production.
Of the Spanish red wines, the most planted and respected grape variety is Tempranillo, the star of Spain’s Rioja and Ribera del Duero regions. Priorat specializes in bold red blends, Jumilla has gained global recognition for its single varietal Monastrell and Utiel-Requena has garnered recent attention for its reds made of Bobal.