I had the pleasure of visiting Don Melchor this September. Last month I enjoyed working with the winery to put together a lunch for a group of Miami wine professionals. The below is my take on the current release, Don Melchor 2020, which I tasted both at the winery and in Miami.
Friends, I have some entirely unsurprising news: Winemakers know best.
In September I was lucky enough to visit the Don Melchor estate in Puente Alto, one of Chile’s most revered grape growing areas. Visits take place in the 19th century summer residence of Concha y Toro’s late founder, Don Melchor, who as well as lending his villa to the experience, also gives the wine its name.
This was no ordinary Cabernet tasting, however. I was put to work. The 127-hectare Don Melchor vineyard is famously divided into seven blocks, themselves subdivided into 151 parcels, based primarily on differences in the soil. This was the initiative of Enrique Tirado, who has been responsible for making the wine since 1997. When you meet the very focused and detail-oriented Enrique, this painstaking attention to quality begins to make sense.
My task, at the summer residence, was to create a blend using three different base wines, each made from a different plot. The first surprise was how significantly different each of these wines were. Block one was vibrant and fruity. Block three was powerfully structured with plenty of dark fruit. Block five was savoury and spicy.
Assuming that the “bigger” wines would take over, I created a blend dominated (2/3) by block one, seasoning it with the others. My assumption turned out to be entirely incorrect, and though my creation was fruity highly drinkable, the blend created by winemaker Isabel Mitarakis Guilisasti (who previously made Don Melchor with Enrique) was far more complex and structured. Winemakers know best.
Don Melchor 2020
The actual Don Melchor 2020 – not hastily composed in a tasting room – is better still, brilliantly framing and intense black fruit with fine, mouthcoating tannins and finishing with cocoa and cedar spice mingling with blackberry and plum. It is fresh and, despite its concentration, not a blockbuster wine. Even in its youth, it was a pleasure to drink.
Which, I suppose, is what happens when you combine a great vineyard with careful attention to detail.
Sarah is a freelance wine educator, writer and events host, based in South Beach. She holds the WSET Diploma in Wine & Spirits and is a current Master of Wine student.
