Miguel Silva learned something from his 2014 tempranillo.
You see, winemakers like to dabble. They try out different blends, they expose their wine to mixes of wood and so on. Yet it’s possible to push the bounds of trial into the dreaded error territory.
And that’s where the Don Angel winemaker found himself after experimenting with plastic totes as aging vessels.
“My thinking was ‘this is like stainless steel — no transfer,’” he recalled, referring to the ability of metal to frustrate the intentions of air.
Much to Silva’s dismay, he discovered that the sturdy tubs employed by winemakers during the pressing phase actually breathe. After a year in plastic, the wine had enough. It threw a silent tantrum, like a teenager slamming the bedroom door.
“I thought ‘I’m losing it,’” Silva said.
But winemakers often joust with ill-tempered varietals and generally come out on top. Silva calmed the tempranillo and provided a little counseling, in the form of syrah — just a splash, added to the wine before resting it in neutral oak barrels for another 18 months.
“It was tight,” he explained. “The syrah opened it up.”
The result is a confident wine, full of brash fruit yet patient enough to reveal itself slowly.
On the nose it embraces you with impressions of pressed cherries, juices dripping into cedar buckets, and tomatoes splitting under a noonday sun. This assertive introduction is softened by hints of vanilla, chocolate and earthy spice.
A sip confirms the wine’s initial petulance is all in the past. It greets you with bright cherry and hearty tomato then welcomes you into a comfortable space — leather lounges, cedar humidors, cool chocolates dressed in vanilla and mint. The finessed balance of fruit both assured and cultivated allows denser flavors into the room.
Streaks of tobacco and earthy spice emerge on the finish. Yet the fruit never withdraws. Instead it approaches the herbs, the wood, the vanilla as a supporting cast, remaining in control of the palate.
It is a finely balanced wine. Despite the Silva’s predicament after experimenting with plastic totes, he clearly managed to find a perfect solution. Although he’s unlikely to venture outside the wood and stainless steel box again, Silva reached his goal.
“What I’m looking for in a tempranillo — I see it as an unrestrained wine, but a very composed wine,” Silva pointed out. “It’s fruity and mellow, but it’s not a wimpy wine.”
Indeed, the 2014 Don Angel tempranillo is ripped with fruit and sure of itself.
“If you give it a chance, it will explode in your mouth,” Silva added.
Dave Faries can be reached at 900-2016
