Don Melchor Cabernet Sauvignon

The 2020 Cabernet Sauvignon Don Melchor has a 6% dash of Cabernet Franc along with 1% splashes of Merlot and Petit Verdot from Puente Alto, Maipo, and was aged for 15 months in 71% new French barrels. Vivid garnet red in the glass. The aromatic profile features red fruit such as cherry and black currant along with hints of mint, spice and pepper over secondary aromas from the aging process, including a gentle whiff of cedar. Intense in the mouth, with juicy freshness and young tannins that will integrate better in time. The fruit was especially vivid this year, adding greatly to the nuance and subtle details. This will growth deeper in the bottle.

The 2020 Don Melchor opens with a distinctly more red-fruited and candied bouquet than the other iterations served next to it, while retaining its classic Cabernet aromas of dried tobacco, cedar and mint. The palate is juicy and sweetly concentrated before transitioning to a comparatively stiff, introverted and drying finish that, after aeration, eventually is supported by a creamy, toasted-oak-derived texture. It is a fine wine, to be sure, but to me, it falls short of the more harmonious 2021 and 2022 harvests. It's 92% Cabernet Sauvignon, 6% Cabernet Franc and 1% each Merlot and Petit Verdot.

Full bodied, this classic Cabernet Sauvignon displays ripe red-plum aromas followed by oak spice. It has a very fine balance on the palate between ripe fruit and good acidity that will keep this fresh as it evolves. Oak flavors are a bit intense but still pleasant providing notes of chocolate in the supple finish.

Packed full of vibrant fruit, plum, blackberry and tar. Exceptional concentration of fruit and sophisticated tannins. Oak and spice but lots of juicy curranty fruit.