I’ll cut to the chase: this is the best Chilean white wine I have ever tasted
A friend recently opened a random bottle of white wine which happened to be a Chilean Gewürz*, not the most common combination. On closer inspection of the label it was a ten year old Chilean Gewurz*! Fearing something old, possibly oxidised or just out of condition, a few sips revealed something wonderful: a well made, maturing, but far-from-over-the-hill, delicious white wine.
One of my mantras on wine is that most of us drink wine too young – particularly white wine – and this wine only serves to reinforce it.
Miguel Torres Chile is an offshoot from the Spanish Torres family who have been producing wine since the 19th Century. From the website:
Miguel A. Torres decided to begin the Chilean project on the advice of Alejandro Parot, a Chilean friend and classmate from his studies in Dijon (France).
Winemaking is ultra-clean and intended to have minimal impact on the finished wine:
- No skin contact
- No oak ageing
- Bottled five months after picking
Notes on the latest vintage state that it is “an ideal match for shellfish (particularly oysters) and most fish dishes”. Without doing extensive vertical tastings I can’t argue against that, but I actually think the 2005 is far more versatile than the above suggests – quite possibly as a result of bottle ageing.
There’s texture and much more body than expected for a white. Acidity is still present but perfectly counterbalanced by the modest residual sugar (7.5g/L). The exotic tropical fruits of youth are now a little more subtle but still present and correct.
For Alsace fans such as myself, this wine was a revelation. Tasted blind, I wouldn’t have been shocked to hear it was from a big name Grand Cru producer such as Zind-Humbrecht.
I now need to work out how to collect more vintages of it…
*Note: in Germany Gewürztraminer has an umlaut, in Alsace they leave it off. I’ve tried to randomly represent both parties in this article. I’d like to think of myself as an equal opportunities speller.