Region | |
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Subregion | Spain > Rioja |
Colour | Red |
Type | Still |
View all vintages of this wine | View all wines by Compañia Vinicola del Norte de España (CVNE)
This is very ripe with blackberries, dried fruit, toasted oak and black licorice on the nose. Full-bodied with ultra-fine, linear tannins and a racy, refined finish. This has fantastic structure and length. It goes on for minutes. It needs time to open and refine even more. One of the best Imperiale Gran Reservas in a very long time. Drink after 2023.
Produced in CVNE’s bodega within a bodega, entirely dedicated to Imperial, this is a superb Gran Reserva that combines Tempranillo with 10% Graciano and 5% Mazuelo. Rich, dense and layered, with fine new French and American oak, wonderful focus, savoury tannins and the depth and concentration to age for a decade or more.
The 2015 Imperial Gran Reserva is crafted from a constellation of eighty-five percent Tempranillo, ten percent Graciano and five percent Mazuelo this year. Like the Contino Gran Reserva, this wine tips the scales at fourteen percent alcohol in 2015 and offers up a pure, nascently complex and sappy nose of black raspberries, black cherries, Cuban cigar wrapper, a lovely base of soil tones, toasted coconut, a touch of cedar, fresh nutmeg and a smoky topnote. On the palate the wine is pure, refined, deep and full, with a great core of fruit, impeccable focus and balance, ripe, firm tannins and a long, tangy and nascently complex finish. This is going to be an absolutely superb vintage of Imperial Gran Reserva, but it is even younger than the Viña Real Gran Reserva out of the blocks and will need a bit more cellaring to soften up. In due course, it is going to be a stunning wine! (Drink between 2031-2080)