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| Ladies and gentlemen: Presenting the crown jewel of Chilean wine grapes: I give you: the Carménère. |
Chile is wine country. So, in first trip to Chile, I visited no wineries. I visited a brewery. A really good brewery that brews really good beer, Second trip to Chile and it's time to be a more typical Chilean tourist and start touring the wineries.
The Concha Y Toro winery in Pirque, Chile, about an hour south of Santiago.
It was definitely a fall day. Not a "crisp" fall day, like yesterday. A cold fall day. Upstate New York fall day. Single digit temperatures. Yes. Single digits. Celsius. Which translates in a real and proper temperature measuring scale to temperatures in the upper 40's.
Which is cold. Especially given the clothing choices found in my suitcase. Oh well. Layers. Lots and lots of layers.
The winery tour was offered in three languages: Spanish, Portuguese, and the default language of tourism: English. I chose English.
The number taking the English language got bigger, although not a whole lot. The Portuguese language tour was probably the mots popular. Lots of turistas brasileiros here for the fermented grape juice.
There were only two other native speakers of English on the English language tour. Like I said, English is the default language of tourism. There were six French speakers and four others speaking an East Asian language that my untrained ear could not properly peg.
Let's walk through the tunnel of vines and take the tour. In the international language of tourism.
First stop was the mansion of the founder of the Concha Y Toro: Mr. Melchor Concha Y Toro:
This was his summer house. Until, in 1883, he decided to expand his hobby of winemaking by importing a variety of grapes from the Bordeaux region of France. He then made it his regular homestead since commuting time in 1883 from Santiago (where he was a lawyer and well-connected politician) were even worse than they are now in heavy Santiago traffic.
These are his guard dogs.
So the winery "Concha Y Toro" is named for the founder. Even though the name translates to "Shell and Bull," the name is not "Shell and Bull." The name is the family name.
The wines of Concha Y Toro are imported into the United States primarily under the "Casillero del Diablo," the mass market wine from here.
There is a pond.
It used to be fed by the irrigation for the grapes. Now, most of the grapes are grown elsewhere so it's part of the irrigation for all the greenery on the property.
Let's look at Concha Y Toro mansion from across the lily pads:
The next stop was the demonstration garden. There is a small plot where each of the many grape varieties -- white and red -- are grown for the wines produced by Concha Y Toro. Only one grape variety is now grown in market quantities at this particular vineyard: cabernet sauvignon. The soil and climate are particularly well-suited to maximize the quality of this particular grapes. The other two dozen or so white and red varieties are grown elsewhere, some in Chile, some in Europe, some in the Napa Valley of California.
But in this demonstration garden, each of the grape varieties may be found.
Here is the sauvignon blanc.
Of course, you did not need me to tell you. You could have read the sign.
The carménère vines look a little distressed.
Is this typical? Or are they stressed out from the unseasonably early cold fall temperatures? I doubt it's the latter since the carménère primarily are grown a little farther south which, southern hemisphere, means a little bit cooler.
They even had a small plot of the German white grape gewürztraminer.
They look a bit distressed. You would think the Germans would be hardier. The mourvedre grapes also looked a little distressed.
Chicken loose in the pinot gris!
Keeping the vineyard bug free.
Behind the demonstration garden is a huge field of cabernet sauvignon.
The next stop was the wine tasting. Three wines. One white: a sauvignon blanc. Then a high end (i.e., high-priced) carménère that tasted about the same to me as a bottle of Casillero del Diablo at Lee's Liquor for under 10 bucks.
That is more a comment on how good the Casillero del Diablo carménère reserve is. The final taste was a high-end cabernet. I really like the carménère, hence that is the only one I photographed.
The final stop was storage.
But one last look at the demonstration garden:
This is where the magic happens. This is where grape juice is turned into wine.
Oak barrels. The highest grade wines gets the newest barrels. I know oak is a good source of vanillin, the primary flavor compound in vanilla, so I guess the better wines have more vanillin.
This was a piece of equipment used in the old days.
This piece of antique equipment, however, is one whose use I could readily see:
This is the tub you climb in to stomp the grapes with your bare feet, to separate the juice from the pulp and the seeds.
The final stop was the deepest part of the wine cellar, where the highest quality wine is aged.
And by highest quality, I mean $200 a bottle wine.
And like all good tours, the tour ends at the gift shop.
Time to pick out a souvenir bottle.
If you guessed "carménère," you guessed right.
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