Errazuriz Don Maximiano Founders Reserve 2021

Description

Errazuriz Don Maximiano Founders Reserve 2021 is a tribute to the founder of Errazuriz and is the producer’s flagship wine. It is the result of a continuous quest to produce the best, most elegant Cabernet Sauvignon based wine which also truly reflects the Aconcagua Valley terroir. The 2021 vintage was a moderately cool season with long, slow ripening enabled Errazuriz to make fresh and elegant wines with intense colour, complex aromas and silky ripe tannins.

The Errazuriz Estate was founded in 1870 when Don Maximiano Errazuriz planted his first vineyards at Panquehue in the Aconcagua Valley – 100km North of the capital. Today, the tradition of quality lives on with Don Maximiano’s descendant Eduardo Chadwick. Eduardo is the fifth generation of his family to be involved in the wine business. The Don Maximiano vineyards are located in the Aconcagua Valley, a region that features an extended dry season with moderately warm summer days cooled by soft afternoon breezes from the Pacific Ocean. The vineyards were planted between 1978 and 1993 on hillsides with north and northeast exposure on soils with a thin layer of decomposed granite over soils of colluvial origin, which ensures good drainage. Thre oldest blocks are located in the MAX I, MAX II, and MAX V vineyards.

Errazuriz Errazuriz Don Maximiano Vinification

The grapes for the Errazuriz Don Maximiano Founders Reserve are hand-harvested into small 12kg boxes to ensure that they arrive at the winery in the best condition. Grapes are carefully selected on a sorting table, where all plant matter, such as leaves and stems are removed to ensure the fruit character in the wine. The grapes were fermented in stainless steel tanks. There are three daily pump-overs of the grapes to achieve the right amount of extraction. Maceration lasted from 16 to 28 days at 24°-28°C depending on the development of the individual batch. All of the lots were aged for approximately 20 months in new French oak barrels, during which time fining and stabilization occurred naturally. To best express the terroir of the Aconcagua Valley and the Cabernet Sauvignon grapes of the Don Max vineyards, small amounts of Malbec, Carmenere and Petit Verdot were added to the final blend to maximize complexity and quality.

The Errazuriz Don Maximiano Founders Reserve 2021 is a blend of 63% Cabernet Sauvignon, 22% Malbec, 8% Carmenere and 7% Petit Verdot (previous vintages have included Cabernet Franc). The wine was aged for 22 months in French oak barrels, 70%  of which were new.