Alchemy’s 100 Year Old Vine Carignan
£16.49
The 2018 is sourced from a very special parcel of over 100-year-old vines in Nezingnan l’Eveque (east of Beziers) this “Old Vines Series” release Carignan is a real treat! Large pudding stones cover the vineyard floor; gently warming the fruit, ensuring full ripeness and flavours. A combination of handpicking, extremely low yields, minimal traditional winemaking techniques and time in a combination of America and French oak produces this wine of fantastic concentration.
Rich dark purple/red, the aromas of ripe summer pudding berry fruits and subtle vanilla intensify on the palate. With smooth velvety tannins on the long complex finish adding to the layers of this exceptional high-quality limited wine.
Rob Chase –
2018 Alchemy’s The Old Vine Carignan, Vin de Pays d’Oc Carignan can be tannic, metallic, hollow and mean when made from over-cropped young vines. The grapes for this dark and sensuous wine, however, come from a block of low-yielding, 100-year old Carignan vines, which spent 5 months in nearly new (‘2nd fill’) American oak barrels, developing nuances of velvety, black herbaceous fruit, with a touch of bitter chocolate and a textured, rich finish.
Colin Hamilton (store manager) –
Dark ruby in colour. Aroma quite forward for a one year old wine: hints of liquorice, blackcurrant, cherry and spice. Vibrant with bags of ripe fruit on the palate; well balanced acidity with a fairly full tannic structure which. Medium to full bodied with oak not obvious at this stage. Enjoyable now with rare beef or pink lamb, but will develop some complexity and become more rounded with age.
Ross Hawley (store manager) –
I have often wondered about the benefits of 100yr old vines and if they aren’t too old to deliver. The Alchemy Carignan definitively answers the question. Here age and experience tames what I have always thought of as a robust and challenging grape variety into something remarkably refined. It is concentrated and sophisticated, instantly brings back memories of the part of southern France I know very well, but in a wine fit for dinner parties. Intense but in no way overpowering.