Clos Apalta - Apalta 2020

Clos Apalta, one of the oldest vineyards of Cabernet Sauvignon and Carmenère in Chile.

The 2020 vintage

"The Chilean 2020 vintage is undoubtedly one that will be remembered. We faced both an extremely early and hot season made especially challenging by the ongoing drought and outbreak of the Coronavirus pandemic.

Harvest dates were brought forward by 10 days. This was a blessing, as we managed to bring in the vast majority of the grapes by late March when curfew and quarantine restrictions arrived. When all the odds were playing against us, the Clos Apalta terroir did not fail us. The quality of the 2020 Clos Apalta wines is simply outstanding. It is characterized by a lively acidity and lush tannins all the while showcasing bright fruit and a concentrated style. The earlier harvest also allowed us to maintain freshness and minerality leading to extraordinary ageing potential.

We are also proud to introduce the 2020 vintage in our new Clos Apalta bottle. By embossing the Clos Apalta letters on the lower section of the bottle, we reaffirm our identity and spread our roots even deeper into the Clos Apalta terroir, highlighting its uniqueness. This innovation falls into place with our sustainable values, enhancing the circularity of glass packaging, reducing the bottle weight by more than 10% and decarbonizing our activities by sourcing the bottles locally."

Tasting notes

Jeb DUNNUCK

byJeb Dunnuckthe5/20/2024

The flagship 2020 Clos Apalta is based on 64% Carmenere, 19% Cabernet Sauvignon, 15% Merlot, and 2% Petit Verdot and it was aged for 27 months in 85% new barrels. It takes the second wine and turns the dial up, offering a dense purple hue as well as gorgeous aromatics of red and black plums, smoked tobacco, fresh flowers, and spicy oak. Medium to full-bodied on the palate, it has beautiful depth and concentration, yet it stays light on its feet, has a beautiful sense of freshness, and ultra-fine, polished tannins. It's a stunningly good bottle of wine that offers pleasure today yet will benefit from 3-4 years of bottle age, and I would be shocked if it wasn't still drinking fabulously well at age 20.

Decanter.com

byGeorgina Hindlethe9/4/2023

A great effort in the hot and dry 2020, COVID-19 vintage with the earliest harvest ever. The grand vin shows power, richness and tons of fruit but retains a sense of charisma and direction that is so compelling. Bright, forward, sleek and silky, tannins enrobe the palate creating a cushion for the ripe blackcurrants and blueberries, bright acidity and underlying spice to meld together. A large percentage of Carmenere at 64% gives the fragrance and backbone while 19% Cabernet Sauvignon adds texture and depth, 13% Merlot bringing freshness and acidity and 2% Petit Verdot adding spice, colour and richness. Only just beginning to really express itself with liquorice, eucalyptus, figs, plums and a salty-wet stone minerality that comes in on the finish. Despite the intensity, this is layered and well sculpted with tons of pleasure to be had with a few more years ageing. Ageing 27 months in 225L French oak barrels, 85% new, 15% two years old. 3.7pH. Winemaker and viticulturist Andrea Leon kept more leaf coverage, a thicker and higher trellis and natural cover crops during the vintage to moderate the high temperatures. Bottles for this, and the second wine, are now made in Chile as of this vintage and have reduced in weight by 10% in a bid to increase sustainability. Clos Apalta now also featuring its name embossed in the glass at the bottom of the bottle.

Jane Anson, Inside Bordeaux

byJane Ansonthe9/1/2023

Enticing layers of tobacco, cocoa bean, redcurrant, blackberry and pomegranate. There are good acidities also to support the spicy core of toasted oak, cloves, liqourice, cigar box, Provence herbs, and soft, supple tannins. Small berries in this hot vintage (around two weeks ahead of average throughout the growing season) mean clear concentration and a lot of body, and the bell pepper and eucalyptus notes of this Carmanère-dominant wine are extremely welcome. Harvest finished on March 6, the earliest on record. Ageing in a mix of new and second-use barrels, with a long light toasting (this ageing changed as of the 2017 vintage, bringing down levels of new oak to 85%), 3.71ph, unfiltered and unfined. There has been a change to the bottles also, lowering their weight and ensuring they are produced in Chile itself. 96 points

Wine Advocate

byLuis Gutierrezthe8/31/2023

The grand vin 2020 Clos Apalta was produced with a blend of 64% Carmenere, 19% Cabernet Sauvignon, 15% Merlot and 2% Petit Verdot from a ripe and warm year. It's ripe, concentrated, dense and powerful, reflecting the house style and the conditions of the year, with more influence from the élevage than in the second wine, Le Petit Clos. It fermented with indigenous yeasts for five to six weeks, with manual punch-down of the cap in 7,500-liter French oak vats, followed by malolactic in new French oak barrels. The élevage was 27 months in 85% new barrels and 15% second use barrels. It has a creamy, smoky and spicy personality, with notes of sweet spices, such as cinnamon and vanilla and ripe blackberries, and it is quite forward, ripe and showy, with generous oak and 15% alcohol. It's lush with abundant, fine-grained tannins and a persistent finish. Give it a little more time in bottle, and enjoy with powerful food. 116,700 bottles produced. It was bottled in August 2022.

The Drink Business

byColin Haythe8/30/2023

Gosh, this is lovely. There are plenty of very floral wines amongst this September’s releases on la place, but this is perhaps the most intensely floral aromatically of them all. Lily and iris, violet and a touch of rosemary and lavender, saffron and pollen grains too, beeswax, and copious black berry and stone fruit. There’s a little wood smoke too and a touch of Szechuan pepper. On the palate this is lithe and limpid, energetic and dynamic and rather more saline in its minerality than one expects from the nose, with plenty of salty liquorice. The tannins are of gossamer, though they build in the mouth, slowly shaping and sculpting the highly contoured, richly-detailed mid-palate. This is really excellent.

Vinous

byJoaquin Hidalgothe3/1/2023

The 2020 Blend Clos Apalta is 64% Carménère, 19% Cabernet Sauvignon, 15% Merlot, and 2% Petit Verdot from Apalta, Colchagua. It was aged for 27 months in 85% new barrels. Rich purple in hue. The clearly defined, ripe, complex nose has a leafy character underlined by fruit such as prune and blueberry jam along with hints of pepper, tobacco and rosemary, all packaged in a cedar cigar box. Creamy and broad in the mouth with good volume. The firm flow is channeled by appreciable structure in which polished tannins set the tone for an expansive, indulgent profile. A genuine Michel Rolland interpretation of a year with a rapid ripening season.

Jamessuckling.com

byJames Sucklingthe2/10/2023

A really refined, expressive and layered Clos Apalta with fine olives, incense, cigar box, cocoa powder, Spanish chocolate, pencil shavings, graphite and fine spices. Juicy, bright and full-bodied palate with a fine saline, savory twist. Very long and juicy. 64% carmenere, 19% cabernet sauvignon, 15% merlot and 2% petit verdot. Real finesse from 2020. Drink from 2024.

Information:	Details:
Couleur	Rouge
Cépages	Carmenère 64 % Cabernet Sauvignon 19 % Merlot 15 % Petit Verdot 2 %
Appellation	Apalta
Millesime	2020
Contenance	Magnum (1,5 l)

Information:

Details:

Couleur

Rouge

Cépages

Carmenère 64 %
Cabernet Sauvignon 19 %
Merlot 15 %
Petit Verdot 2 %

Appellation

Apalta

Millesime

2020

Contenance

Magnum (1,5 l)

Un repas	Autour du repas
Un cadeau	Faire une découverte !

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Clos Apalta - Apalta 2020

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