Score: 92/100
This Rioja wine by Bodegas Ysios is made from 100% Tempranillo grapes sourced from vineyards that average 35 years. It was aged at 100% in French oak barrels.
Tasting Notes
This Rioja Reserva wine comes is a rather dark red color, with hints of purple hues making it look young and youthful despite its few years of age. Yes, perhaps touches of orange on the rim, but overall lively yet dark red.
The nose is exuberant and very pungent, with powerful red berry liqueur aromas proudly striking your nose as soon as you approach it to the opening of the glass. Raspberry liqueur, some ripe blackcurrant, blackberry. It’s richly and ripely fruity. Not jammy, but smelling like a gorgeous fresh dark berry jam would.
You have to add intense vanilla scents, some sweet spices such as nutmeg and clove, lifted eucalyptus, and minty grass notes to picture the whole aromatic profile.
A captivating, vibrant, very fruity and minty nose that impresses!
The palate is quite full, rounded and soft. Also featuring a zesty acidity. Tannins showcase a good density and are particularly smooth. They’re velvety with a silky edge.
Flavors of dark chocolate and cocoa, torrefaction, and some coffee liqueur, marry the berry jam notes for a burst of joyful warming sensations. It tastes somewhat like a cherry-liqueur-filled dark chocolate would, the sweetness subtracted, if you can mentally picture this.
Intense black and white pepper notes, oaky caramel and toasted hazelnut complete the profile with strength yet a relative elegance. Layered and long finish.
Overall
An excellent, rich and vibrant Rioja wine in rather a modern style, all about the intensity of red berry fruity flavors, but deepened and immensely complexified by herbal notes of peppermint and eucalyptus, and a wealth of powerful yet refined oaky flavors.
Solid density and smoothness are the main featured of the palate, well balanced by a good acidity that keeps the whole tasting experience fresh and lively.
When to Drink?
Like any good Rioja, this wine’s few years of age have only started to smoothen it up and reveal its potential enjoyably. It still has a long way to go, and should develop much further depth and savory complexity over the next 15 years.
Enjoy 🙂
Learn more about the producing winery and all their wines reviewed at Bodegas Campo Yios winery profile:
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