Chile’s Old Vine Carignan is coming! These are bush-trained, dry-farmed vines in a nation of lush vineyards. They are threads of legacy that tie the current wine industry to its roots. These vines are the same vines that subsistence farmers used for decades to make wine for local consumption, though today things have changed. In particular, Chile has a successful and popular wine export program, with Bordeaux varieties leading the way. Many of the wines are excellent, but the one thing that most lack is that connection to the past that seems to be all the rage today.
The vines are dry farmed, which is exceedingly rare in Chile yet super popular with a certain clientele. More to the point, the wines have little competition. Cabernet from Chile is easy to compare with Cabernet from wherever, even Carmenere can succumb to these comparisons, but Old Vine Carignan? If you want a wine to set yourself apart from the crowd, it is hard to think of a better alternative!
In a way, these are hipster wines. They will never gain much of a following, but that’s okay since there’s not that much wine to begin with. They are being made in a fairly broad style, from Cabernet wannabes to something indefinable but certainly special, something that is and will be uniquely Chilean. More than that, they will be uniquely not what has made Chilean wine so popular; they will not be safe.
It’s easy to take risks when the stakes are low and in some ways, the stakes here are quite low. But for the small farmers with tiny plots of Carignan, the stakes have never been higher. The fruit from their vines has tripled or quadrupled in price since these vines were targeted by quality minded producers. What used to end up in big batch blends and anonymous jugs now finds its way into some of Chile’s most expensive wines. That is one reason that everyone involved hopes that these wines succeed. The other is to further embellish Chile’s credentials as a wine making country. We all know they can make great wines, but they have yet to find a wine to call their own. It seems a bit odd to me, since I think that if they stop trying to Cabernet their Carmenere they will have a runaway hit on their hands. So be it.
Comments
The most verbose, repetitive review I have ever read (I didn't read it all, I have a life to lead and I haven't the time to cut through the greenery to get to the grapes) and the language, not to mention the grammar, left a lot to be desired. Here was an opportunity to talk about a very unique wine out of Chile, and all we get is verbiage.
Sep 04, 2012 at 9:37 PM
While I agree that the preamble to this report might be described as wordy, overally, i found it to be very informative. And, recalling a Carignan, discussion over on the Forum from a couple weeks ago, timely. (OK, grammar nazis, I know that was not a sentence.) I enjoyed this report, and I will look for Chilean old vine Carignans at the purveyors that I frequent. It is clear that there are wines here that I would enjoy.
Sep 06, 2012 at 7:30 PM
cri cri cri
Sep 06, 2012 at 8:56 PM
This is a warning to complacent and well-educated wine drinkers. Heed the tragic tale of American beer. We ignored craft brewers and made doing business so difficult for them that one by one they fell off until all we had were giant mega-corps producing pale, lifeless lagers. It's only recently, fighting tooth and nail, that beer hand crafted, and with an eye for flavor over raking in money had a resurgence in this country. Now those mega-corps are struggling to keep up with the craft brewers. At least twice a week at work I have people coming in begging for some beer they've heard of, read about, or imbibed while on vacation that they want to buy locally, but we don't carry. I tell them to order from the brewery, call the distributor, get the name out, and maybe we can get it. I don't hear complaints from them, I see a twinkle of fight in their eyes! Wine drinkers should not rest on their laurels lest they find themselves over run by the Arbor Mists of the world. It can happen.
Sep 29, 2012 at 7:46 PM
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