MIguel Merino Miguel Merino La Quinta Cruz Rioja 2022 750ml

Immediately inviting, this Mazuelo offers intense varietal characteristics with wild strawberries and mint aromas that opens to a silky, velvety palate with just the right amount of tannic lift. The texture is wonderfully appealing, with a touch of stony grip. Poised and refined, it is a unique take on a cooler zone of Rioja with this different variety. Grown on a steep, southeast-facing slope in Briones, Rioja Alta: a 1.2ha vineyard planted in 1986 on thin sandy-gravel soils topped by rounded pebbles. Fermented in a small stainless-steel tank, with malolactic fermentation in two 500L French oak barrels and one 1,300L concrete tank, where it remained for 12 months before bottling.

Cariñena/Mazuelo is a Mediterranean grape that likes heat—it needs it! And there was plenty of heat in 2022. The 2022 La Quinta Cruz Mazuelo shows the rustic/elegant character of the grape, combining notions of tree bark with floral aromas, an earthy touch and a medium-bodied palate with fine tannins and great freshness. And the parameters look good: 13.5% alcohol, a pH of 3.4 and 5.3 grams of acidity. It matured for 12 months in used 500-liter barrels and concrete. 3,499 bottles were filled in April 2024.