The UK’s finest range of Chilean wines
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It is great to have won the International Wine Challenge’s Specialist Merchant of the Year for Chile for the fourth time in five years but I won’t be getting complacent.
The first time we won this award, my boss Sebastian Payne said it was for: ‘Just doing your job’.
And what a privileged job it is. Chile continues to excite because it keeps discovering new regions and expanding its list of well-made grape varieties from its myriad terroirs and diverse climates. The remarkable Limarí chardonnays, pinot noirs and syrahs from this cool climate with many vineyards with limestone-based soils has been a very exciting new discovery. We have already moved our Society and Exhibition chardonnays to this region.
The discovery of many 50-year-old, unirrigated carignan bush vines in Maule has resulted in some superb new wines appearing on the market. Grown in a warm region of Chile, carignan is a little fleshier than in France, but still keeps its lovely perfume and thrillingly fresh and fine palate that really is perfectly designed to match a hunk of roasted or grilled protein, especially belly pork or shoulder of lamb. I’ve also been tasting some excellent cinsault and mourvèdre which I hope will soon make it to our List.
The ‘Rhône Ranger’ blends are perhaps the only missing varieties in Chile’s remarkable range and may soon appear.
If you have already tried some of our Chilean range, then thank you for your support. If you are yet to try them, then now is the time. Click here to view the full range, or here to try a special exploration mixed case we have put together to celebrate winning the award.
Toby Morrhall
Society Buyer
We had the great pleasure and privilege to live in Chile for six and a half years between 1967 and 1973. In those days there were only a dozen or so wineries – because in the 1890s the owners ganged up on President Balmaceda and “persuaded” him to introduce a law which prohibited the expansion of wine production. They could supply the internal market easily – so why bother going to more trouble? They were all as rich as Croesus anyway.
Accordingly a good bottle of wine cost about 40/50 pence and really pushing the boat out for a special occasion would cost less than £2. Not today’s quality, but still very good. Just imagine the lost exports for all those years. I remember saying to my colleagues soon after arrival, when the balance of payments was a real problem, that all they had to do was double the price and export the surplus. There would be a revolution they said (but there soon was!).
It was the Pinochet government which finally repealed that law and the rest, as they say, is history. We return to that lovely country as often as we can and it is amazing to see vines from La Serena in the north to Bio Bio in the south. Originally they were all around Santiago. – nothing in Casablanca except a Ford factory and wheat fields.
We managed to tour Rapel Valley and Leyda Valley last time. It is wonderful to see such huge development and that Chile is using its amazing climate and tierra to produce such a fantastic array of varieties. It is also wonderful to witness the close involvement of the Wine Society and the range you have in the list. I do not think that there was a single Chilean wine in the list when I joined the Society in 1973. Thank you, Mr Morrhall, for all you have done to help develop such quality and variety. I do agree with you – it is a wonderful job you have to visit regularly what we have always called God’s own country. The outcome every year must give you great satisfaction – it certainly does to us!
Yours sincerely,
David Gill (54822)