Finca la Emperatriz Gran Vino 2016 White Wine

Elaboration

Finca La Emperatriz takes its name from Eugenia de Montijo — the Spanish-born Empress of France whose wines from this estate in Baños de Rioja won a medal at the Universal Exhibition in Paris in 1878. The estate has been producing exceptional Rioja ever since, and when the Hernáiz family acquired it in 1996, they brought both modern precision and deep respect for tradition to a property whose history already spoke for itself. The Gran Vino Blanco is the most serious expression of that history in white wine form: 100% Viura, hand-picked from the estate's own vineyards in Rioja Alta, from a 2016 vintage whose slow, perfect weather conditions allowed the grapes to mature with the complexity and depth that great Rioja white demands. Aged without oak — a deliberate statement of confidence in the variety and the vintage — the wine develops its structure, its nuance and its ten-year cellaring potential entirely from within. White fruit, grass, dried herbs and fine toast on the nose. Full-bodied, juicy and lively on the palate. An Empress's wine, still.