Contino Rioja Vina Del Olivo 2021

“Well, well, well. This is one of the best wines of an outstanding vintage, demonstrating that this warm Rioja Alavesa site performs best in cooler vintages. It’s a wine that oozes quality from the first sniff, all blackcurrant leaf, coffee bean and wild herbs, leading into a palate of mocha, plum and blackberry. The palate is refined, polished and beautifully freighted, marrying Tempranillo, 15% Graciano and 5% each of Mazuelo and Garnacha to (near) perfection. I can’t recall a better wine from the estate. Bravo!”  99pts, Tim Atkin, February 2024

Contino Viña del Olivo is produced from the best bunches of grapes hand-harvested from our Olivo vineyard (a 700-year-old vineyard, located next door to an ancient olive tree, giving the wine its name). The grapes are carefully harvested in crates and sorted meticulously upon arrival at the winery. Next, the grapes are fermented in 100-hectolitre French oak vats at a temperature of 28-30ºC for ten days, after a further ten days of maceration. The grapes then undergo malolactic fermentation for 15 days in new French oak barrels (85%) and American oak barrels (15%). Finally, the wine is then aged for 16 months before being transferred to wooden vats for three months.