Bodega Chacra, Pinot Noir “Sin Azufre”
Patagonia, Argentina 2018 (750mL)
Regular price$38.00
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Bodega Chacra, Pinot Noir “Sin Azufre”
Talk about wearing your heart on your sleeve: One look at this label and you’ll see that, more than anything else about this wine, Piero Incisa della Rocchetta of Bodega Chacra wants you to know it was made without using sulfur. That’s not an easy thing to do—or, rather, it’s not easy to make an un-sulfured wine that is this vivid, this varietally true, this physically sound.
The ambition of this wine is to present the most transparent, unadulterated expression of Pinot Noir possible, and it succeeds triumphantly on that front. Despite being a scion of an iconic Italian wine family, Piero found his wine inspiration much further afield, way down near the southern tip of Argentina along Patagonia’s Río Negro. He wasn’t the first person to think of this place as a Pinot paradise—three of the estate’s 24 hectares were first planted in 1932, another seven in 1955—but since founding Chacra in 2004, his wines have put this out-of-the-way appellation on everyone’s radar—including the critics, who lavished major praise on today’s ’18. This is a true wine of the moment, and still a well-priced one given its notoriety. If you’re a devoted Pinot-phile, this fine and floral 2018 must be on your shopping list!
Today’s 2018 is 100% Pinot Noir from the “Cincuenta y Cinco” vineyard, so named for the year of its planting (1955). Hand-harvested grapes are fermented spontaneously in 223-liter barrels, then aged 11 months in a mix of concrete tanks and used French oak barriques. No sulfur (or anything else!) is added at any point in the process, resulting in a Pinot Noir of exceptional freshness and tension. In the glass, it’s a bright ruby with hints of magenta and pink, with perfumed aromas of woodland berries, black cherry, violets, crushed stone, and black tea. It is medium-bodied, juicy and exuberant, with soft tannins but a pleasing, mouth-watering tanginess to the finish. It’s reminiscent not only of red Burgundy but of the better, naturally made Pinot Noirs coming out of Alsace these days—finesse and freshness are the keywords, so don’t over-power it with the food pairing. I’d go with salmon or maybe a classic coq au vin, with a second bottle of this fast-disappearing wine at the ready. Organic, biodynamic, natural…this checks all the boxes and gets it right! Cheers!
The ambition of this wine is to present the most transparent, unadulterated expression of Pinot Noir possible, and it succeeds triumphantly on that front. Despite being a scion of an iconic Italian wine family, Piero found his wine inspiration much further afield, way down near the southern tip of Argentina along Patagonia’s Río Negro. He wasn’t the first person to think of this place as a Pinot paradise—three of the estate’s 24 hectares were first planted in 1932, another seven in 1955—but since founding Chacra in 2004, his wines have put this out-of-the-way appellation on everyone’s radar—including the critics, who lavished major praise on today’s ’18. This is a true wine of the moment, and still a well-priced one given its notoriety. If you’re a devoted Pinot-phile, this fine and floral 2018 must be on your shopping list!
In Patagonia, the term chacra is used to describe a special piece of land, which, in the Río Negro region, was historically more likely to be used for apple and pear cultivation. Formed by meltwater from the Andes to the west, the Río Negro itself runs east to the Atlantic, with most viticulture centered around the town of Nequen, in the upper, or alto, part of the valley (Piero Incisa’s cousin, Noemi Marone Cinzano, runs the acclaimed Bodega Noemia nearby). The climate conditions are desert-like and the soils are mostly sandy/silty loams, which at first blush might not seem like ideal Pinot Noir terroir—Piero Incisa describes it as “surprisingly perfect,” citing the cooling (and drying) influence of strong winds from the Andes, along with the acid-preserving effects of dramatic (often 40-degree) diurnal temperature swings. In addition to instituting a rigorous organic and biodynamic farming regimen at Chacra, his estate vineyards are composed almost entirely of Pinot Noir (there is a little Chardonnay now). This laser focus on the variety, as many around him continue to produce Argentina’s signature red, Malbec, has earned Piero Incisa a reputation as a “maverick,” but single-mindedness apparently runs in the family: His grandfather is the late Mario Incisa della Rocchetta, whose iconic Tuscan red, “Sassicaia,” was an immensely successful bet on Cabernet Sauvignon in Italy.
Sourced primarily from the heirloom vines that made Chacra such an appealing prospect to begin with, the Pinot Noir lineup here is all about finesse, nerve, and high-toned aromatics—with “Sin Azufre” being the most direct, most “primary” wine of the lot. Whereas many un-sulfured reds pick up unpleasant bacterial aromas and flavors, this one is alive with pure fruit flavors and floral aromas, as if you bit into a cluster of ripe grapes pulled from a harvest basket. You’ll notice some trace C02 lending the wine a slight ‘prickle’ when it is first opened—a little extra C02 picks up the anti-oxidation slack in place of the sulfur, and it dissipates after about 30 minutes in a decanter.
