It would be very easy to go off on some long-winded rant about the Ribera del Duero in general and Hacienda Monasterio specifically. This area has been producing wines for a couple of millennia and probably became more focused as a region way back in the 12th Century. But the official D.O. of the regions only became official in 1982 which is when we started seeing examples in the U.S.. They clearly didn\u2019t have the marketing savvy of Rioja, nor the identity. But some of the best wines in Spain, indeed the world, come from here. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Vega Sicilia, founded in 1864, is sort of the de facto \u2018flagship\u2019 of the region, but there are a few other superstars that also carry the proverbial torch. Probably the fastest rising one was an estate assembled by Danish winemaker Peter Sisseck, whose top wine Pingus, only created in the mid-90s, is now one of Spain\u2019s most revered and expensive bottlings. Sisseck essentially searched the land for vineyards in his spare time from his \u2018day job\u2019, which was the founding and development of Hacienda Monasterio. We have followed this wine for a long time and it has only continued to get better and better, these days we believe achieving the quality level of a classified Bordeaux, maybe a 2nd or 3rd growth.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Hacienda Monasterio\nhas been on an upward trajectory since the beginning, which is no small fact\nsince it was pretty much one of the stars of the region almost out of the gate.\n The styling is modern, but plenty of care\nis taken to let the true terroir of the Ribera, aromas of chocolate, mineral,\norange peel and tapenade and a core of intense dark red and black fruits on the\npalate, shine through. To quote the importer, \u201cIt is a testament to the terroir\nof Hacienda Monasterio that throughout the evolution towards a more elegant\nstyle of winemaking, it still retains all of its power and intensity, deepened\nand enriched by greater finesse and complexity.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
We wrote an email that was a virtual love letter about the 2015 in February of last year, complete with appropriately enthusiastic scores like a 95 from Jeb Dunnuck and 94 from Wine Advocate, ending with Dunnuck\u2019s words that, \u201cEven at $50, it\u2019s a smoking value!\u201d Our take was, as people who have been following this estate for some time, we were comfortable saying that it may have been the best and most seamless and complete effort of Monsaterio we have ever had as well as one of the best red wine options for this kind of price from anywhere in the world. We sold it for $39.99 and it vaporized…as well it should have.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
We were recently presented with the 2016. Sadly, there wasn\u2019t enough juice for us to consider sending out a full-blown email offer, but that didn\u2019t stop us from buying all they did<\/em> have. Why? Well, once again, it got strong praise. The 94 from Wine Advocate was actually a little higher given that there was a \u2018plus\u2019 attached. Also the words were strong, \u201cThe Crianza is now simply the 2016 Hacienda Monasterio<\/a>, a powerful wine from a large vintage where the vines delivered a good crop of ripe grapes, even when the grapes were harvested early… This is a generous and ripe wine with a juicy texture, ripe flavors and abundant, round tannins. It feels very young and undeveloped, and the wine seems to have the stuffing and balance for a positive development in bottle.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Jeb Dunnuck hasn\u2019t issued a review yet but we would be surprised if it wasn\u2019t the same or higher as the last one. In point of fact, the 2016 is a notch better, with a more complete and seamless texture, great fruit, and plenty of stuffing. It is the best Monasterio we have ever tasted in this series, period, and thanks to a market quirk, we are able to offer it for $5 a bottle less! Enough said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" It would be very easy to go off on some long-winded rant about the Ribera del Duero in general and Hacienda Monasterio specifically. This area has been producing wines for a couple of millennia and probably became more focused as a region way back in the 12th Century. But the official D.O. of the regions … Continue reading “MAS MONASTERIO MAGNIFICO”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[37],"tags":[94,651,652,545,32],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.winex.com\/stockreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3563"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.winex.com\/stockreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.winex.com\/stockreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.winex.com\/stockreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.winex.com\/stockreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3563"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.winex.com\/stockreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3563\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3565,"href":"https:\/\/www.winex.com\/stockreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3563\/revisions\/3565"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.winex.com\/stockreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3563"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.winex.com\/stockreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3563"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.winex.com\/stockreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3563"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}