2015 - Marques de Murrieta Gran Reserva, Rioja

A barrel selection of the most age-worthy wines from the vintage, the 2015 Gran Reserva Limited Edition is a blend of 80% Tempranillo, 9% Graciano, 9% Mazuelo and 2% Garnacha from their 300 hectares of vineyards. The grapes were picked between the September 14 and October 16; the destemmed and lightly crushed grapes were fermented by plot and variety in stainless steel, and the varieties aged separately for 27 months in American barrels. Tasted next to the wines from 2018 and onward, this is a more powerful and concentrated wine, also because of the style of the vintage. The concept is to make a wine with more structure, power and aging potential. It's very classical with notes from the aging in American oak clearly recognizable, very spicy and tasty. The wine is medium to full-bodied and powerful but already developed by some time in bottle; it's spicy, tasty, chalky and still young with potential to age. 62,418 bottles produced. It was bottled in May 2018.

First bottle: rather dull fruit on the nose. Furry tannin and oxidative flatness on the palate. Seems to be DOA.  Second bottle has a more attractive liquorice and chocolate aroma on the nose – and much better red fruit too. Even so, this is far from the most expressive Rioja I've tasted, especially at Gran Reserva level. Seems very muted overall. (RH)