Aalto 2005
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Spectator
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Robert
Product Details
Your Rating
Somm Note
Winemaker Notes
Average oak ageing of 23 months, 50% new French barrels and 50% one or two years old French and American barrels.
Professional Ratings
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Wine Spectator
The Aalto is dark-hued, firm, rich and layered, with aromas of mocha, plum and cedar. It kept getting better with every sip, ending with a delightful black licorice edge.
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Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
The 2005 Aalto, made from 100% Tinto Fino, is a deep purple color with an enticing nose of wood smoke, bacon, floral notes, spice box, and blackberry. This leads to a powerful, layered, intense wine already beginning to show complex flavors. Structured for 5-7 years of further evolution, this strong effort will be at its best from 2015 to 2030.
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Wine &
In 1999, after 30 years as technical director and world–renown winemaker for Vega Sicilia, Mariano Garcia founded Bodegas Aalto. From the beginning he has been guided by three principals: old-vine or massale selection Tinto Fino, a wide range of terroirs spread over nine villages in the province of Burgos, and his vast experience in viticulture and winemaking. Bodegas Aalto controls and farms 110 hectares of vines. Twenty hectares are a young vines (a massale selection from their best old-vine material) while the remaining 90 hectares are from 40 to 100 years old. The soils where their vineyards are situated vary from stony red clay to free-draining and limestone rich sands. The combination of the two provides both structure and a purity of fruit to the final wines.
Vineyard work at Aalto is entirely manual with the primary goal of maintaining low yields. With many of the vines being old, yields are kept low naturally but Mariano will also green harvest to ensure that the fruit at harvest is concentrated and evenly ripe. Harvesting is manual as well and the grapes are transported to the cellar in small crates where they are sorted, chilled, destemming and sorted again before crushing. Fermentations are conducted, by parcel, in stainless steel, cement or oak vats designed specifically by Mariano. Maceration is gentle with regular pump overs ensuring a good extraction of fruit without harsh or bitter tannins. Once the fermentation is complete the wines are racked, by gravity, into French and American oak barrels located in a cool, subterranean cellar.
Final blends are decided by site rather than barrel. The primary cuvée, simply known as Aalto, sees about 50% new oak with the remainder in second and third fill barrels. In the very best vintages a small selection of the oldest vines fruit from the best sites is bottled separately as Aalto PS (Pagos Selectionados). This wine is aged entirely in new French oak and sees an additional four months of elevage.