Attollo The Juias Reserve Touriga Nacional 2011

Attollo The Juias Reserve Touriga Nacional is made from a 40 year old vines on the Dunsborough Ridge, Margaret River.  These gnarled old vines produces a Touriga with amazing savouriness and restrained fruit power.  In very special years, a batch is good enough to be the Jewell of the vintage – and hence the name of this wine The Joia [translates as Jewell in Portuguese].

2011 was again a warm to hot year in Margaret River, which was becoming the norm here in Margaret River.  It had a warm start and consistent warm conditions throughout the growing season with limited rain events until the last week of April.  It was a text book year with a perfect ripening period producing wines with lovely generosity and a reactivity [stickiness] to the tannins that will afford good medium to long-term cellaring.  Evening ripening afforded wines with luscious ripe fruit flavours and fine velvety tannins.  This Touriga is unirrigated and shows beautiful balance, grown using a VSP trellis and cane pruning.  The Touriga was hand picked on 30th March 2011.

0.4tt of Dunsborough Ridge Touriga Nacional was chilled for 48 hrs before being gently destemmed to an open fermenter for a week long cold soak.  The wine was then inoculated with a Portuguese yeast stain and the ferment was plunged twice daily for the duration of ferment and pressed after a 10 day ferment at close to dryness when extraction was deemed sufficient.  The wine then underwent malolactic fermentation in barrels and was matured for 4 months before being transferred with lees to stainless steel for maturation for 2 years on lees.  After this period, the wine was gravity transferred to bottle without fining or filtration.

pH 3.85

Titrateable Acidity [TA] 5.0g/L

Residual Sugar [RS] 0.1g/L

Volatile Acidity [VA] 0.65g/l

Alcohol 15.8%

Cases Bottled  December 2014

50L

11 6 packs screw cap

Cellaring Best

 Best 2015-22, Maximum 2030

Taste [12/05/18]

The wine has a typical deep pink red centre and a  purple rim--  Touriga usually has a wonderful deep colour.  Vibrant black pastille fruit fills the nose, with a savoury herb element in the background.  The palate is naturally low in acidity, with an amazing fruit power and depth, with lovely savoury chalky tannin to afford a dry finish.  This is a unique expression of touriga from a single vineyard on the Dunsborough Ridge, Margaret River.  Enjoy with strongly flavoured meat dishes or tapas.