Luis Cañas Crianza 2019

Luis Cañas Crianza Red Wine is not the typical standard wine in the catalogue of the established Rioja wineries. Luis Cañas goes in another direction. This family makes the same efforts producing the wine as the ones constructing the very top of the pyramid. It is one of the scarce Rioja wineries with a great selection of enviable quality wines characterized by little difference between the extremes in its catalogue.

The red wine proceeds from approximately 30-year old vineyards of clayey and clayey-calcareous lands which spread over the typical Rioja Alavesa terraces, those characterised as being not very fertile with little productivity of 4500kg of clusters per hectare. Those are vineyards situated at 400-700 metres of altitude, located in Villabuena, Samaniego, Leza, Navaridas and Baños de Ebro.

It is made with the grapes of 95% Tempranillo, which gives the best identity of this variety in these chalky landscapes. 5% of the grape Graciano is added, which gives the wine certain herbal taste and balsamic notes. Once situated in the winery and having passed the best cluster selection, the grapes have their stems removed and the grapes are squeezed later to be placed in the steel tanks to make the alcoholic fermentation with a gentle 20-day incubation, which helps to obtain a better extraction of colour with limited tannins in order to be served in its younger stage. After the fermentation, the wine passes into the barrels made of 60% French and 40% American wood with an average age of 3 years where it performs malolactic fermentation during a minimum period of 12 months followed by other 12 months in the bottle.

Cherry red colour. Balsamic notes and memories of fine woods can be smelt. The taste in the mouth is soft, fluid and with volume, where the notes of red fruit (raspberry, cherry, etc.) appear. It has a nice taste ending where the balsamic memories reappear. It is ideal to combine with sausages, red meats, poultry, fatty fish, small game hunting, half-cure cheeses, spicy dishes and hot stews like legumes.