2018 Casa Real

Nuanced dried herbs with savoury blueberry and grilled butterscotch on the opening beats. Really an enjoya- ble wine, juicy, muscular and broad shouldered but with balance. As it unrolls through the mid palate you are gripped by strong coffee grounds and cocoa bean notes, and the whole thing is a gourmet slice of pleasure. Andre Lavados director. First year on the Place de Bordeaux for this exceptional Chilean Cabernet Sauvignon, now 30 years in existence, with vineyards at the foot of the Andes.

The 2018 Cabernet Sauvignon Casa Real is made with grapes from vines planted in Jahuel, Maipo, in the 1950s, and it spent 18 months in 83% new French barrels. Classical in every way, the complex, detailed aromatic profile improves with each layer and includes black currant, herb, graphite, roasted pepper, rose petal and spice notes over a bed of cedar. In the mouth it is full, juicy and extractive – up to 15% is pressed juice – with elegant, fine-grained tannins. Expressive with a lingering aftertaste, this is the very definition of a Cabernet from Maipo.