2023 Artadi Vinas Gain

Floral, spicy, dark cherry, and black fruit — juicy and vibrant on the palate, with fine-grained tannins, good acidity, and the kind of elegant ripeness that is the Artadi signature. The 2023 Artadi "Viñas de Gaín" is certified organic Tempranillo blended from around 20 vineyards in the high-altitude villages of Laguardia and Elvillar — the entry point to one of Spain's most principled estates, and a wine with real ambition behind it. In 2015, Juan Carlos López de Lacalle walked away from the Rioja DOCa rather than let a bureaucratic label obscure the identity of individual villages — "Laguardia alone is bigger than Châteauneuf-du-Pape," his son Carlos notes — and since then Viñas de Gaín has been quietly elevated, absorbing old collector-level vineyard plots that used to be sold separately at the winery. The entry point got a lot more interesting. Fermented in stainless steel, aged in a mix of 225, 500, and 600-liter barrels for roughly ten months, then further in tank. Roughly 3,750 cases made.