Wine Advisor
La Rioja Alta, Vina Ardanza Reserva 2020
View analysis
Description
Tasting notes
Reviewed by: Luis Gutiérrez
The subtle, balsamic, structured and elegant 2020 Viña Ardanza Reserva is a blend of Tempranillo from Rioja Alta and around 20% Garnacha from Rioja Baja. It fermented destemmed in stainless steel and aged in American oak barrels, 20% of them new, for a period of 36 months in the case of the Tempranillo and 30 months for the Garnacha, then the two wines are blended before bottling. It's a textbook example of the label, with the perfume and elegance of the Garnacha and the clout from Tempranillo. It has clean aromas and is still quite fresh, only starting its tertiary phase. It comes in at 14.5% alcohol and keeps a pH of 3.57 and 5.7 grams of acidity. It's balanced, seamless and well-built, and its tannins are mostly resolved. It should live long in bottle. 500,000 bottles produced. It was bottled in November 2024.
About the Producer
La Rioja Alta S.A. is located in the Rioja wine region of Spain. Rioja is the earliest and largest high-quality wine producing area in Spain. It has the reputation of "Spain Bordeaux" and has many Spanish boutique wineries. This winery is one of the best representatives. The winery is now part of Grupo La Rioja Alta S.A. With the popularity of European wines and American wines, various wine exhibitions and wine critic competitions have become popular internationally, and Oak River Winery has also participated and achieved quite good results. In 1893, the winery won the gold medal at the Chicago Columbus Wine Show; in 1895, the winery won the silver medal at the Bordeaux World Wine Show; in 1910 and 1911, it won the Buenos Aires and Toulouse Wine Show Awards. But after winning a gold medal at the Latin American Wine Show in 1930, the winery announced that it would no longer participate in any wine shows or wine critic competitions, because they no longer needed to make wine for any awards, they needed to make real wine. Although it did not win international awards, its good reputation continued to spread. In the following 10 years, the winery has become famous and quickly became the top wine in Rioja, Spain. One of the Spanish wine brands.
