EQUILIBRIO 2011 (Balance 2011)

A wine filled with emotions, difficult for us to part with: it was harvested alongside friends, immediately after selling the family winery and vineyard. 3 days after our return from Boston where our oldest son Santiago, 4 years old at the time, underwent heart surgery, and Felipe, who was 2 years old, undergoing chemotherapy treatment. It is a symbol of perseverance and rebirth from the ashes.
It was an amazing year in Uruguay, among the best along with 2015. When we returned from our trip the grapes were ready: seeds completely mature, cigar toned with a taste of walnut. A juicy and tasty pulp with a perfect balance between sweetness and acidity. The skin was free of pyrazines, colorful when chewed alongside with fine and mature tannins. We got in touch with our friends in order to help us with the harvest. Héctor Stagnari and his wife Virginia lent us crates and a tank without hesitation. On Sunday, March 13th 2011, we expected 20 friends who had confirmed they would help us. We hired a reefer truck to transport the grapes to H. Stagnari's winery.

Over 60 friends showed up, a preschool teacher, childhood neighbours, lifelong friends and people we'd only recently met, relatives of friends, former co-workers, acquaintances from the Ministry of Labour, people that traveled long distances to be there for us.

We harvested 1.4 hectares of high density Tannat and Merlot, they were put into the crates and packed onto the truck. It was almost a party, one of the most fun and enjoyable harvests we can recall. The grapes remained in the truck until the following Tuesday, no grape selection was needed.

It underwent a pre-fermentative maceration for a week. The fermentation swiftly began, with native yeasts. It was kept cool by adding water around the tank, with daily pumping. At the end of the alcoholic fermentation, we kept the moist cap in contact with the wine for an extended period of time, with brief daily pumping. The maceration lasted a total of 48 days.

When Felipe´s chemotherapy treatment finished, towards the end of October 2011, we bottled a few liters as a matter of celebration. It was such an exceptional wine that we decided to bottle it. A friend made his bottling machine available to us in order to use it. Together with him and our karate friends, we packaged Equilibrio 2011 in November. It was tannic wine, practically undrinkable, however we felt it was perfect.

9800 bottles of an aged, modern red wine, are produced without passing through barrels, highlighting the quality of the calcareous clay soil of southern Uruguay. A potent and highly drinkable wine was the result of harmonizing the structure of Tannat and the fleshiness of Merlot. Nowadays, even years later, it maintains an incredible freshness, with so much more yet to give.

It must be served between 16 to 18 ºC, due to its high alcohol content. It must be allowed to breathe for a couple of hours. Crystals were formed in the bottle which you must avoid serving. It's a wine to accompany a meal, not to drink on its own. It pairs perfectly with fruits, raisins, quince jelly, blue, matured and hard cheese, pasta with strong sauces, bluefish and roasted meats. It combines very poorly with chicken or mixed nuts because it exaggerates astringency and dries the mouth.

Presentation: It can be personalized for a gift in leather or wood.