Ventisquero, Tara Chardonnay

Pale straw with golden hues. A leaner style, perhaps more challenging, great power and focus here. There’s a lovely, slightly reductive aroma to it, savoury, that is more appealing than the previous vintage. The palate brings apricot, peach, apple, pear fruit, less fruity than savoury with vibrant apple acidity, intense minerality, some saltiness on the finish.

A young, dynamic winery Viña Ventisquero typifies the new wave of modern wines that are appearing through South America. Established at the turn of the millennium, the winery now produces wine from a number of the top regions of Chile and seems to constantly strive for perfection. The wines are made in a minimalistic style that has become fashionable these days, with the emphasis on enhancing the varietal styles of the grapes they are working with. With a large range of varieties and regions at play Ventisquero wines provide plenty to enjoy and continue to develop and evolve as only a young winery on the cutting edge can. Tara is named after the mythical Tara salt flat, guarded like a temple by the imposing 'Monjes de la Pacana' and anointed each day by the desert sky, a place which evokes silence and awe. Tara is born in the world’s driest desert, where just 20mm of rain fall each year, This area is influenced by the nearby Pacific Ocean and every morning the land is blanketed by the coastal fog known as the Camanchaca, which offers a brief respite to the sun-baked landscapes of Northern Chile. With this unique geography and in the absence of coastal mountains, the winds blow directly from the ocean to the vineyard, transforming the otherwise desert climate into a cool Mediterranean climate. A combination of factors which could only give rise to a truly distinctive and extreme wine like Tara.