Viña Maquis, 2016 Maquis Franco, Palmilla, Colchagua, Chile
Based in the region of Palmilla in the heart of Chile's Colchagua Valley, the viticultural history of the Maquis estate can be traced back over 300 years when the land was first planted to vine by Jesuit missionaries. The modern story of the estate begins in 1916, when the property was purchased by José María Hurtado Larraín, who built a cellar and began to make wines with his son, Ignacio. The winery today is still in the hands of the Hurtado family, and is lead by 4th generation Ricardo Rivadeneira Hurtado. Viña Maquis is unique, not only in Colchagua but in Chile as a whole, as the winery's history and ethos is deeply connected to Cabernet Franc. Among the first wines made at the estate by José and Ignacio where based with Cabernet Franc from vines planted on the property in the late 1800s, and some of these heritage vines remain planted today.
This commitment to Cabernet Franc was further solidified with the creation of Maquis Franco in 2008, the estate's flagship wine and Chile's first icon wine made from 100% Cabernet Franc - a wine that consistently ranks as Chile's best Cabernet Franc. And this passion for Cabernet Franc has continued at the Hurtado family's sister estate Viña Calcu in the Colchagua Costa region of Marchigüe, where they also grow Cabernet Franc for a single varietal wine. All told, the family is working with about 39 hectares of Cabernet Franc vines across their estates and making three single varietal Cabernet Francs, two at Maquis - their Maquis Revela Cabernet Franc and the Maquis Franco, and Cabernet Franc play an important role in their other top red Lien - and Viña Calcu at have their Tiny Blocks Cabernet Franc Gran Reserva. Their vineyards are farmed certified sustainable, and they one of the first wineries in Chile to receive sustainability certification, Ricardo is supported by head winemaker Rodrigo Romero, and in the vineyard and cellar they are working with renowned viticulturalist Xavier Choné and consultant Eric Boissenot, son of legendary Bordeaux consultant Jacques Boissenot.
While I did a video featuring a Chilean Cabernet Franc a few months back, I didn't take a moment to provide an overview of the current Cabernet Franc picture in Chile. As of 2022, there was 1702 hectares of Cabernet Franc planted in the country, representing a mere 1.3% of the area under vine. Perhaps unsurprisingly the majority, a whopping 95% is planted in the Central Valley, with the region of Colchagua being the most planted with the variety, with about 647 hectares, followed by Maule and then Maipo with 463 and 300 hectares respectively. And while 1702 hectares doesn't seem like a lot, in 1997 there were only 64 hectares planted, so that is an impressive increase in planting in the last 30 years.
Viña Maquis and the Maquis Franco takes us to the region of Colchagua, and more specifically the sub-region of Palmilla in the Entre Cordilleras zone. Colchagua is the powerhouse region in Chile's Central Valley that was a the centre of the country's wine boom of the 1990s, there is currently over 32,000 hectares of vines planted across this rather compact region that stretches less than 90km from the Andes in the east to the Cordilleras Costa in the west. This region is also emblematic of diversity of Chile's wine industry as whole. Diversity of wine estates, from small polyculture farms to state-of-the-art, billionaire-owned icon properties; diversity of grape varieties, about 45 in total, producing a myriad of wine styles; and diversity of microclimates across the Colchagua Costa, Colchagua Entre Cordilleras and Colchagua Andes zones. In general, the climate would be characterized as Mediterranean, with warm to hot, long summers, with relatively low rainfall, with the Costa and Andes zones generally being cooler than the Entre Cordilleras.
The sub-region of Palmilla is the second largest in Colchagua and is located in the western part of the Entre Cordilleras, and by all accounts this is Cabernet Sauvignon and Carmenère country, and I would argue that most of the region is too warm for Cabernet Franc. But Maquis and their vineyard are located is in truly a unique part of Palmilla, which is part of the reason why Cabernet Franc has been the cornerstone of this estate for over a century. They are situated in the southern part of Palmilla, right at the confluence of two major rivers, the Tinguiririca and Chimbarongo Rivers, in fact these rivers come together right at the northern most part of the Maquis Vineyard. These rivers provide important cooling influences by moderating the summer temperatures and also bringing with them cooling breezes during the summer to moderate conditions, dropping the temperatures of this area 2 to 3C during the summer months. The second part that is unique here at Maquis is the soils, which are clays of alluvial origin, 2m of clay with a subsoil of gravels and river stones. If you've been following me for some time now you will know that Cabernet Franc really loves clay, particularly in warmer climates, because clay is a cooler soil because of its ability to retain moisture, so it creates a cooler and more moist environment, so that Cabernet Franc ripens slowly and the little possibility of drought stress, but also Cabernet Franc doesn't like to have wet feet, so that's where the gravels in the subsoil come in to provide balancing drainage.
So, today's wine is coming from about 2 hectares of vines planted on their own roots, that is ungrafted, in 1999 by massale selection using heritage vine materials brought over from Bordeaux at the end of the 19th century planted next to the Tinguiririca River. The Cabernet Franc blocks are at an elevation of around 160m above sea level and have a very gentle west-facing exposure, and we in the southeast corner of the vineyard, very close to the Tinguiririca River, and family planted the Cabernet Franc in the coolest parts of the vineyard, while Carmenère and other varieties are planted in the hottest blocks. Now, in terms of soil, we are on that deep, heavy clay, and I understand from winemaker Rodrigo Romero, that the clay is not only provides a cool, moist environment for Cabernet Franc, but is also critical in managing its pyrzaines, by giving the vines the optimal vine balance, so no shoot thinning or green harvesting is necessary, and yields are balanced by slightly more generous canopy to aid photosynthesis and burning off the pyrazines, while also being a cooler environment to slow down ripening and achieve greater phenolic development, retaining higher acidities, and lower alcohols.
In terms of the winemaking for this wine, the fruit is hand-harvested and hand-sorting is done of the bunches and berries. The fruit is 100% destemmed, with about 30% of the berries being crushed, the remainder left whole so more gentle tannins are extracted. The fermentation is in stainless steel with selected yeast at a fermentation temperature of around 22 to 24C, so a cooler fermentation temperature for reds, and the total time on skins of about 21 days with gentle pumping over during the fermentation only. The wine is predominantly free run wine with about 5% press wine added, and the final assemblage of the wine is done by Eric Boissenot before the élevage in barrel, and the aging is over 24 months in 225L French oak barrels, about 1/3 new.
Key wine wine facts below:
Producer: Viña Maquis
Region: Central Valley
Region: Colchagua (Entre Cordilleras)
Sub-region: Palmilla
Soils: 2m of clay over a subsoil of gravels and river stones
Assemblage: 94% Cabernet Franc, 6% Cabernet Sauvignon
Alcohol: 14.0%
