Case configuration: (6 x 750mL)

Winery: Âmevive

Appellation: Los Olivos District AVA, Santa Ynez Valley, Santa Barbara County, Central Coast, California

Philosophy/Practices: Biodynamic and regenerative organic practices

Grape Variety: Graciano and tempranillo, co-fermented.

ABV: 11.8%

A version of Tempranillo you’ve never tried before. Bright, yet moutfilling, and exceptionally balanced. Barely ripe dark berry tart with a nice little grippy finish!

Some notes from Alice: “Cariño is a coferment of the Pesquera Tempranillo and Graciano from the late 90’s plantings at Ibarra-Young. The Pesquera Tempranillo at Ibarra-Young is an own-rooted suitcase clone originating from Bodega Pesquera in Pesquera del Duero, Spain. The Tempranillo grows beautifully at Ibarra Young. In Los Olivos District AVA, Tempranillo grows easily, is very drought resistant, and always wins the beauty contest. These vines clearly want to be here! Cariño translates to ‘darling’ in Spanish, a symbol of how the two varieties complement each other in bottle.  

Tempranillo is always the first to ripen at Ibarra-Young. We harvested a few tons of this Pesquera clone to kick off our 2022 vintage. And we definitely drank Champagne! At the winery we processed the Tempranillo using about 40% whole cluster. 7 days after the Tempranillo harvest, I picked a few rows of Graciano to destem on top of the Tempranillo ferment. Graciano adds the acid backbone to Cariño, something that Tempranillo doesn’t typically have on its own. After pressing the ferment in the basket press after about 20 days, Cariño aged in neutral French oak barrels until a month before bottling. The barrels were racked up to tank and the wine was bottled unfined and unfiltered in June of 2023.

Label Art: The mushrooms on the front label were painted by my lovely mother, Eileen Anderson. Fungal activity is a good sign of healthy soil in the vineyard. We are seeing more and more mushrooms growing on our vineyard floor as the years go on. Mushrooms are the fruiting body of underground fungal hyphae. Hyphae help break down nutrients into organic matter and help improve plant’s access to water. Fungus is absolutely essential to soil health for our plants. The psychedelic compost microbes on the back are painted by me! Their rainbow color palette isn’t exactly the way you see these organisms under the microscope, but it was way more fun to paint in rainbow. :) Protozoa, bacteria, fungal hyphae, organic matter, and (beneficial) nematodes are all really good signs of a productive and beneficial compost. All of these organisms (+OM) are found in our barrel compost and our windrow compost, both of which are used in our compost tea to spray our vineyard.”

Only 72 cases of this wine were produced; allocations in Ontario are first-come, first-served. For purchasing on license or to pre-reserve an allocation of the next vintage, please give us a shout at hello@theroadwineimports.ca!