It’s not every day that you strike a cheap wine that ticks all the boxes but that’s the case with this bottle from Chile. The label says 3-Tres Medelles, which I assume means 3-3 Medals, which is a bit dumb as it only has three medals on the label, not 33 or 3-3=0. I’d list them for you here but I can’t read Spanish and reckon it’s some marketing wheeze anyway.
I believe it is this wine, probably the 2020 vintage, that was our introduction to carménère. Carménère is a wine much like merlot. So similar, in fact, that the folks in Chile thought that it was merlot when they put the vines in the ground back in the 1800s.
The legend says that this variety, mostly from Bordeaux, got wiped out in France during the phylloxera epidemic of the early 20th century. Luckily it was already in Chile so the variety survives. That may not be the full story but Wikipedia gives a good start: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carm%C3%A9n%C3%A8re
We first tried this with Indian, spicy, food and found it to be an excellent pairing.
At Bt400 from Villa in Bangkok, it’s not a fancy wine. The nose is not great, even after breathing, but it’s a nice dark red, typical of South American wines. My friend Peter says that he can always spot the South American reds from their earthy flavour — he’s from Australia, so is used to bold, fruity reds — but I don’t detect it in this bottle.
On the tongue it’s a a very simple, one-note flavour without much beginning or end. It’s a classic, cheap, table-wine for easy drinking on a Tuesday. Not as bold, or fresh, as a cheap Australian shiraz or such but extremely tolerable. I would describe the taste as stoic but not at all unpleasant. It is slightly acerbic, which is probably what makes it so good with spicy food.
Pretty much all the carménères you get are going to be from Chile’s central valley and I am sure there are better ones. We have found the results spotty, so far, but we are sticking to the cheap end of the market. I would recommend, without hesitation, that you try out some of this variety. I find them superior to the cheap merlots and they are the best wine we have yet paired with curries and other hot foods.