2022 Camarcanda

80% Cabernet Sauvignon, 20% Cabernet Franc. Harvest: first ten days of October. 21 days’ maceration. Aged for 18 months in 225-litre barrique bordelaise, then a further six months in concrete. TA 4.76 g/l, pH 3.9, RS 1 g/l. Transparent crimson. Really interesting nose. Smooth as a baby’s bottom initially (appropriately enough in view of Gaia’s recent delivery of a baby daughter, Lucia Soraya) and then the tannins make their impact felt but this is serious wine with more intention and more of a beginning, middle and end than most of its peers. Unusually long. (JR)

The 2022 Camarcanda is an attractive, open-knit wine from the Gaja family’s Camarcanda estate. Juicy dark cherry, plum, spice, new leather, licorice and incense all meld together in this understated offering. The 2022 is nicely balanced in the smaller-scaled style of the year. It’s a very pleasant wine that doesn’t quite offer the dimension and breadth of the very finest vintages.

A blend of 80% Cabernet Sauvignon and 20% Cabernet Franc, the 2022 Bolgheri Rosso Camarcanda shows a very ripe character with dark fruit and stewed blackberry. This was a hot and dry vintage with above average temperatures well into August. Rains came in mid-August, with showers until mid-September. That velvety softness gives this wine a shorter drinking window compared to more balanced vintages such as 2019 and 2021. This is a 16,500-bottle release.