Neo 2021

Neo is a Ribera del Duero red from Bodegas Neo, built on old Tempranillo vines aged between fifty and sixty years across several plots near La Horra, in the heart of the appellation. The high plateau of the Duero sits at altitude, where cold nights and hot days produce a wide diurnal range that ripens the thick-skinned Tempranillo fully while holding the acidity that keeps the wine fresh. The old low-yielding vines concentrate flavour into a small crop. Grapes are picked by hand into sixteen-kilo boxes, then macerated for around twenty days at controlled temperature to draw out colour and tannin from the skins before a long ageing of fifteen months in French oak, with a smaller portion of American, the two woods adding fine spice and a rounder vanilla and coconut note respectively. The wine is clarified and filtered before bottling, with production limited to twenty-two thousand numbered bottles. It pours deep and dark. The nose shows ripe blackberry and plum, vanilla, cocoa and toasted oak. The palate is full and structured, with ripe tannins and a long savoury finish. Serve at 16 to 18 degrees, decanting an hour ahead.