Wine region
Chile’s Central Valley
Chile’s Central Valley and its coastal valleys: Cabernet from Maipo, Carmenère from Colchagua, cool Sauvignon Blanc from Casablanca, ungrafted vines.
- Vineyard area
- about 125,000 hectares of wine grapes in Chile as a whole, most of them in the Central Valley
- Main grapes
- Cabernet Sauvignon (over a quarter of the area), Sauvignon Blanc, Merlot, Carmenère, Chardonnay
- Climate
- Mediterranean with dry summers; Andes to the east, Coastal Range and cold Humboldt current to the west
- Signature wines
- Cabernet Sauvignon from Maipo, Carmenère from Colchagua, Sauvignon Blanc from Casablanca
- Carmenère
- identified in 1994 in Maipo, until then taken for Merlot; officially recognised in 1998
- Distinctive feature
- many vines ungrafted on their own roots, because phylloxera has so far spared the country
Chilean wine growing is concentrated in a narrow strip in the centre of the country, around the capital, Santiago. Between the Andes to the east and the Coastal Range to the west lies the Central Valley, the Valle Central, with the sub-regions Maipo, Rapel (with Cachapoal and Colchagua), Curicó and Maule; this is where most of the roughly 125,000 hectares that Chile devotes to wine grapes are found. The climate is Mediterranean, with mild, damp winters and long, dry, sunny summers, and the vines are irrigated with meltwater from the Andes.
Vines have been here since the 16th century, when Spanish conquistadors and missionaries brought the first plants. In the 1850s vines from Bordeaux arrived: Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot and Carmenère. Phylloxera, which destroyed Europe’s vineyards in the 19th century, has so far spared Chile; the Andes, the Pacific and the Atacama Desert act as a natural wall. As a result many vines stand ungrafted on their own roots, a rare thing in the wine world.
The variety that makes Chile unmistakable is Carmenère. It comes from Bordeaux, where it almost vanished after the phylloxera crisis and was long thought extinct. In Chile it grew for decades unrecognised among Merlot vines. In 1994 the French ampelographer Jean-Michel Boursiquot identified it in a vineyard in the Maipo valley; in 1998 the variety was officially recognised. With nearly 10,000 hectares Chile now has the largest area of Carmenère in the world. The wine is dark and spicy, with red and black fruit and, when the grapes are not quite ripe, a note of green pepper; because the variety ripens late, it needs long, warm autumns.
Three names are worth knowing. The Maipo valley around Santiago is the classic home of Cabernet Sauvignon, Chile’s leading grape with over a quarter of the vineyard area; the Alto Maipo at the foot of the Andes gives powerful but fresh wines. Colchagua, in the Rapel zone, is known for Carmenère, Syrah and full-bodied Cabernet blends. Casablanca lies further west towards the Pacific and formally belongs to the Aconcagua region: the cold Humboldt current, an ocean current that runs along the coast from the south, brings morning fog and coolness. Thanks to this cooling, Sauvignon Blanc, Chardonnay and Pinot Noir thrive here, at about 33 degrees south.
At the table, Cabernet and Carmenère go with grilled meat, beef fillet, lamb and spiced dishes, a Casablanca Sauvignon Blanc with fish, seafood and goat’s cheese. The best reds from Maipo and Colchagua gain from a few years in the bottle.