2023 El Enemigo - Chardonnay Mendoza (750ml)

El Enemigo began with a walk along the Thames in London, where Alejandro Vigil, chief winemaker at Bodega Catena Zapata, and Adrianna Catena, historian and youngest daughter of Nicolás Catena, celebrated the elder Catena's Decanter Man of the Year award and decided to build a project of their own. The name, Spanish for "the enemy," nods to the internal battles each of us fights to surpass ourselves, and the wines are conceived as tributes to the European immigrants who first sought to make wines finer than those of their homelands in Argentina a century ago. Vigil, one of the country's most respected soil scientists and winemakers, handles the technical side, while Catena brings a historian's perspective to a range built around Cabernet Franc, Malbec, and Chardonnay, made at the BESA facility in the Vista Flores district of Tunuyán, Mendoza.

This Chardonnay comes from Gualtallary, in the Uco Valley, from vines over twenty years old planted on calcareous soils at roughly 1,400 meters, where cool Andean nights preserve sharp acidity. The wine ferments with native yeasts and ages around a year in 500-liter French oak barrels, part new, allowing a touch of flor, the same protective yeast layer used in sherry and Jura winemaking, to develop naturally and lend the wine its distinctive savory edge.

The wine shows green apple, chamomile, white peach, and herbs, with a subtle vermouth-like note. The palate is dry, saline, and compact, with hints of aniseed, wild thyme, beeswax, and citrus zest, its restrained richness balanced by bright acidity. It pairs beautifully with creamy cheeses, seafood, or risotto.