Clos de los Siete – A Good Start

What is an entry-level wine?

An entry-level wine is positioned just above the minimum threshold of acceptable quality. It’s designed to offer a refined experience while remaining accessible. The challenge lies in the fact that the minimum threshold can vary greatly depending on the context. In Italy, the production cost of a bottle, including the cork and capsule, can range from €0.70 to €5.70. This variability depends on materials, purchase volumes, and transportation distances, all of which contribute significantly to the final cost.

For Italian wines sold in Italy, to ensure an adequate margin for the producer and avoid flooding the market with low-quality wines, an entry-level wine shouldn’t cost less than €7. Above €15, it already enters a higher category. Naturally, for imported wines, transportation costs, taxes, and tariffs play a significant role, making similar wines from other countries generally more expensive.

Why do wineries produce entry-level wines?

Wineries choose to produce entry-level wines for various strategic and commercial reasons:

1. Market Accessibility
   Offering wines at lower prices helps attract a wider audience, including those on a budget or new to wine.
2. Customer Loyalty
   These wines serve as a calling card. If customers enjoy them, they’re more likely to explore higher-tier labels, acting as a hook.
3. Sales Volume
   Sold in large quantities, entry-level wines play a crucial role in a winery’s financial stability. They provide a steady base, balancing potential drops in sales of more expensive labels, which, having a smaller audience and stricter quality criteria, are more sensitive to economic downturns and bad vintages.
4. Managing Surplus Production
   Entry-level wines allow wineries to use grapes that don’t meet premium wine standards. This avoids waste and ensures the entire production is utilized.

Difference Between Quality Wine and Refined Wine

Wine is like a landscape observed and admired. A poor-quality wine is like viewing that landscape at night: visibility is limited, and it even strains the eyes. A quality wine is like seeing it during the day but with a light haze. Some details are visible, and we might enjoy what we see, but the outlines remain blurred, mixed in an indistinct gray.

A refined wine, on the other hand, is like a clear, bright day. The landscape is revealed in its entirety, with sharp, clear profiles that showcase not only what lies before us but also what extends far into the horizon.

Refined wine has precision and richness: everything is in its place, and every detail stands out clearly. Quality wine, while attractive, leaves some aspects less defined, slightly blurred. And that’s fine—it’s not always necessary to bear the responsibility of having a great wine in the glass.

For this reason, during major events like VieVinum, after an entire day of tastings, it’s often the simplicity of a straightforward, unpretentious quality wine that’s most enjoyable.

This type of wine also serves as a way to “dip a toe in,” to test out a wine, a producer, or a region without immediately investing in an expensive bottle. It’s a first step, much like watching a trailer on Netflix before deciding if the film is worth watching.

Clos de los Siete – Best South American Entry-Level Red Wine

Over time, I’ve purchased several South American entry-level wines, mainly because South America is a region I’m not very familiar with but wanted to explore. Of all the options, Clos de los Siete stands out as the best value for money. It’s perfect for those who want to start discovering this part of the world and its great reds.

Clos de los Siete is a project by French winemaker Michel Rolland, who, during his travels in Argentina with Jean-Michel Arcaute, discovered a property at the foothills of the Andes, about 1,100 meters above sea level, in the heart of the renowned Uco Valley. The estate spans 850 hectares of vineyards with soils rich in pebbles, clay, and sand, irrigated by glacial meltwater.

The project centers around four Bordeaux winemaking families who built four wineries: Monteviejo, Cuvelier Los Andes, Bodega Diamandes, and Bodega Rolland. Each produces its own range of wines, but part of the production goes into a blend: Clos de los Siete.

The name “Clos de los Siete” represents the idea of a single, united vineyard (clos in French). The wine is the result of:

• Generous soils: Deep and well-draining, ideal for root development and terroir expression.
• Favorable climate: Warm days and cool nights enhance aroma, tannin, and color concentration.
• Exceptional vines: Cultivated using grand cru Bordeaux techniques, with controlled yields and a planting density of 5,500 vines per hectare.
• Ideal orientation: South/southwest exposure ensures optimal grape ripening.

The dominant grape is Malbec, which occupies more than half of the estate and provides structure and depth to the wine. The blend also includes Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot, Syrah, Petit Verdot, and Cabernet Franc.

Clos de los Siete – Review

Clos de los Siete (by Michel Rolland) – Vintage 2020 – Tasted on 08/09/2024 with rump steak.

Deep ruby red in the glass. On the nose, notes of blackcurrant, black cherry, and black pepper emerge. The wine is vibrant and youthful, with a bouquet offering well-integrated dark fruit notes and lively aromas.

On the palate, the interplay continues with sour cherry notes, accompanied by pleasant acidity that makes for an easy drink, and solid, mature, and well-integrated tannins that envelop the mouth.

This is not a wine that takes shortcuts to become a “big, bold, and sloppy” glass—it avoids excess at every turn. However, it does lack some fruit concentration; at times, the body feels a little weak. The finish aligns with the bouquet, emphasizing peppery and cassis notes. It has good persistence but is not a wine that aims to linger—it’s meant to be enjoyed in the moment.

A perfect, unintrusive companion to meat: the wine and dish complemented each other beautifully.

Cost: €18