The Santo Tomás Estate
- Santo Tomás is the oldest winery in the Baja region. Jesuit missionaries first established vineyards, (now privately held) in 1791, just 5 years after the US signed its Constitution. Over a century later, in 1888 the land was purchased by Francisco Adonegui and Spaniard Miguel Olmart and became Mexico's first large scale commercial winery.
- The largest landowners in the 5 valleys of northern Baja, Santo Tomás has access to some of the best fruit available. The quality and balance of their wines is a signature of the estate.
- Winemaker Laura Zamora passed the baton she held since 2003 to the talented Christina Pino in 2019 and the first results of Christina's efforts are all that we'd hoped for. Expect to see this estate delivering increasingly high levels of quality. Christina plans to lower yields, increase quality, and work towards fully organic farming.
Total production: 22 wines, 130,000 cases
2022 ST Merlot - Santo Tomás
Tasting Notes and Drinking Window:
This 2022 is another representation of the continual elevation in quality in the offerings from Santo Tomás, and an enormous amount of this has to do with their decision to bring on the talented Christina Pino in as winemaker. Given free reigns to alter the program as she saw fit, there was a massive change to all aspects of production from the fields to the bottle. Bravo.
The "ST" series from Santo Tomás focuses on the potential for a wine to deliver immediate pleasure. Their Merlot, like the rest of the series, is aged in stainless steel so what you get out of the wines from this series is a bright fresh showcasing of the naked qualities of the fruit. There are plenty of big bold, highly extracted wines out there, so let this be the one you turn to when light bright zingy fruit is more apropos.
Drinking window: Upon release - 4 years
Vintage:
2022
Blend:
100% Merlot
Producer:
Santo Tomás
Winemaker:
Christina Pino - Spanish, lives in Mexico
Vineyards:
Santo Tomas is the largest land owner in the region and this Merlot comes form a selection of the younger vines spread throughout the holdings. The range of soil types is vast but here they are mainly working with sandy soils that have some iron rich clay mixed in as well.
Aging:
Fermented and aged in stainless steel tanks
Farming:
Sustainable
Alcohol:
13.3%
