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 Barbera - Santo Tomás
Tasting Notes and Drinking Window:
The monovarietal “white label” wines from Santo Tomás all represent their premium efforts below the ultra premium “Unico” label. Perhaps the most remarkable bottling of this line, the 100% Barbera is always a delight. Old vines deliver exciting high note tension of bright red fruits combined with ripe dark fruit notes and elements brought in from the barrel aging that give this tenor a baritone foundation to play harmony over. The Barbera is always a standout but the 2022 shows us yet another example of the wonderful work Christina Pino is doing at Santo Tomás since she took over in late 2018.
Drinking Window: upon release - 7 years
Vintage:
2022
Blend:
100% Barbera
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.
Winemaking:
Fermented in stainless steel tanks and then aged for 12 months in 1st use French oak barrels.
Farming:
Sustainable
Alcohol:
13.8%
