CHATEAU DENOVI | Negru de Iar | 2011
cabernet sauvignon | merlot

WineStatistics will be evaluating wines in no particular order on no particular schedule. Just stay tuned and you will never miss one. If the wine is tasted more than once, the rating table will be updated so as to reflect all the new impressions and observations. The logic is simple – the more we taste, the more we learn.

Tonight we are going to review a classic Bordeaux blend, made of cabernet sauvignon and merlot. Since cabernet sauvignon is quite bold and spicy, it is blended with merlot to add smoothness, a leaner texture and more balance to the final wine. Both grape varieties originated in the Bordeaux region and have become the two most popular red wine varieties in the world. What’s surprising is that both are born from cabernet franc as the father variety, perhaps this is why there are so many similarities between them. But enough theory, the wine we’ve selected for the review tonight is Negru de Iar 2011 from Mold-Nord.
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Take a look at the tasting notes bellow and our detailed assessment of the wine:

Visual
Deep and noble garnet color, with shades of ruby towards the rim of the glass.

Olfactory
The nose is strong, filled mostly with black fruits flavours: blackcurrant, black cherry, blackberry, black plum, sour cherry, and wormwood. An instant later the nose is filled with notes of sun-dried oakwood, nutmeg, black tea, black pepper and some nuanced hints of tobacco.

Gustatory
The wine is dry, with high alcohol level, high acidity and ripe tannin. It tastes earthy, tannic and smoky, with a nuanced fruit-forward profile. This is definitely a new-world blend – fruit-forward, seedy and expressive. It feels ripe, spicy and structured, with a firm body and a quite appealing complexity. The wine has a fair overall balance between fruit and barrique and a quite oaky accent.

Aftertaste
It has a medium-plus finish and an balanced, bitter-seedy aftertaste.
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This is definitely a great Wine of Moldova and the overall rating says the same, with 90.9 points scored it is right there, among the best wines we’ve tasted so far. Please click on the chart icon on the left in order to get to the wine rating page, where you can find all the wines we’ve tasted to date.

Conclusion: this is a wine in its prime – elegant, complex and well balanced. It displays a promising ageing potential, but we would strongly recommend to drink it now, before it will reach the declining phase. Pair this wine with any red meat based dishes, like for example a T-bone steak or a grilled top sirloin steak, as the acidity and tannin in the wine will cut well through those gamey and rustic notes in the meat, or add some reductive sweet cabernet sauce and you will most likely reach a new level of food-and-wine pairing. Enjoy!

WineStatistics tasting results:

CHATEAU DENOVI
Negru de Iar | 2011

grape: | cabernet sauvignon | merlot |

region: Moldova | Valul lui Traian

overall rating: | 90.9 |

conclusion: great | a must try

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(c) The WineStatistics ratings are based solely on our own knowledge of the world of wine and on our personal wine tastes, which may, or may not, differ from yours – the reader. There are no absolutes of right and wrong in wine appreciation.