The first thing you notice at Botánico is not the cellar or the vines, but its architecture. Inspired by a contemporary greenhouse, the restaurant blends seamlessly into the surrounding landscape, creating a truly unique and immersive experience.
The restaurant sits within Viña Casas del Bosque, in the coastal cool of the Casablanca Valley, and it opens onto an orchard kept under organic management, a working garden of vegetables, herbs, fruit and flowers picked fresh each morning. Long before a dish reaches the table, it is gathered here, by hand, a few steps from the kitchen door.
© Casas del Bosque Winery
That proximity is the whole idea. Botanico describes itself as an invitation to reconnect with the roots, the land, the vineyard, the flowers and the crops, and it means this literally. The menu is not fixed. It shifts with the seasons, written by what the orchard is ready to give, so that an autumn plate bears little resemblance to one served in spring. The kitchen calls it an ode to nature, and for once, the phrase is earned rather than borrowed.
“The menu is written by the orchard, not by me,” says chef Rodrigo Cangas. “I walk the beds in the morning, and whatever is ready that day decides what we cook. By autumn, the plate looks nothing like it did in spring, and that is exactly the point.”
© Casas del Bosque Winery
The story of Botanico began in mid-2023, following a journey to London and Paris that sparked countless ideas, from recipes and culinary concepts to floral design. The trip became a source of inspiration for what we wanted to create: a restaurant unlike any other, deeply connected to its organic orchard and closely linked to our Botanic Series wines.
Bringing Botánico to life was a true team effort. It involved great challenges, endless ideas, and very little time to create something distinctive from anything we had done before.
Botánico is designed to feel like stepping into a greenhouse, where every dish is thoughtfully crafted and rich in detail. Vegetables take centre stage, telling the story of the orchard while being carefully paired with our wines to create a harmonious lunch experience.
Each menu is inspired by the flavours of the season, featuring ingredients harvested from the orchard and celebrating fresh, vibrant cuisine full of colour.
© Casas del Bosque Winery
More than thirty years later, the winery remains entirely family-owned, a rarity at this level. It all began in 1993, when the Cuneo family founded Casas del Bosque in Las Dichas, the coldest sector of the Casablanca Valley. It was a bold and visionary decision. At the time, the valley was only beginning to establish itself as a recognized wine appellation, and the family placed its confidence in producing cool-climate wines of exceptional precision and character.
Giorgianna Cúneo, serves as winery director, closely involved in both the cellar and the ambitious tourism project that Botanico now crowns. Beyond the vines, the family directs the Liguria Foundation, devoted to improving early education in vulnerable communities across Chile, a reminder that the estate’s idea of stewardship reaches past the vineyard wall.
© Casas del Bosque Winery
What lands on the plate carries an Italian accent: antipasti, pizzas made in the purest Italian style, fresh house pastas and proteins sourced from producers committed to animal welfare. None of it strays far to get there. The herbs are often still warm from the sun, the vegetables cut within the hour, the flowers lifted from the same beds guests can wander before lunch.
“We cook with an Italian heart but a Casablanca soul,” Cangas says. “A tomato picked an hour before service, a herb still warm from the sun, a glass of our Botanic Series beside it. That is the whole idea. Nothing travels far to reach the table.”
The wines he mentions are the natural companions to this kind of cooking. Casas del Bosque’s young Botanic Series, spanning Sauvignon Blanc, Chardonnay, Riesling, Rosé of Pinot Noir, Pinot Noir and Syrah, is drawn from carefully chosen parcels and made to express their origin. They are sustainable wines that respect place, and they pair with the kitchen’s seasonal rhythm in easy harmony.
© Casas del Bosque Winery
The setting completes the argument. Guests can walk the gardens/orchard, pause on a deck that looks out across the vineyards and follow the estate inward to the Tranque Los Olivos, a reservoir/ dam alive with birdlife and resident geese, or up to Casa Mirador on the high ground above the vines. The orchard is not a backdrop to all this. It is the point of it.
There is no rushing a place like this. Come hungry and a little early, so there is time to walk the beds where lunch is still growing. From the orchard to the table is barely a sentence here. It is the distance between the soil and the fork.