Been a hard few days at the coalface and this is just the sort of pick-me-up a fellow needs.
Lovely aromas as soon as the cork popped out of the top of the bottle, a gorgeous old gold colour, buttery mouthfeel and creamy buttery flavours to it too. Really lush, even as it sizzles the saliva out of the old taste buds.
Just what I needed. Absolutely top drawer.
Las Botas is one of the most recent arrivals in the world of the marquistas with some interesting wines including this cracking fino, selected from the Camborio solera.
This one has had a bit of time in the bottle judging by the colour and a suggestion of bitterness on the palate. Nice aromatics – a really mulchy nose of wet haystacks – and a nice sharp zingy start, a savoury, granary bread and bitter almond palate and a long fresh finish.
Cracking stuff – would be interesting to line up some of the different bottlings of Camborio to see how they compare.
After a cracking unfortified Cadiz palomino at the weekend thought that this would be an interesting comparison – an unfortified pedro ximenez from Montilla Moriles and the “basic” wine of the “3 Miradas” project between Alvear and the guys from Envinate.
3 Miradas (“three looks”) is a project aiming to show the potential of dry white pedro ximenez wines and also the impact of terroir. The first “mirada” is this wine – a dry white wine from eight selected vineyards in the style of a Borgougne “villages”. The second “mirada” is a set of six wines, from three different parcels and with and without skin contact, respectively. The third “mirada” is apparently going to be some years in the making – the idea is to show the effect of different kinds of ageing on the wines.
As a starting point you have to say that this is pretty good. I always come at pedro ximenez a little bit predisposed to find it heavy and full of liquorice but this is fresh and light, with a nose of grapey fruit and maybe just a hint of leafy anis, and a sweetish, fruity palate, again with grape written all over it. Maybe just a hint of salinity on the finish.
Overall a nice drinkable white wine – not complex but very nicely done.
They made two whole barrels of this – 1460 bottles of which I just inhaled bottle number 37. Watery gold in colour and pretty easy supping: sweetness suggested and then that french oak and then that salinity. Long finish of salinity, heat there on the tongue. A voyage downhill and South – no need to pedal and nicer weather.
Will never forget asking Alejandro about this wine and him telling me a long explanation about his mum being from France – what he failed to mention was that it had a few months in french oak. But when you drink it is unmistakeable and it works. Especially with that spicey salinity.
Another cracking wine from this brilliant little winery – one to drink by the barrel.
There is an English expression intended to belittle achievements: “a legend in his own lunchtime”. It is a comment on ephemeral glories. The phrase feels completely inadequate in the face of my own lunchtime today.
Today in Taberna Maitea I came face to face with such legends and so quickly that it hardly seemed real: Carta Blanca, Fino Caribe, Manzanilla Pochola, PX Viña 25, and the legendary Amontillado la Botaina. Dinosaurs that once ruled the earth and even in fossilized form are like a jeep ride through jurassic park. In addition there was the Callejuela manzanilla madura, the Viejo C P palo cortado and a mystery 2016 from Miraflores, all of them ourstanding, but still …
I should say right away that this was not an everyday lunch at the bar (although they have a great list these wines are not generally available). All I can do now is express my sincere thanks to Nico for such an outstanding lunch (the food was also brilliant – just see below) – notes of the wines will follow when I come down from the clouds.
Madre mia. Good grief. I love these wines. Pure noughtiness. What a cracking juice this is …
A worthy successor to the illustrious 20 and other noughties that followed it, this is potent but vertical and elegant. Not as broad in the beam or packed with flavour as some manzanillas pasadas, but sharp, long, and a beautiful profile.
Also a really interesting contrast to the Bota 59 and the Bota 60 that I have had recently. Where those were gentle and mellow this has a zip and sharpness to it.
And finally a word for the bar of Angelita – stuff like this and Fino La Barajuela 2014 by the half glass, among many others. Absolutely cracking.
A beautiful sight, and I am not just referring to the skillful composition and masterful control of light and perspective in the photo. The beauty is in the centre of shot: the words “Viña Las Cañas, Pago Balbaina”. This sort of thing makes the old heart hum along with the band: I strongly believe that those that can put the vineyard’s name on the label should do so. (In fact without wanting to take too much credit I did in fact mention that it might be worth putting these details on the label when I met up with Sanchez Ayala back in September.)
More importantly, this is a classic manzanilla, pure, clean, fresh and crisp. About the most refreshing thing you could drink and still no push over. And a bargain, when you consider that you can buy the same wine at considerably higher prices under other labels.
Another intriguing bottle of manzanilla pasada from Equipo Navazos. After the 60 last week in Media Ración, the last glass of the 59 in Madrid Angelita.
These are lovely, lively wines. Such a buzz off this – talk about length, my mouth is still vibrating and salivating as I write. Heat in that salinity, and after the elegant, sweet to bitter palate it is really something. The nose too is like a very subtle salty caramel – caramel notes on top and bitter and salt underneath. Both the nose and the palate have a slight bitter note that I don’t remember when it came out and that I associate with the bottle age – even if it is only a couple of years.
But this is impeccable as a wine – really fantastic stuff.
Back on the Costa where this blog was born three years ago now and it has been another fun year. More than 900 posts , thousands of hits and visitors and the rest (from over 120 countries, not including Iceland), some enjoyable lunches, sneaky glasses, fascinating tastings and riotous dinners, but most importantly, a few pennies are starting to drop and I am beginning to think I am getting a handle on what is what where these wines are concerned.
The first thing I learned is the incredible range of wines that can be achieved in the cellar: whether through concentration, oxidation, reduction and barrel and biological aging, blending with sweet wines and in soleras at variable speeds, all with the benefit of timescales that shame other regions, there is a sense of possibility that is quite amazing.
But the second thing you discover is that those possibilities bring great responsibilities, and mean great discipline is needed. With so many dimensions it is all too easy for your wine to end up unbalanced and misshapen, and if you get it just slightly wrong for thirty years you will finish up quite a long way off the path.
And the third thing you learn is that the biggest mistake that has been made is one of the most common, and it has been made for a lot longer than thirty years. Simply, that many bodegas have forgotten that underneath all those effects there should be a wine, a wine with a personality given it by vine, vineyard, and vintage. Too many of the wines in the region are being made with high yield, low concentration, low personality palomino clones that could and indeed are sourced from anywhere across the region. They are often still delicious – crisp, mineral, punchy and full of yeasty or caramel goodness – but they could be so much more.
Because once you have discovered the unique personality that palomino can have when produced with low yields, in different vineyards and in different vintages it is impossible to forget and difficult to go back. The resulting wines not only have added dimensions, they are unique. However majestic the bodega, however great the skill of the capataz, bigger bodegas can be built and techniques can be copied, but vines, vineyards and vintages cannot be replicated.
Don’t get me wrong, I never say no to a glass from one of the great soleras (and the Solear above was absolutely delicious at sundown yesterday), but if this blog gets a birthday wish it would be for the region as a whole to rediscover the miracles of its vines, vineyards and vintages. (And if I were allowed a second wish, it would be for the great “gurus” of terroir and vine to finally give el marco de Jerez the credit it deserves.)
Has been an intense period of work lately and although the last few days have seen an uptick in the number of enjoyable lunches, a chap has not really had the time or the energy to keep up the blog, for which I am sorry. Not least because this little beauty, which I tried at the fantastic Cuatrogatos Winefest a little over a month ago nearly got lost as a result – if it hadn’t come up in conversation earlier today I may have never sought out my notes.
“La Fleur” is the latest wine from the Forlong stable and as the name suggests (in Alejandro’s mother tongue), this one has a little bit of flor influence (my rudimentary notes don’t tell me how much). And its name isn’t the only french thing about it either because although this is palomino it really has the sweet apple pie nose of a jura wine from savagnin, a touch more acidity and an overall higher register than you often get from palomino. Very elegant with that zippy acidic start and quite fine in body – I have the impression it might lack just a touch of oomph in the middle of the palate but maybe with a little time in the bottle …
But why wait, the nose really is incredibly inviting and while not as serious minded as some palominos this wine is seriously easy to drink.
undertheflor.com 