Not a bad spot – sure beats the office. And not a bad wine at all. Very pallid straw colour, citric, slightly herbal nose, again a meaty almond/citrus start, salinity that is just short of zingy and then a long, long finish with that nutty/lemon feel to it.
Perfick. The wine was gone before the sun was.
This was a fantastic bottle of wine. The highlight of a brilliant dinner at El Faro del Puerto courtesy of Don Fernando – a prince among hosts.
Not literally from 200 BC but pretty old nonetheless – has a pretty good ficha which explains that it is from a Solera founded in 1864 and would have an average age of 40 years or so. Fernando told us that these were the “Botas de los Consejeros” reserved for the executives with the biggest hats and also that it was the favourite wine of the Tsars (although it wasn’t clear whether the Tsars were executives of Osborne themselves).
As the ficha says, there is a a 1/8th share of PX in here but it is perfectly integrated and, even better, there is none of the excessive astringency or concentration of some really old wines. It is full in flavour – some very pleasant spices and black treacle that really repays swishing around the tongue – but also has a nice acidic entry and an equally pleasant sweet tail to it.
A really silky smooth wine all around in fact and a privilege to have tasted it.
An oloroso you would not pick out of a lineup. Look at that beautiful gold colour. This is the twin of the Fino la Barajuela 2013 but these are the even heavier grapes, harvested later and creating what must have been an almighty mosto.
No flor here, and if two years is young for a fino it is remarkably young for an oloroso. Maybe as a result it isn’t very aromatic and certainly not very caramelized – but intriguingly I thought it had a suggestion of the burnt edge of an oloroso. Almonds and slightly jammy fruit on the nose. Then on the palate extremely meaty and more almonds and jam. Then the burnt edge at the end. Or am I imagining it? I would really like to taste this one blind one of these days.
In any event, another wine with personality and a pretty nice one too.
I have been after this wine by Bodegas Luis Perez for a good long while and am glad to say it was worth the wait.
It is a wine from some of the most famous real estate in the area: Pago Corregidor in Carrascal – the Northernmost and furthest inland of the great pagos of Jerez (dead North of Jerez on this map). The vines are on Albariza “Barajuela”, which is characterized by visible sedimentary layers, like a deck or “baraja” of cards and for producing fruit capable of wine with a muscular, horizontal quality. It has been statically aged and is still a baby compared to many finos around at only two years under flor, but there is no doubting its force of personality.
As you can see, it is a crystal clear, slightly golden colour and this might sound odd but I would describe the nose as “compact” – not a yeasty/acetaldehide nose but punchy almonds, melon, herbs and maybe just a bit of salinity. On the palate it is indeed big and muscular – with a punchy yeastiness, maybe some very mellow fruit like melon or pear, almonds, and some sapid zing. It is an intense experience, with a lot of body (still a high glycerin content you would say), structure and flavours but also a long, pleasant, fresh finish.
“Old school” stuff: it is said that back in the days when the wines of Jerez ruled the earth they were wines such as this -big, solid, wines quite distinct from today’s lighter styles. Drinking this you can absolutely believe it. Magnificent.
No trip to Sanlucar would have been complete without a trip to Taberna Der Guerrita, legendary cradle of the current renaissance of the wines of Jerez and Sanlucar.
Don’t be fooled by the unassuming exterior you can see above – or the colourful traditional bar (complete with local fauna) you will find when you get in through the door. There they have manzanillas of all varieties on tap and some wicked bar food – we had an awesome cheese and chicharrones – but the real magic is in the back.
The back is a beautiful modern, white space that has become a place of pilgrimmage. The wine tastings here are of an almost unbelievable class (example program for 2014 below) and have surely played a key part in helping the sherry triangle regain prestige amongst the great and the good in Spanish wine. (There is a fantastic wall of fame on the way back there with key figures from Jerez, Sanlucar, and other regions and countries.)
In fact the proprietor (proprioter?) Armando Guerra comes across as a brilliant bloke and in addition to those tastings seems to have been at the center of the innovative action in recent years. He has an absolutely outstanding little store where you can pick up rare sherries and manzanillas of every kind – paradoxically difficult to do in the region – and is not averse to taking the message on the road if necessary.
It is also a cracking place for a bite to eat and drink. We had an excellent dinner here – just seamless, tasty dish after tasty dish of traditional cooking – and you can take any of the brilliant bottles off the shelf and for a very small premium swig away at them on the spot.
A brilliant place, one I hope to go back to, and in many ways it is a worthy symbol of what is happening in the region: from the outside it appears old fashioned and traditional, and even inside the old lives on, but there is a real sense of future potential here too.
Watch this space.
This is a really interesting new release by Barbadillo. Love the name: at first I thought the shepherdess in question was the great Montse Molina but I gather it is a reference to a historic Barbadillo wine – the Divina Pastora (the first manzanilla released by Barbadillo, in 1827).
Whoever it is named after it is a really top drawer wine and another demonstration of the qualities of a manzanilla pasada. Barbadillo’s Solear en Rama are of course of the highest order (and someone once told me they were technically pasadas) but this is quite different – whereas the Solear are full of zest and life this is elegant and mineral, with a floral, green apple and sea air nose and an illusion of green apples on the palate and a smooth, compact salinity. (I say illusion in homage to the discussion we had while we drinking it – the issue of where this fruit comes from in manzanilla pasadas is fascinating.)
Lovely in fact. A fitting wine for such a famous name.
[Having bumped in to Armando Guerra at a recent Lavinia sherry palooza I can update this note slightly – it appears that this spends six years in the Solear solera and bodega before spending an additional three in the bodega of the Solear en rama. It really is intriguing how the fruit profile of this contrasts with the mineral and vegetable power of the Solear en rama.]
An interloper from the Sierra de Gredos – the mountains to the West of Madrid on the border with Castilla y Leon, this got a run out at dinner last weekend (in Der Guerrita) due to its “crianza biologica” (biological ageing). It is by the Comando G – yet another young, terroir focussed group of winemakers who in this case are rescuing grenache (garnacha) from a life in servitude as a “workhorse” grape . They are probably the trendiest thing in Spanish wine right now – but the wines are excellent (read this write up by Spanish Winelover for a flavour).
So this is white and grey grenache from 60+ year old vines in a North facing vineyard at 1230 meters. Fully artisan and biodynamic, it has apparently spent at least some time in demijons under flor, along the lines of a Jura (although I really have not found much by way of a ficha).
It is good stuff alright – very lemony in colour and character, with a buzz to it as if it was a white with maceracion carbonica. It is also potent, but you get the feeling that the biological ageing has taken the aromatics from the grenache a little. The result is really not comparable to a fino or a manzanilla (or the real vin jaune and Chateau Chalon that we unfairly matched it with) but on its own merit it is an attractive, characterful wine.
I didn’t have the chance to study this because I was in a little bit of a daze at the time I came across it but am glad I at least tried it and it impressed me quite a bit.
This is not fortified but is 100% palomino from Pago Mahina, by all accounts a legendary corner of a legendary pago of very pure albariza in the zone to the North of Sanlucar on the heights and inland, said to be under the influence of the river as opposed to the Atlantic. (I said in the original note that I couldn’t get much information and have since been innundated.)
Whereas other wines I have had from Alba (the Sobretabla 2013 Lots I and II and the Confitero 2014) were from Miraflores, and this wine seemed to have a bit more spark. I am not sure how much of this is narrative of the day – I had been talking about this wine earlier (standing on the driving range that was Martin Miguel, la Charanga was pointed out to me) and was keen to try it, – but even accounting for my predisposition, this is an interesting wine alright.
Like the other wines I had tried it had an alcoholic nose (although to be fair it was at room temperature) but whereas the Sobre Tabla reminded me of pineapples this is more herbal or floral. Then on the palate not quite muscle in the Macharnudo sense (this was the day I discovered La Barajuela, after all), but structure and a little bit of power, those nice slightly sweet floral/herb flavours and a long finish, but not clingy – compact and elegant.
Very good. Maybe these guys are onto something!
On a recent trip down to El Puerto de Santa Maria we had dinner at El Faro del Puerto and I felt I had to post something. We went for the wine list and tried a lot of cracking stuff. Although Jaime, the sommelier, wasn’t around, the list was excellent and the private stash of Don Fernando (part of it and the owner in the pic above) was even better: in turns outstanding and outstandingly eclectic.
I did of course neglect to take many photos but from memory there were four pages of sherries, including some really interesting bottles. Not counting aperitifs we had some finos del puerto, including the Gutierrez Colosia Fino en Rama, the Lustau Fino del Puerto and the Pavon (all excellent) then some amontillados – the Equipo Navazos 31 (from Sanlucar), el Tresillo, the Fernando de Castilla Antique and a Gutierrez Colosia (which turned out to be the people’s choice – having ordered a glass we finished the bottle – of course I took no photo) and with the fish we had a bottle of the Equipo Navazos Florpower 57 that really showed superbly. Best of all, however, was a bottle that Fernando produced at the end (as he showed us around his bodega)- an Osborne Solera BC 200 that was just sublime – on many measures the wine of a high quality weekend.
And although we may have chosen the restaurant based on the winelist you could certainly be forgiven for going for the solid matter alone – the food was absolutely great. Not one of the dishes was less than excellent: from memory there was a tasty toast of anchovy and boquerone (er, anchovy again), a brilliant fragrant salad of pigeon and mushrooms, some tiny squid and artichokes, grilled salmonetes that were perfect (when the skin has that king prawn umami) and presa iberica in oloroso that was just soft, full flavoured and juicy. There was also some dessert but that is not really my bag.
A really excellent dinner all round, highly recommended to anyone travelling to el Puerto, and a massive thanks to our host, Don Fernando, a true gentleman and entertaining bloke who was happy to show us around his cellar and, more importantly, share it!
I have really enjoyed the 2013 and 2014 and now here is the 2015 with an even more evocative label of seashore and birdlife (the finca that this comes from – Finca Matalian – is only 7km from the sea in the far South of the marco).
I only had a chance to taste this in passing (and late in the day) but no doubt that the same characteristics are there. I actually tasted this on the same night as the Las 30 de Cuadrado and the La Charanga and, although I am conscious of the risk of lazy rationalization, it seemed to have less structure than either – an almond profile compared to a spearhead/leafhead. Very pleasant though – that floral, herbal, only slightly mineral freshness. A fresh, elegant sup.
(I have a 2013 in the fridge here and am wondering whether to stick or twist. Will see if I can get all three – and maybe the version that has had some later oak – together.
undertheflor.com 