Meet The Introverted Extroverts Of Spanish Wines: Galicia Winemakers Render Modern Interpretations By Learning The Intricacies Of The Land And How It Is Expressed Through Its Heritage Varieties.

Contrast has always animated the soul of wine; the subtle way that sugar plays against acid while fruit notes wrangle savory undercurrents. Wine is about transformation—fermentation is a pretty radical transmutation, after all—a metamorphosis of grape juice from the plebian to the profound. In tandem, Spain is a land which has been in upheaval for as long as records have been kept, changing with each millennium, each decade, every hour. Given this churning cauldron of people, processes and perspectives, why shouldn’t the introverts become extroverts and the other way around?

The drive to look inward while simultaneously looking outward is a major dynamic that is motivating young Spanish winemakers in nearly all the established wine regions. At the same time, changing climate, technology and the innately radical Spanish love of freedom is expanding the territory where world class wine can be produced.

This week, we look at some of the emerging stars of the Spanish wine scene and how they have integrated tradition with trajectory in a vision of sustainability that is key not only to the future of the industry, but to its survival.

Galicia: Spain’s Moody Atlantic Landscape

The cliff-battering waves and darkly sensuous landscape of Galicia on Spain’s northwest coast have given rise to a unique language and a distinctive culture. Among wine lovers, the Galician patchwork vineyards have often been viewed as a synonymous with Albariño. But nothing is as simple as it seems, particularly in a region that the wine world has pigeonholed at best, and at worst, overlooked entirely.

Of course, some Galician wine has earned the overlook: The region, inextricably linked to the ocean, is famous for its mariscos—seafood—and much of the vinous output (cultivated on seaside slopes) was simple, slightly fizzy, bone dry, light-bodied white wine similar to the Vinho Verde made over the border in Portugal. These wines are considered the stereotypical match for the renowned Galician shellfish—oysters, goose-neck barnacles, velvet clams, cockles and scallops along with the working-class octopi and lobsters.

But the further inland you go, the greater the wealth of indigenous grapes and styles, from the light, tart, deep-colored reds of Ribeiro to the mineral-driven whites of Valdeorras. These unusually fragrant and elegant wines are finding an expanding market outside the region and underscore the fact that Albariño is merely the tip of the Galician iceberg.

Like most of Europe, Galicia is facing a future in which climate change will affect every aspect of life. Having long embraced its inherent green abundance, which has been likened to that of Ireland, the region is under recent pressures of drought and excessive heat.

María Sagrario Pérez Castellanos, General Director of Environmental Quality in Galicia, has an ambitious plan in the work, aiming for a 2050 climate neutrality target: “If we don’t manage to involve every individual, every citizen, such a goal is impossible,” she says. “This is our issue to tackle, not something that ‘the wise men of the world will solve.’ And it’s clear that this involves you: in every behavior, from when you buy a product, to the waste you generate, when you turn the lights on or off, when you are using renewable energy sources… It involves you.”

Viticultural Polygamy: Wealth of Ancestral Varieties

The wine world’s equivalent to the dinosaur-destroying Chicxulub meteor is a microscopic louse called phylloxera. By the end of the nineteenth century, the bug had killed most of the vines in Europe, and when they were replanted (often using louse-resistant American rootstock) the focus tended to be on resilient varieties capable of producing the most fruit. This was a desperation move; a means of recouping losses and ensuring that the industry could survive. Today, of the ten thousand grape varieties, only 13 of them occupy more than a third of the world’s total vineyard surface.

In Spain, this catastrophe rang the death knell for many of the ancestral grapes that had formed the regional backbone of the wine industry, especially at the cottage level. Today, part of the rediscovery initiative that has taken hold in rural Spain is an attempt to revive the most obscure of these grapes, many found only in a few isolated back-country pockets. Young winemakers are amazed and intrigued to unearth this historical cornucopia—a collection of tastes and flavors that have nearly been forgotten. Much like the outré winemakers themselves, these grapes are the scrappers—tough little fighters who have made it into the twenty-first century despite the odds. As such, they are looked to as a window to the future, when climate change is making conventional grapes less comfortable with their terroir.

Still, it’s a labor of patience as well as love. On average, it takes 14 years between the discovery of a heritage variety and the time it is viable for winemaking. Once a vine has been designated an ‘ancestral variety,’ the hard work begins: Old vines are riddled with disease, and the viticulturists need pristine plant material for experiments; the vine must be reproduced multiple times in a greenhouse using new cells over several growth cycles until it’s given a clean bill of health.

And even then it takes time to understand a heritage vine’s individual nature, requiring several harvests. Like all grapes, terroir plays an irreplaceable role in finding the ideal site to bring out desired qualities, and finding this happy place may also take many vintages. And even then, the vine must reach the level of maturity required to produce acceptable wine.

Ribeiro

Climatic Middle Grounds

Ribeiro may be Galicia’s oldest D.O., but its three valleys have been ground zero for quality wine production for centuries. Cultivated by Romans, perfected by monks and served on the tables of kings and queens throughout Europe, Ribiero—as gushed over by Cervantes—holds the distinction of being the first wine to travel from Spain to the New World.

Located on the northwestern edge of the province of Ourense and bordering Pontevedra to the southwest, Ribeiro’s 6000 acres of vineyards spread out from the central hub of Ribadavia and extend to the north, east, and west, hugging the Avia, Miño, and Arnoia river valleys. These valleys are surrounded by flat areas that gradually increase in altitude to the west, reaching up into the foothills of the central Galician mountain range, forming staggered levels of terrain descending from about three thousand feet in the west near Carballeda de Avia, to a few hundred feet at the bottom of the valleys. But this is just the natural terrain; it is the man-made terraces that define much of the viticulture here.

Ribeiro means ‘riverbank’ in Galician, and appropriately so—rivers are the regional lifeblood, the arteries through which culture and economy life have passed for centuries. In poetry, Galicia has been referred to ‘the land of a thousand rivers,’ but in Ribeiro, the three heavy-hitters are the Avia, the Arnoia and the Miño. These three waterways form a triumvirate that defines Galician wine country.

Cool, wet air from the Atlantic hits the Serra do Suído and Serra do Faro de Avión ranges, rises, and condenses into rain. The warmer, drier air comes down on the other side of the mountain.
See it in action here.
Tttrung, CC BY-SA 4.0 , via Wikimedia Commons

Coto de Gomariz

Coto de Gomariz is located in an ideal winegrowing zone near the eastern edge of Galicia, where the slopes overlook the Avia River. The 66 acres were the brainchild of Ricardo Carreiro, who made the most of the unique microclimate (schist, granite and sandy soils) through a cornucopia of local wine varieties including Treixadura, Godello, Loureira and Albariño.

At the turn of this century, Carreiro upgraded the entire estate with integrated architecture and modern installations that allow for the annual production of nearly 200,000 bottles of wine.

With the death of Carreiro in 2008, Inma Pazos along with Miguel Montoto joined the team, intending to carry forward (and where appropriate, improve upon) the state of the art. Pazos describes the estate like this: “Gomariz is unique in itself: a rural area with a set of certain soil characteristics. Our various plots of land are vinified separately to be able to observe the evolution of the grapes and respect the characteristics of the different estates that make up the personality of each of the vines.”

Ricardo Carreiro, Middle, and Team, Coto de Gomariz

Montoto adds, “The plants are grown on trellises and with a high density of planting. The palisades are high allowing for maximum sun and air exposure. Our goal is to produce more authentic wine, following a clear path to quality and authenticity with autochthonous varieties like Treixadura and Sousón, which had been pushed aside to make way for international varieties that were more productive and less prone to disease. The ancestral grapes of Galicia show characteristics that are often common to the wild vines; small bunches of grapes, highly fertile and potential for an intense aroma.”

Albariño

Albariño is nearly a synonym for Rías Baixas, where it makes up 90% of the plantings. It has been viewed traditionally as a fresh, aromatic, hardy variety that makes light, peach-tinted wines, although thanks to the introspection of a handful of Spanish winemakers, it is now seen to be a wine capable of a remarkable maturation within the bottle.

Ultra-modern styles of Albariño are richer and more textural, having been aged on their lees and given some time add complexity and a touch of creaminess.

Coto de Gomariz X ‘Viño de Encostas de Xistos – Albariño’, 2022 Ribeiro ($31)  White
Albariño 95%, Treixadura 5%, 580 cases produced.

The grapes for this wine originate in the As Panelas and O Taboleiro plots, farmed without any synthetic applications or insecticides. The ‘X’ in the label name as well as the word ‘Xistos’ is a reference the Galician word for schist, the dominant feature of the terroir. The fruit is hand-harvested and fermented at low temperature in stainless steel vats using indigenous yeasts before bottling on a Flower Day (when, according to the biodynamic calendar, the moon is in an Air sign). The wine shows white peach, tangerine, candied orange, jasmine, green tea and aromatic herbs.

Godello

Emotionally, Godello is like a high-maintenance date. Chief among its commercial cons is the fact that it ripens early and delivers low yields, making it unsuitable for use in mass production. But this is a pro when it comes to quality, and a guarantee that winemakers who grow it are using artisan sensibilities; in the right hands, this ancient white varietal produces straw-colored wine with good acidity and plenty of fruit-forward body that emphasizes citrus, green apple and peach. But noteworthy is Godello’s slate-like minerality, often tinged with saltiness. For this reason, Godello is generally fermented and aged in stainless steel in an effort to preserve these qualities from soil to glass.

Coto de Gomariz X ‘Viñedos Excepcionais – Godello’, 2022 Ribeiro ($40)   White
Godello 100%, 200 cases produced.

2022 was an unusual climatic year for Galicia in that there was little rainfall and an exceptionally hot summer. Occasional vegetative stops slowed down maturation, but underground water sources kept the plants safe, and they were able to complete maturation successfully. The concentration of phenolics produced by this drought lends considerable intensity to this wine: The nose shows lime peel, kiwi with grapefruit and flinty gunpowder before a fresh citrus finish.

Loureira

Called ‘Loureiro’ in Portugal (where it used to make the popular Vinho Verde wines of Minho), the Galician version is the same grape, but flexes a bit to add orange and acacia blossom to the often somewhat neutral notes of Vinho Verde. Loureira is very much at home on the verdant terraces of Galicia, and must be checked to keep it from over-producing. Reined in, however, it resembles Riesling in depth and focus.

Coto de Gomariz, 2021 Ribeiro ($27)  White
Treixadura 70%, Godello 15%, Albariño 10%, 5% Loureira, 4150 cases produced.

Primary selection is done in field using a sorting table; at the winery, the grapes are again sorted, destemmed, crushed and pressed. The free run juice is then statically settled and fermented at low temperature in stainless steel vats and barrels. Different plots are fermented separately and coupages made and allowed to round-out in the vat until bottling. The wine offers zesty orange and lemon pith with a touch of bitter quince, finishing with a strong lift and stony persistence.

Coto de Gomariz ‘Finca O Figueiral’ – Colleita Selecccionada’, 2019 Ribeiro ($51)  White
Treixadura 70%, Godello 10%, Lado 10%, Albariño 5%, Loureira 5%, 270 cases produced.

A traditional blend of indigenous grapes, but one in which Inma Pazos and Miguel Montoto have sought greater terroir expression; they consider Finca O Figueiral their top wine. O Figueiral was the first plot restored by Caco Carreiro with various native varieties from Ribeiro. The wine shows an exquisite use of wood to compliment mineral-accented citrus and gingery spice.

Brancellao

A fairly common red variety found throughout Ribeiro, Brancellao is highly resistant to botrytis and produces medium-sized yields with aromatic, oily flavors. For this reason, it is generally used as a blending grape. When paired with varieties that contain more polyphenolic contents, Brancellao offers aromatic complexity and red fruits aromas as well as savory and unctuous volume.

Coto de Gomariz ‘Abadía de Gomariz’, 2020 Ribeiro ($27) Red
Sousón 50%, Brancellao 30%, Ferrol 10%, Mencía 10%, 1655 cases produced.

Grapes are manually harvested and a careful selection process takes place at the winery followed by a cold pre-fermentation maceration. Fermentation is done on wild yeasts in temperature-controlled stainless steel with frequent pump-overs and punch-downs. The wine is aged for a year in used French foudres and aged in the bottle for six months and shows spicy blackcurrant with a pronounced mineral accent and a woodsy, rustic finish.

Sousón

Largely unknown outside Galicia, Sousón is the most widely-planted red grape in Rías Baixas, and is genetically identical to Loureira Tinta. It is a late-budding variety that matures slowly, so it well suited to warmer areas and south-facing plots. Because of longer hang times, Sousón can reach high levels of alcohol with enough acidity to permit extended barrel aging. As a rule, Sousón showcases dark fruits (blackberries and currants) and is often used as a blending grape, although the experiment-prone wine Galician winemakers are increasingly using it as a stand-alone variety.

Coto de Gomariz ‘VX Cuvee Caco’, 2007 Ribeiro ($46) Red
Sousón 50%, Caíño Tino 30%, Carabuñeira 15%, Mencía 5%, 200 cases produced.

Grapes originate in the A Ferreira vineyard, which was re-planted with local varietals in 1994. Initial fermentation is done in wood and stainless on salvage yeast; malolactic fermentation in barrels, following which the wine is aged for 20 months in new French 500-liter oak barrels. The wine showcases oak-spiced berries and licorice with depth and focus shored up in supple tannins.

Ferrol

Ferrol, also called ‘Ferrón,’ is a rich red native Galician grape that is often used to bring aroma and structure to blends. It’s a vigorous variety, naturally resistant to mildew and botrytis, and based on the exposure of the vines, it may retain a bracing level of acidity after fermentation.

Wish ‘Viño de Encostas Xosé-Lois Sebio – Viño de Encostas’, 2018 Galicia ($52) Red
Ferrol 50%, Caíño Tinto 35%, Sousón 10%, Bastardo 5%, 160 cases produced.

Viños de Encostas Xosé Lois Sebio’s personal project of unique, small-lot wines coming from all around northwest Spain. Wish is a field blend of many indigenous varietals grown throughout the Ribeiro D.O.; it is naturally fermented in 2000/l open stainless steel vats after a week-long cold maceration. Before malolactic fermentation has finished, the wine is moved into 300/l used French oak barrels where it then rests for 18 months, and results in a deeply-tinted wine with gorgeous aromatics of lilac, red and blue fruits and a characteristic minerality.

Son de Arrieiro 

Isolation inspires ingenuity: Xulia Bande is living proof. The first of her five parcels in the Beade area of Ribeiro is a nearly inaccessible plot in Porte Leira; at over 1500 feet, it is one of the highest vineyards in the DO. Here, in schist and shallow sandy granite, Bande plants Sousón, Brancellao and Loureira. Closer to the Tui is ‘Salgeiros’—a clay heavy vineyard planted to Treixadura—that has required considerable soil revitalization, which the winemaker has undertaken organically. ‘Serna’ is in Gomariz, and it comprised of 50-year-old Treixadura planted on a sandy clay with pure granite and a southerly exposition. ‘Bieja’ is a tiny plot of Caiño, Sousón, Brancellao and a local variety called Caraboneira Tinto.

Xulia Bande, Son de Arrieiro

Xulia Bande has chosen to dominate this unforgiving landscape, and in working these fascinating terroirs, has gained a profound understanding of each parcel and the landscape in general.

Treixadura

Called ‘the Jewel of Ribeiro’, Treixadura sprouts and ripens slowly—as such, it is sensitive to altitude. It is grown mainly in valleys and slopes which are suitably orientated to maximize sunlight. It blends well with other local varieties like Godello, and as a stand-alone, makes an aromatic, refreshing wine with peach, apricot and citrus notes behind a floral background.

Son de Arrieiro ‘Castes Autóctonas’, 2021 Ribeiro ($39) White
Treixadura 92%, Lado 4%, Loureira 4%, 404 cases produced.

Blended grapes from all of Xulia Bande’s vineyards, the wine is made via direct press and fermented on native yeast in stainless steel, then lees-aged for 12 months and after bottling, aged for a further six. The nose is gentle and creamy with concentrated green apple and white peach with a touch of spice underlined by a racy edge and a silken finish.

Caíño Tinto

Dark-skinned and fragrant, Caíño is another border-hopping variety that leapfrogs Galicia to Portugal, where it is known as Borraçal and is used as a blending agent in the zingy, lesser known reds of Vinho Verde. The grape is tricky in the vineyard as it is susceptible to many ailments including powdery mildew, sunburn and grey rot. Not only that, but yields can be highly irregular, a quirk which seems to be better managed in Spain than in Portugal.

When grown in optimal conditions, Caíño Tinto has thick skins, which give deep color and hefty tannins to wines. The variety tends to do well with carbonic maceration to combat the tartness and unusually high tannin.

Son de Arrieiro ‘Castes Autóctonas’, 2021 Ribeiro ($39) Red
Sousón 30%, Caíño Tinto 30%, Brancellao 20%, 383 cases produced.

Not your usual light Ribeiro, this is wine of great intensity and depth, cark and fleshy with a cornucopia of forest berries, black black pepper, black tea and some sticky balsamic notes.

 Lagar de Sabariz

Although it lies outside the boundaries of DO Ribeiro, Lagar de Sabariz is located against the backdrop of the Miño and Avia river valleys in the San Amaro region; Pilar Higuero estates occupies thirteen acres grown around a carefully restored country house dating to the 16th century. Among the innovations she has brought to the winemaking process is biodynamics, which she refers to as ‘cosmetics for the vineyard.’

Pilar Higuero, Lagar de Sabariz

The vines are situated at a higher elevation than is typical for Ribeiro (about 1300 feet) and are grown according to a low-yield philosophy. The soil is not fertilized and the vegetation cover is whatever grows naturally. Further soil amendments are done with biodynamic preparations. “We’re a small holding and the animals do their part in working the land,” Pilar points out. “The sheep and geese are natural lawnmowers and hens also help to aerate the soil around the vines.”

The commitment to the environment even extends to only using bottles weighing less than 400 grams as well as completely doing away with labels. Pilar herself hand paints every bottle that comes out onto the market.

Lagar de Sabariz ‘A Pita Miuda’, 2017 Galicia ($69) White
Ribeiro – Treixadura 100%, 125 cases produced.

Pure, estate-grown Treixadura grown organically and harvested at dawn. The wine was aged for two year on lees years in stainless steel tanks and shows, white, with lots of creamy lemony aromas and notes of infused herbs over a subtly smoky background, combining unctuousness with a delicious spark saline freshness.

Lagar de Sabariz ‘A Pita Cega’, 2015 Galicia ($79) White
Ribeiro – Albariño 50%, Treixadura 50%, 666 cases produced.

Harvest is done at first light and ends by midday so that the grapes remain at their freshest when they arrive at the bodega. The grapes are pressed without destemming and the must is allowed to settle before fermentation begins with wild yeasts. After 17 months on lees in stainless steel tanks, it matures in bottle for an additional eight months before release. The wine shows a pure, clean nose offering well-defined peach and apricot notes with good tension and a mineral finish. It is not off the mark to say that this wine is reminiscent of a Condrieu, home of Pilar Higuero’s great-grandparents.

Rías-Baixas

The Birthplace Of Albariño

The rain in Spain stays mainly in Rías-Baixas; at least, this lush patch of southwest Galicia receives on average more than three times the rain as the rest of Spain. And that’s not the only source of irrigation—ría means estuary in Gallego, the Galician language, and rías are coastal inlets that form from a flooded river valley. The sea rises and eventually comes inland, drowning the valley and leaving a tree-like formation of inlets and coves somewhat similar to the fjords of Norway.

The ten thousand acres of Rías Baixas is subdivided into five subzones—Val do Salnés, Condado do Tea, O Rosal, Soutomaior, and Ribeira do Ulla—and unlike the subzones of most wine appellations, they’re not contiguous. The original three founding subzones are Val do Salnés, Condado de Tea, and O Rosal. The Ribeira do Ulla and Soutomaior subzones were added more recently.

Like most of Galicia, Rías-Baixas bedrock is mainly granitic. The most common soil is a type of decomposed granite known as ‘xabre’. Granite is a naturally hard rock, but it begins to weather when it’s affected by elements of erosion. In Galicia’s case, heavy rainfall and high humidity in the soil gradually penetrate into the rock, wearing it down and decomposing its structure more rapidly than in drier regions.

Rías Baixas wine is often typified by single-varietal Albariño, or those made from a blend of Albariño Loureira and Caíño Branco. They tend to showcase a balanced between acidity and fruit. Aromas differ between subzones, but in general you can expect green apple, peach, apricot, and fresh citrus like lime or lemon peel.

Red wines from Rías Baixas are made from traditional Galician varieties like Caíño Tinto or Sousón. They’re also very acidic with lower alcohol levels around 11-12%. They have fresh red fruit aromas with occasional vegetal or herbal notes.

Sparkling wines from Rías Baixas are made from Albariño, and they conserve all the best characteristics of the Albariño grapes they’re made from. They combine the usual traditional method notes of bakery and brioche with a backbone of Albariño fruit and acidity.

Fento

Hard-working vigneron Eulogio Pomares is a rising star in the far northwest corner of Spain where he receives accolades from critics and consumers alike. Although perhaps best known for his work with the region’s Albariño variety as the seventh generation winemaker at Zárate, his family’s estate, Eulogio can’t be contained and is branching out into some of “Green Spain’s” other subregions.

Eulogio Pomares, Fento and Zarate

Fento is a partnership of Eulogio with his wife Rebeca that works with both rare and common indigenous grapes found within Galicia. Organic viticulture is difficult in the region due to humidity and mildew pressure, but Eulogio is applying the methods to bring the Fento vineyards into full organic cultivation, relying on native cover crops and natural products to do most of the work.

Fento ‘Bico Da Ran – Albariño’, 2023 Rías-Baixas ‘Val do Salnés ($19) White
Albariño 100%, 1800 cases produced.

From 40-year-old vines grown on granite-rich soils; the wine spends six months on lees, with about 25% going through natural malolactic fermentation. Eulogio Pomares studied in Germany because he saw parallel between Riesling and Albariño, and here, he treats the grape with a similar reverence. Named after a beach in Rías-Baixas, the wine offers a lean and salty profile with orange blossom and a blast of mineral acidity.

Ribeira-Sacra

Heroic Viticulture

Vertigo is not a condition that thrives in Ribeira-Sacra. Suffice to say that the steeply sloped vineyard terraces that tower over silvery, slow-moving rivers are a challenge even to the most mountain-goatish among wine growers. But is precisely the physicality of the landscape that allows Ribeira-Sacra such a wide diversity of grapes, expositions, altitudes, slope angles, bedrock types and topsoil compositions.

As in most wine regions, climate dictates success. The west and north end of Ribeira Sacra is more impacted by Atlantic winds and precipitation tends to be heavy due to the absence of any significant mountain range. Between the Atlantic and the Ribeiro and Ribeira Sacra regions, some small mountains curb the influence of oceanic winds. Toward the south and east the mountains rise to higher altitudes and maintain a much stronger continental influence.

Rivers remain a dominant feature of the microclimates; inside river gorges there is an abundant supply of exposures and slope angles—a saving grace for the vineyards because as the climate changes, growers can shift from the hottest exposures to cooler ones while maintaining the same superb bedrock, topsoil and all other characteristics imparted by the local terroir. This practice has already taken hold in the area, with many growers exploring potential vineyard sites that in the past would not have been advantageous.

Mencía

Native to northwest Spain and once considered synonymous with the red wines of Bierzo, Mencía has enjoyed a revival in recent decades following years of producing light and astringent wines; today, dedicated winemakers are using the grape to produce beautifully structured wines, often by using carbonic maceration to accentuate the variety’s fruit characteristics and reduce the naturally heavy tannins.

Fento ‘Xabre’, 2021 Ribeira-Sacra ‘Quiroga-Bibei’ ($33) Red
Mencía 90% and 10% Sousón, Mouratón and Garnacha, 447 cases produced.

Named for the slate and granite sands of the region, the grapes come from terraced vineyards in Quiroga-Bibei subzone where vines are planted at between a thousand and 2200 feet. The oldest of these vines are over eighty years. Fermentation is done in 500-liter barrels, followed by 10 months in French oak and six more months in foudres. The wine shows elegant floral and balsamic nuances offset the rich forest fruit.

Sílice Viticultores

Founded in 2013 by brothers Carlos and Juan Rodríguez and Galician-Swiss DJ-turned-winemaker Fredi Torres, Sílice Viticultores is a project of family and friends. The project’s lifeblood is the intense manual work on the precipitous slopes above the Sil River Canyon. Their 20 acres—planted primarily on granite with some schist and gneiss parcels, in the zones of Amandi, Doade, and Rosende—are farmed organically, with copper and sulfur treatments applied as needed. Like many top producers in the region, Sílice Viticultores chooses to work outside of the D.O. Ribeira Sacra.

Juan and Carlos Rodríguez with Winemaker Fredi Torres, Sílice Viticultores

Production is necessarily small, and the wines are racy, focused and fun, but with the structure to age. Both farming and winemaking prioritizes bright Atlantic fruitiness and the expression of their individual parcels and zones without sacrificing the fierce natural energy of the region or its great red grape, Mencía. Choosing the perfect moment of harvest, fermenting multiple red and white varieties together with the strategic use of stems, cold maceration and gentle extraction is Sílice Viticultores guarantee of expression of both location and vintage.

Merenzao & Albarello

Merenzao by any name would smell as fruity; you may know the same grape as Trousseau, Bastardo or Gros Cabernet. Originally from the Jura region of eastern France, it is widely used in the production of Port, but in Ribeira Sacra, it adds flavor density while remaining translucent.

But when it comes to confusing names, Merenzao can’t touch Albarello. It is not only a rare white wine grape grown in Galicia to make fragrant, gently-effervescent seafood wine, it is also a local synonym for the Portuguese red wine grape Alvarelhão.

Sílice Viticultores ‘Sílice’, 2019 Galicia ‘natural’ ($31) Red
Mencía 80%, Albarello 5%, Merenzao 5%, Garnacha Tintorera 5%, Godello 5%, 875 cases produced.

The grapes are hand-harvested, of course (there is no alternative in the vertical vineyards of the Sil River Canyon) and vinified using indigenous yeasts. 80% of the grapes are destemmed, and 20% are whole-cluster. The wine ages for nine months on its lees in a combination of neutral oak foudre, stainless steel tanks and concrete vats.

- - -
Posted on 2024.05.16 in Spain DO, Wine-Aid Packages, Ribeiro, Ribeira Sacra, Rias Biaxas