Rioja Alavesa: Going Its Own Way New-Generation Viñadores Emphasize Vineyard Over Cellar Treatment and Show the Specialness of Thier Sub-region.

There are no philosophical mandates in winemaking, but there are certain truisms that seem to arise regardless of appellation and country of origin. That is, low-end wines tend to emphasize immediacy; they display linear, fresh fruit notes unhindered by the sort of essential inner structures that can evolve into something else—something more interesting.

Pricier wines are faithful vessels for a specific time and place.

No dusty tome on why certain wines improve, or become more complex with age, does justice to the words of Luis Gutierrez in his book ‘The New Vignerons’ as he describes a tasting with one of our featured winemakers, Telmo Rodríguez of Remelluri:

“In 2015, I returned to Remelluri to talk to Pablo and Telmo about all this, to taste their new vintages and reminisce about that dinner in 1998, once again eating some of the most typical dishes from La Rioja in front of the huge fire in the kitchen. We had Patatas a la Riojana (Rioja-style potatoes), ribs, and spring onions from their vineyards. And we drank a superb 150-year-old-plus Madeira, a wine that made us travel in time and think about the people who had made it, people with no means, and we imagined how they must have lived, possibly without electricity or shoes. They would have never dreamt that someone in Spain would be drinking that wine a century and a half later. We were there at Remelluri the day after a heavy snowfall, the heaviest they had seen since 1999, one of those days when you have to take photos of snowy vineyards that have to last for the next ten years.”

The Ascendency of New Generation: Setting the Path to the New Rioja

When a generational shift overtakes an old, familiar wine zone, the first casualty is often conditioning. In days of yore, Rioja meant big, blustery, barrel-bludgeoned reds, where quality was measured by ‘crianza’—the years a Tempranillo blend spent first in oak, then in bottles. The farther the wine was away from the vineyard, the better it was supposed to be. Entry level Crianza wines undergo a two-year old process which keeps them at least a year in fifty-gallon barrels. Riserva sees three years of aging; Grand Riserva, five-years, with at least two years in oak. These wines are, by intent, filled with complexity, with the oldest displaying matured tertiary flavors of tobacco, leather, truffle, etc.

It’s a style of wine has its legions of apostles, but in a general sense, freshness over oak and a sense of place rather than a sense of wood is the name of the game in the modern era. Less ripeness is traded for more bracing acidity. Rioja may have been a bit slow to get the memo, and wine drinkers in America even more so, but the new wave of younger winemakers in Spain’s most famous wine-producing region are spreading the wings of innovation so wide that we can’t help but feel the influence.

In this package, we will feature five bodegas run by five charismatic winemaker who are offering a fresh take on an old style, breaking with tradition and frequently loosening the Tempranillo stranglehold in favor of a cornucopia of other varieties.

Rioja Alavesa: Finding the New in an Old Land

To level set, Burgundy contains 70,000 acres of vineyards divided into 84 distinct appellations. Rioja, with 161,424 acres, has three—Rioja Alavesa, Rioja Alta and Rioja Baja—and even those rarely appear on labels. Instead, the traditional way of categorizing wine from this sprawling blend of Mediterranean and mountain landscapes, has been a celebration of how long the wine has spent in wooden sarcophagus, from the youngest Joven styles through Crianza, Reserva and Gran Reserva. The aging is carried out in 225-litre oak barrels for a period ranging from 1 to 3 years, and later in the bottle itself for a period between six months to 6 years.

This is largely the doing of the Consejo Regulador, the Regulatory Council of La Rioja, whose mission is to safeguard the region’s identity—a noble enough pursuit, whose result has traditionally been an ocean of largely homogenous wine: Silky, moderately potent, often displaying lackluster fruit with a patina of age. Under current rules, Rioja is often blended from vineyards across the entire territory, and the barrel is, perhaps, given more emphasis than the grapes.

Says winemaker Gil Berzal of the eponymous bodega in the Rioja Alavesa: “Rioja has forgotten its roots and it gives the prominence to the barrel, basing its attributes in the presence of the wine in touch with the wood. Our area is different from the rest of areas included in the D.O. Rioja, due to the characteristics of the soils, climate, age of the vineyards, and the relief of the land. This is the reason to give Rioja Alavesa its worth.”

Berzal is a pioneer of the new thinking afoot in Alavesa, a hilly region along the north bank of the Ebro River full of chalk and limestone, ideal for growing the mainstay grape, Tempranillo. Iconoclastic winemakers like Álvaro Loza, Arturo de Miguel Blanco, Olivier Rivière and Telmo Rodriguez have pioneered technical advances and field techniques designed to rise above the rusticity of the region’s wines, and at least one consortium, the Asociación de Bodegas de Rioja Alavesa has gone so far as to explore the formation of an entirely new DO that would allow Alavesa producers to include information on the label that reflected terroir, lot and the winemaking process.

Álvaro Loza
Rioja Alavesa
‘A Declaration of Intent’

Talent occasionally skips a generation. Case in point is Álvaro Loza, who grandfather raised vines in the hills of Rioja but whose parents are not in the business at all. When Álvaro took his grandfather’s lessons to heart, that wine is “all about happiness and joy,” he quickly learned that a whole lot of experience is also required to make a complete package. As such, he realized (in the nick of time) that he should switch his studies from mechanical engineering to oenology, and having completed his schooling in Beaune’s famous wine school, Álvaro set out on a series of jaw-dropping internships. First in Napa, where he worked the harvest, then back to France where he worked with a small producer in Condrieu. In 2018 he travelled to Tasmania, and in 2019 he took a job at Domaine Léon in the Côte des Bar (Champagne), before joining the harvest at Clos Ibai in Rioja, where he made his first wines. Since then, he has moved between hemispheres, harvesting with Marlise Nieman in Bot River (Cape South Coast, South Africa) and picking grapes in Champagne and Rioja. Working at Clos Ibai has allowed him to have a tiny space in this cellar for his wines.

Álvaro Loza

“I still farm the four plots of land that my grandfather tended—they have become the cornerstone of my wine business. I farm two parcels in Haro and two in Labastida, totaling just three acres altogether. Of the Haro vineyards, one is goblet-trained, the other trellised are in the Zaco meander, next to the river Ebro. They combine a sandy area with another rich in pebbles. The Labastida plots are located on the same terrace between Cien Reales and Las Viñuales, where the most striking feature is a large layer of sandstone with calcium carbonate sediments.”

According to Loza, this soil contributes to obtaining the fresh tannins that characterize his wines wine and prolong the finish. With the exception of some white grapes and a mixture of varieties in the oldest vines, Tempranillo is the dominant variety. Álvaro Loza cultivates the land with the philosophy of maintaining the oldest and most special vines that reflect their potential in the wines.

“This is a global trend,” he points out, “and one that can extend to my homeland. These types of small vineyards would be of no use to the region’s larger producers, and so by maintaining them we can not only ensure that old vines are not lost. Vinifying them is key to making the kind of wine I most appreciate.”

Álvaro Loza Viticultor, 2021 Rioja Alavesa ‘Labastida’ ($53)
95% Tempranillo and 5% Viura. Álvaro’s Labastida plots are located on the same terrace between Cien Reales and Las Viñuales, where Its most striking feature is a large layer of sandstone with calcium carbonate sediments. According to Loza, this soil contributes to obtaining the fresh tannins that characterize the wine and help to prolong the finish.

165 cases made.

Álvaro Loza Viticultor ‘Cien Reales’, 2021 Rioja Alavesa ‘Labastida’ ($87)
100% Tempranillo. A scant 24 cases were made of this highly-prized single-plot wine. The Tempranillo is hand-harvested and 70% of the fruit is destemmed, and the remaining 30% is left whole-cluster, where it ferments in the open air during a 35 day maceration. Following a pressing, the wine is racked to 225 liter neutral French oak barrels for 16 months before bottling.

Arturo de Miguel Blanco
Artuke
Rioja Alavesa ‘Baños de Ebro
Vineyards are Judged on Their Potential  

“We fight to preserve our culture, not to transform it,” announces Arturo de Miguel Blanco.

With his brother Kike (who joined him in 2010—‘Artuke’ is a portmanteau of both their first names), he cultivates about fifty acres of decades-old, high-elevation vineyards in Baños de Ebro in Rioja Alavesa. Working with blends of Tempranillo, Garnacha, Graciano, and Mazuelo (and often with white grapes in the mix) they are creating the sort of bright, fruit-and-mineral driven wines that best mirror both their terroir and new trends in Rioja.

Arturo de Miguel Blanco, Artuke

“We buck the norms and also bureaucracy,” he says. “For example, we plant all bush vines, even our newest ones. Government aid goes to trellised vines because they can be mechanized and the yields are larger, but their resistance to water stress is lower. It sadden me to see the loss of old bush vines in this area; they’re being replaced by trellised plants.”

Blanco’s father Roberto produced bulk wine from the same land, but the brothers have seen fit to explore opportunities their soil might provide by doing a detailed study of various plots in Baños de Ebro, Ávalos, San Vicente de la Sonsierra and more recently, in Samaniego. Arturo’s conclusion was eye-opening:

“Rioja should be bottled along regional, village and single vineyard lines, similar to the Burgundian approach, and we should begin to eschew the traditional Crianza, Riserva and Gran Riserva classifications.”

Artuke ‘Pies Rotos’, 2022 Rioja Alavesa ($24)
85% Tempranillo, 15% Graciano from middle-aged vines, 20 to 50 years old, grown on the alluvial soils of Baños de Ebro. Fermented on destemmed but uncrushed grapes in the carbonic maceration style; aged one year in 500-liter oak barrels, although 10% of the volume was preserved in concrete. ‘Pies Rotos’ means ‘broken feet.’ A nicely fresh evening sip with added complexity from the oak; it shows bright cherries and acidity due to the elevation of the vines, and picks up the licorice notes found in many quality Riojas.

Artuke ‘Finca de los Locos’, 2022 Rioja Alavesa ($40)
The name is a nod to Arturo’s ‘loco’ grandfather, who bought a neglected plot of land in Baños de Ebro and vowed to make productive—which he did. 80% Tempranillo and 20% Graciano, the fruit comes from the single plot ‘Las Escaleras’ planted in 1981 on sandy limestone soils. The wine is ripe and juicy, bright with red berry acidity and balsamic herbs.

Artuke ‘Paso las Mañas’, 2022 Rioja Alavesa ($50)
100% Tempranillo from a ten-acre plot of Tempranillo on the highest slope of Samaniego (at an altitude of 2500 feet) where the wind blows so relentlessly that the vines had to be specially trained, unlike the head-pruning that Arturo uses in the rest of his vineyards. Soils are clay and chalky soils with many surface stones; the grapes are fermented and aged in used French oak foudres, resulting in a wine loaded with creamy black cherry complemented by a hint of blackberries, sweet spices, and herbs.

620 cases made.

Artuke ‘El Escolladero’, 2020 Rioja Alavesa ($120)
tiny production wine, less than one thousand bottles made. And understandably so, since the grapes come from the Escolladero (derived from the Spanish word for obstacle) vineyard in one of the most difficult passages through the Sierra Cantabria mountains. 85% Tempranillo and 15% Graciano planted in 1950; the grapes are vatted in micro-tanks and undergo daily punching down and pigeage, then spends 12-16 months in 600-liter French oak barrels. The wine remains very fresh with luscious notes of bramble berries and coastal herbs behind nicely integrated tannins.

Artuke ‘La Condenada’, 2020 Rioja Alavesa ($150)
80% Tempranillo with a blend of Graciano, Garnacha and Palomino Fino. The grapes are from vines about 40 years old grown on sandy soil at an altitude of about 1800 feet. Harvested by hand and aged in French oak barrels for 14 months, then bottled without sulfur after a soft filtration, it shows dynamic blackberry, cherry and strawberry notes swirling amid toasty vanilla and roast coffee beans with a finish well-balanced with spice and mineral note.

Telmo Rodríguez
Granja Nuestra Señora de Remelluri
Rioja Alavesa ‘Labastida de Álava’
New Single-Origin Rioja 

In September, 2021 a wine that had been in the making for almost a decade was released at the Place de Bordeaux. Called ‘Yjar,’ it is a single vineyard cuvée from the foothills of the Sierra de Toloño in Rioja.

The wine was the brainchild of Telmo Rodríguez, who in 2011 returned to the idyllic family estate of Granja Nuestra Señora de Remelluri in Labastida after an 11-year absence. Intent on improving the bodega’s standing in the wine world while introducing ecologically-sound practices (viñedo ecológico, or organic vineyard, is one such example), his first step was to isolated those grapes grown at Remelluri from grapes sourced from long-standing suppliers, sending the latter to Lindes de Remelluri, a village wine range that includes a red wine from San Vicente de la Sonsierra and another one from Labastida.

Telmo Rodríguez, Remelluri

“Remelluri has not been ill-treated since the Middle Ages,” Temo says with pride. “When my parents bought it in the 1960s, it was farmed with animals, fertilized with manure, and grass grew freely among the vines. What’s so special about it is the proximity to the mountains, something that other properties lack.”

Now extending to nearly 370 acres, vineyards stretch across three valleys; the central area known as Remelluri, plus Valderremelluri and Villaesclusa. Soils vary within the clay-limestone sphere at elevations that range from of the Sonsierra. Elevation ranges from 2000 feet to nearly 3000—remarkably high for viticulture. These higher plots are reserved for white varietals.

Remelluri ‘Yjar’, 2018 Rioja Alavesa – Labastida de Álava ($179)
Pronounced (more or less) ‘Ya,’ the wine is a field blend of Tempranillo, Graciano, Garnacha, Gran Negro and Rojal. The vineyard, 9 acres in size, sits on an eroded slope with its own water supply patter; the soil contains a high concentration of carbonates, accumulated to a depth of around two feet. The wine is juicy with black cherry, crushed blueberry and cocoa powder that evolve to truffle, black pepper, incense and freshly chopped herbs.

Olivier Rivière
Rioja Alta, Rioja Baja, Rioja Alavesa
Channeling Burgundy 

Olivier Rivière’s path to Rioja was hardly one of least resistance: Born in Cognac, he had made up his mind to produce wines in Fitou—the red wine appellation at the heart of southern France’s Languedoc-Roussillon. Having studied oenology in Montagne St-Émilion, he interned in Bordeaux and then in Burgundy, working on a range of vineyards and learning the nuances of biodynamics. This latter skill proved to be his lifeline to Spain; hired by Telmo Rodriguez in 2004 to help convert his La Rioja Alavesa vineyards to biodynamic production, Rivière never left, having fallen in love with Rioja’s diversity of grape varieties and soil types.

Olivier Rivière

“The soils here are made up of red clay, limestone, sand, gravel and alluvial material,” he says, “and the climate is generally mild, typically continental. My harvests are conducted by hand, with grapes transported in 14-kilogram batches to avoid damage, and taken to the cellar for manual selection within 30 minutes. Whole cluster fermentation takes place, each variety separately, using indigenous yeasts, and the wine is aged in variously sized tanks, foudres and demi-muids. Maceration is minimal, and only a small amount of sulfites will be used at the point of bottling.”

Rivière tends to follow a technique of producing cuvées holistically across terroirs and uses a quality grading system imported from Burgundy, starting with generic appellations and village wines, and moving up to Grand Cru; this is in direct opposition of the local tradition of Crianza, Riserva and Gran Riserva. Today, he farms 61 acres with elevations between a thousand and three thousand feet and above sea level. Some of his vines are more than 90 years old, and include Tempranillo, Graciano, Mazuelo, Garnacha, Viura, Malvasia and Garnacha Blanca and cover vineyards in Rioja Alta, Rioja Baja and Rioja Alavesa, as well as his prized plot in Artanza.

Olivier Rivière ‘Las Viñas de Eusebio’, 2015 Rioja Alavesa ($55)
100% Tempranillo, Las Viñas de Eusebio comes from two sites near Laguardia and Navaridas, unique for their decomposed sandstone and limestone soils. Elevation is high (between 1600 and 2000 feet) and the vines are fairly young at 20 years old. With more age, Olivier believes that these two sites will produce at Premier Cru levels. Amazingly fragrant and densely structured, the wine is beautifully scented with forest berries, spiced plum and balsam wood through the finish.

Olivier Rivière ‘Gabaxo’, 2022 Rioja Alavesa, Rioja Alta, Rioja Baja ($28)
‘Gabaxo’ is a vaguely unfriendly term to signify a border jumper, and this wine is, in fact, Olivier’s only wine that blends fruit from various sites within Rioja. The Tempranillo and Graciano are from Rioja Alavesa, planted on rocky, clay-limestone soil at elevation nearly 1700 feet. The Garnacha is from Cárdenas in Rioja Alta, grown on red clay, and from Rioja Baja. Along with Bastid, Olivier considers Gabaxo to be equivalent to Côte de Nuits version of Rioja.

The Other Two Sub-regions: Rioja Baja and Rioja Alta

Despite the innovations happening in Rioja Alavesa, it remains the smallest of the three Rioja regions—wetter and cooler than the other two, boasting predominantly chalky clay with terraced vineyards.

Rioja Alta is located on the western side of Rioja and has an Atlantic climate with soils mostly comprised of iron-rich clay mixed with limestone. Due to the sub-region’s varying elevations, the wines produced here can have great structure and high acidity. The majority of Rioja Alta’s vineyards lie south of the Ebro River. Tempranillo thrives in these conditions, producing signature style of traditional Rioja; as a result, these wines form the backbone of most Rioja blends. Other important grape varieties include Graciano and Garnacha. When compared with Rioja Alavesa, these wines tend to be lighter in body and lower in acid, with the emphasis on elegance.

Rioja’s east is referred to as Rioja Baja, although some now call it ‘Rioja Oriental,’ thinking of ‘baja’ as a pejorative term). In fact, Rioja Baja is primarily fruit tree and vegetable country, and in the 19th century, it was criticized for planting grapevines in highly fertile alluvial soil and as a result, overproducing wine grapes. But since Rioja was traditionally made by blending grapes from all over the region and because Rioja Baja is warmer and drier than the Alta or Alavesa, Baja grapes almost always reach total ripeness, something that happens with less regularity in the other two subzones. Also, Rioja Baja was Garnacha country, adding character in blends to the predominant Tempranillo of the Alta and Alavesa. Sadly, most of the Garnacha has been replaced with Tempranillo since the late 1980s, but Garnacha is still in demand, and some wineries are investing heavily in it or replanting it.

Olivier Rivière ‘Rayos Uva’, 2022 Rioja Baja ($20)
Rayos Uva is Olivier’s version of a Bourgogne Rouge, sourced from fruit grown in the sandy, gravelly and alluvial soils of Rioja Baja. 2022’s blend is biodynamically farmed Tempranillo, Garnacha and Graciano, meant for drinking now, shows raspberry perfume with cherries in the foreground along with light tannins and mineral salts strung across a slender, fruit forward frame.

Olivier Rivière ‘Ganko’, 2022 Rioja Alta ($61)
‘Ganko’—Japanese for ‘stubborn—is Olivier’s nickname. A blend of 60 – to 90-year-old Garnacha and Mazuelo vines grown in sandy red clay at elevations near two thousand feet, it is hand-harvested and whole-cluster fermented on natural yeast in concrete tanks, then aged 16–18 months in foudre and French oak demi-muids. Powerful and full-bodied with intense, spicy red fruit notes ideal for laying down, but enjoyable young with an hour’s decanting.

Benjamín Romeo
Bodega Contador
Rioja Alta ‘San Vicente de la Sonsierra’
‘Even the Smallest Detail Has Its Reason.’ 

We’re fond of saying cavemen made wine by discovering naturally-fermented fruit while foraging, and then translating that natural happenstance to their rocky shelters. In 1995, Benjamin Romeo, winemaker and vine-grower, joined their ranks when he acquired a centuries-old cave hewn into the rock beneath the Castle of San Vicente de la Sonsierra in Rioja. He began to experiment with small-scale wine projects in the cave as he purchased more vineyard land, and meanwhile outfitted his parents’ garage with equipment to increase his capacity.

And then came his dream winery: “Between 2004 and 2006, I worked with architect Hector Herrera on the design,” says Benjamin. “It was built over the following two years and opened in June, 2008 to coincide with the summer solstice.

Benjamin Romeo, Bodega Contador

It is a nature-centered endeavor with terraces covered with plants that blend in with the local vegetation. The winemaker adds, “The bodega has exposed concrete walls so that gradually they become coated with dust and end up melding with the earth from which they came.”

Benjamín Romeo currently owns 124 acres of vineyards spread across 60 different plots, most of which are bush vines. He works with organic compost and shreds vine shoots over the soil to increase moisture retention. Selection, both on the vineyard and the winery, is essential to Romeo’s way of operating: He uses 10,000-litre wooden vats; malolactic fermentation is mostly done in barrels; aging times for red wines range from 16 to 18 months and he takes moon cycles into account when it comes to handling wines.

Both the 2004 and 2005 vintages of Contador received 100-point scores on Robert Parker’s Review—an unprecedented achievement for a Spanish winery. In fact, it’s a feat so tough that only a caveman could do it.

Bodega Contador ‘Alma Contador’, 2022 Rioja Alta ‘San Vicente de la Sonsierra’ ($123)
Romeo’s new red blend, 2020 Alma Contador, originates in three vineyards in San Vicente de la Sonsierra, each at different altitudes. It blends 92% Tempranillo with 8% Garnacha, which then matures in new French barriques for 20 months. The ‘soul’ of Contador is meant to showcases the power and elegance of Tempranillo with notes of black fruit, spice and vanilla. It is still quite young, but displays a structured palate with firm tannins and a long, lingering finish.

Rioja’s White Wine Revolution
Alavesa White,  Orange and the Jurassic 

In the mind of most wine drinkers, the most freely-associated Rioja color is red, and many are surprised to find out that the region has traditionally produced a sizeable amount of white wine—in days of yore, when the climate was cooler, Rioja had more white vineyards than red ones. In fact, it was not until the arrival of phylloxera in Bordeaux in 1866 (when merchants went looking for an alternative source of red wine) that red Rioja came into its own. And even then, these grapes were frequently used to make rosés or lighter reds called Ojo de Gallo by blending them with co-planted white varieties.

What’s true is that the white face of Rioja has suffered slings and arrows in the intervening years, many from critics who considered the offerings to be thin, overly-oaked, low on acidity and aromatics and frequently oxidized. In the middle of the twentieth century, white wine varieties still outnumbered reds in overall acreage, but it dwindled precipitously until it dipped below 10%. By the turn of the 21st century, Mercedes López de Heredia—who still crafts some of the country’s greatest and most traditional whites at her family’s bodega in Haro, admitted that she was starting to feel like ‘the last of the Mohicans.

The recent resurgence of Rioja white has been a deft balancing act between a past focused on aging in oak (and the dominance of Viura) and new grape varieties along with less traditional winemaking techniques. These are challenges that the next generation embraces, and are planting at higher altitudes with more focus on freshness and terroir.

Rioja’s three historic grape varieties—Garnacha Blanca, Malvasía de Rioja, and Viura—were all authorized when the Consejo Regulador was founded in 1925. The palette of varieties they can now choose from includes Sauvignon Blanc, Chardonnay, Maturana Blanca, the local grape Turruntés; also, fruit from old, overlooked vines in abandoned vineyards, with discoveries made of Calagraño, Jaén Blanco, Mazuelo Blanco, Moscatel de Alejandría, Palomino, Pavés, Rojal, and Xarel·lo. Better yet, old-vine Viura has overcome its poor reputation, at least in the best sites, and the development of new white-wine vineyards in areas that, in the days when the climate was substantially cooler, were considered marginal, has raised the bar on Rioja whites exponentially.

Naranja, brisé or amber: Call it what you will. In the absence of a name consensus the trend is clear, and Orange Wine has become a category in Rioja. Although its color makes it look like a rosé, orange wine is in fact the opposite: Rather than using red wine grapes, orange wines rely entirely on white varieties allowed to macerate until the must reaches the desired color and body. Like natural wine, orange wine is not to everyone’s taste, but Rioja’s top entries to the field display notes of dried figs, roasted apples, roasted almonds and fennel with hints of mango and citrus notes.

Another extraordinary style that Rioja is exploring is akin to the Jura’s vin jaune, traditional Sherry and aged White Burgundy where white wine undergoes extended aging to develop rich, nutty, oxidative characteristics.

Artuke ‘Trascuevas’, 2022 Rioja Alavesa White ($53)
90% Viura, 5% Malvasía, 5% Palomino Fino grown on calcareous clay soils from three different vineyards with vines over 50 years old. The harvest is done manually, and the grapes are transported in 20-kilogram boxes to the winery where they are destemmed, and pressed to initiate fermentation in stainless steel tanks with native yeasts. Afterward, the majority ages for 10 months in 500-liter French oak barrels, with a small percentage in concrete tanks. The wine shows a yeasty nose and a full palate of citrus, apple and pear.

Olivier Rivière ‘La Bastid’, 2022 Rioja Alavesa ‘Labastida’ White ($36)
85% Viura, 8% Garnacha Blanca, 7% Malvasía from Olivier’s Labastida vineyard planted on clay-lime soil. After careful sorting and pressing, the wine ages for ten months in 500-liter French oak barrels. It shows carefully crafted nuances of orange peel, anise seed, pear, nectarine and creamy vanilla.

Álvaro Loza Viticultor ‘Con.tacto’, 2022 Rioja Alavesa ‘Labastida’ Orange ($39)
100% Viura, known elsewhere as Macabeo, grown in a single ten-acre, south-facing plot in Elciego. The vineyard is mostly planted to Tempranillo, but Viura occupies the higher elevated end of the vine rows. The fruit is hand-harvested and whole-cluster fermented for 15 days in contact with the skins and the stems (hence, the name), then racked into 8 year old French oak barrels for one year. As in Sherry, the layer of ‘flor’ that forms in these barrels is yeast that allows fermentation to continue without oxidation. The label is a tribute to his grandfather, with his hand and Álvaro’s hand on the label, reminiscent of Michelangelo’s ‘Creation of Adam’ fresco in the Sistine Chapel.

Olivier Rivière ‘Mirando al Sur’, 2020 Rioja Alavesa ‘Labastida’ White ($98)
100% Viura from 55-year-old vines planted near the village of Labastida in Rioja Alavesa. It is named Miranda al Sur (‘looking south’) not because of the vineyard’s exposure, but because it is aged in used Sherry butts (one Fino and one Amontillado) after a whole cluster fermentation in oak vats. The wine is richly toned with notes of Balsam wood and tangerine and a subtle herbal and mineral-spicy accompaniment. In the mouth it is broad and creamy, with layered viscosity; seamless and rounded.

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Posted on 2025.04.07 in Spain DO, Wine-Aid Packages, Rioja DOC