Our Fine Wine Manager Visits Rioja

It is really very exciting to be invited to visit our two new producers in Rioja, and especially so, since I have never been to the region before.  Beautiful warm sunshine is forecast:  all the more reason to escape a dismal English February for a couple of days.

Day 1

The first view of Rioja is underwhelming.  I had been under the impression outside Britain, weather forecasting was always accurate.  I want to get out and snap away at the bee-youtiful mountains as soon as the fog clears, but ‘Dad’ won’t stop the car.  It’s the 1993 family holiday all over again.  Scuffles almost break out in the back seat.

We are welcomed to Sierra Cantabria by the charming and articulate Eduardo Eguren: winemaker, fount of knowledge and fifth generation heir to the family business.  Eduardo explains that although the grape Tempranillo takes its name from ‘temprano’ (early), high up in Rioja Alavesa it ripens late.  Sierra Cantabria’s highest vineyards are at about 600m elevation, and in 2009 it started snowing before they finished picking the grapes!

To the Egurens’ new underground cellars.  Mercedes with darkened windows escort our convoy fore and aft. Massive portal at end of canyon cut into hillside. “Mr King, I have been expecting you.”

This place is jaw-dropping.  Two kilometres of cellars excavated under a hilltop just outside the village of San Vicente de la Sonsierra.  A new winery is being built out of stone excavated from the cellars.

In the middle of San Vicente de la Sonsierra is the family’s oldest winery – Señorio de San Vicente – which dates back to the 1870s.  Since 1991, it has been dedicated exclusively to the production of just one wine, coming from one vineyard, ‘La Canoca’, in the foothills of the Sierra Cantabria.  The Egurens were keen to nurture the almost extinct Tempranillo Peludo (‘Hairy Tempranillo), which ripens exceptionally late, yields low and produces fabulously characterful and concentrated wine.

I have never tasted San Vicente before, but I already kind-of know that I will love it.  And I am right.  And the same goes for all twelve wines we taste here – what a phenomenal range.  Wow!

Just two hours after lunch (it finished at about 6pm), Kirsty and Ana of Ramón Bilbao treat us to the famous ‘tapas run’ in Logroño, where fifty tapas bars jostle in a single block less than 100 paces square.  To avoid competition, each bar specialises in just one or two dishes.  After such a late lunch, the question is:  Can we fit them?  Yes we can!

I must look unmistakably English, because somebody cannons into me and mutters “perdón, perdón,” a couple of times.  Looking at me he then says “sorry, sorry, sorry!” And I haven’t even opened my mouth.  Has someone put a sign saying “Inglés” on my forehead?

Day 2

Ana takes us first to the dizzyingly high vineyard in La Rioja Alta (High Rioja) in which Tempranillo for the ‘Viñedos de Altura’ wine is grown.  Garnacha comes from a vineyard in Rioja Baja (Low Rioja), which is similarly high up.  Confused?  If Ana had hoped to induce vertigo in us, the fog paid to that – you can’t see a thing.

Over the hill and along some very bumpy tracks is the ancient vineyard planted 100% with Tempranillo, whose fruit is made into the ‘Mirto’ wine.

A couple of points of interest are a Roman wine press and a chozo – a shallot-shaped hut traditionally used for storing tools and shelter for vineyard workers from summer thunderstorms.

At Ramón Bilbao’s winery in Haro, we are treated to a tasting of all of their wines, inside a glass cube suspended over a fermentation vat.  Not sure which Bond film took place here.  Yesterday’s tasting is a hard act to follow, but to our delight, this is another ‘wow’ experience.  The style is different here – more succulent and forward – but the wines are also delicious, and there’s some exciting innovation.  Even at today’s exchange rates, they are also very affordable.

The team – Ed, Kirsty, Graeme, Kate, Matt, Dave (‘Dad’), Kathrine, Freddie and me.