spanish wines - Galicia

This "entry level wine" is really a top wine! Respectful of its terroir, elegant and complex, with a good ageing potentiel. Pazo means estate in the Galician language.

An entry-level wine... and a top wine! Respectful of its terroir, elegant and complex. And with some ageing potential. Pazo means estate in Galician.

The new top wine by Berta Garcia, who made wine at Latour and Haut Brion. The grapes come from within the estate's walls, hence the name of this cuvée, Tras Los Muros, behind the walls.

This cuvée is only produced in the best vintages. It is not aged in barrels but in stainless steel tanks, on its lees, at low temperatures. This unique wine is only released after 6 years.

This is only the second time that this cuvée Castro Baroncelli has ever been produced - a 100% Mencia from the highest vines. And one of its greatest wines.

A nice blend from the "campo de probas" (the experimentation field) where José Luis Mateo has planted or grafted several old local varieties. This fantastic wine was produced for the first time in 2015.

This wine is made from Garnacha Tintorera vines planted in the 1920s. It us quite unique, for this grape is habitually used in blends, mainly for the colour. But José Luis Mateo has decided to use it on its own and makes a wine full of personality out of it, a refined wine with a Rhône character.

With this wine, José Luis Mateo has accomplished a tour de force and a première, recuperating the Verdello Antiguo, an old clone of Godelllo from the Monterrei heights. This wine has more tension than your usual Godello.

An Atlantic-climate wine coming from Southern Galicia. Its Burgundy, refined style is that of a different Spain.

The smoky and leesy 2019 Gorvia Blanco is a single-vineyard white from a classified vineyard, the first one he planted 38 years ago with trellises and later transformed to goblet. It's one hectare on a slope by the Monterrei Castle on decomposed and complex slate soils, mostly Dona Blanca with 5% Treixadura and Verdello Antiguo. It fermented in a 1,500-liter foudre and a 500-liter barrel, all used and neutral, where the wine is kept with lees for one year, then blended and put in stainless steel for one more year. It feels young and undeveloped; it's still pale and primary, with notes of herbs and fennel, crushed stones and a balanced palate with precision, delineation and purity and with a very tasty finish. The variety is considered quite neutral but does reflect the character of the place quite faithfully ... at least when worked like this! Bravo! 2,500 numbered bottled were filled in November 2021.

This wine is named after a small enclave in the D.O. Monterey: Govia. The estate's wines are all farmed biodynamically.

With this wine, José Luis Mateo has accomplished a tour de force and a première, recuperating the Verdello Antiguo, an old clone of Godelllo from the Monterrei heights. This wine has more tension than your usual Godello.

Louro is only the second wine of this estate but it illustrates the huge potential of Godello: it is a showcase for minerality and balance. Rafael says that he vinifies the Spanish Grüner Veltliner.

Sorte O Soro is Rafael Palacios' first Grand Cru in the Bibei valley in Valdeorras. This is definitely one of Spain's absolute top wines and the nec plus ultra of the Godello. Sourced from one of his best parcels "O Soro", The result in the glass is a tighter Godello in its youth with plenty of fraîche, complexity and structure. Everything the greatest white wine should have in the house is found in this bottle.

Sorta Antiga comes from the oldest and the most spectacular of Rafa's vineyards- he names it "the Montrachet of Valdeorras". The parcel is only 0,24 ha. Only bush vines, planted in 1920. The soil is covered with straw, to avoid erosion of the powdery granit. Thos Godello is something apart in Rafa's range. Darker, due to the skin-contact maceration - a tannic white, the orange wine by Rafael Palacios.

Rafael's wine adventure all started with this As Sortes. He wanted to produce one wine, and that's all. And no doubt this wine is at the top of the Valdeorras wines, and white Spanish wines also. "As Sortes" is an old Galician administrative term which refers to a lottery system supposed to avoid too much division of hearted lands. Warning: only 600 bottles are available on the Belgian market!