A big anniversary & Va Va Valdeorras
Year 14, No. 16
Highlights: Valdeorras Regional Report
Welcome back from summer!
I want to start out by sending tremendous thanks to all the Hudin.com readers as this week celebrates the fifth anniversary of relaunching the site as a subscription wine publication!
To celebrate that, it’s time to offer up a special, limited time discount of 50% off for 15 hours by using the code ‘5for50’ on the subscription page. You can read additional details here as it’s been quite an adventure.
With that announcement out of the way (and hopefully used!), it’s the thick of harvest season currently where I’m based in Spain. In the mornings it’s easy to hear that soft, telltale sound of grape clusters being dropped into the picking boxes, followed by the tractors bringing in the harvest midday, and then whatever sound it is when people take a well-deserved midday rest.
As I mentioned in the previous newsletter, it’s been a rough year in terms of water which has made for small harvest totals. So, as Murphy’s Law dictates such things, we did finally get a fine dose of water last week… the first solid week of harvest for most wineries in Priorat.
I say “most wineries” as more and more as starting in August these days because that’s when the grapes are ready. It’s not uncommon for the Merlot and Grenache to already be above 14% of potential alcohol at the end of August in some locations, although a healthy splash of rain can help to dial that back a bit, but only a bit.
Is this detrimental to the wines? The answer, as always in the wine world, is yes and no. For certain vineyards, they do perfectly fine with this much heat and are actually making better wines than they ever did historically. For others, it’s “tricky” and it seems the further south you go in Priorat, the harsher it gets. Even if the grapes are in a good state, there are simply far less of them this year.
And this is singular to the region as while others such as, Penedès or Empordà have seen rainfall decreases as well, they’re not having the extreme water shortages of Priorat. And as you go further up into the southern French regions, they’ve actually have a touch too much rainfall.
One thing is for sure in that wineries seem to realize that the hotter harvests are here to stay and big, brawny, pruney-tasting wines like 2012 are, for the most part, being avoided.
Showing the great diversity in Spain, the place they’re not having problems with water is in Galicia, the northwest corner. That was readily shown in the visits as well as 75 wines tasted for the new Regional Report. I also took a in depth look at how the white grape, Godello, became the key player for this unique region. These are definitely exciting times in the far west of Spain.
Drink well, be well.
-Miquel
(*) Free to read
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This is such an exciting Galician wine region in Spain that’s come of age via a renewed focus on the white Godello grape which was nearly extinction at the turn of the 21st century.
And now this
How about two very different tastes of Macabeo wines? Those from Paraísos Perdidos in DO Bullas & Viña Salceda in DOC Rioja couldn’t be further apart in terms of profile despite having much in common initially.