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Lebanese Nat

Published 21. February 2025 by Vidar Kenneth Johansen

This wine was served in a tasting of Lebanese wines in my local wine club this week. It was the only sparkling wine, or pét nat, and stood out in more than one way.

The producer is Mersel Wine, named after the region Maksar Mersel, which is the highest viticultural region in Lebanon. The grapes for this wine however are grown in Deir El Ahmar, Bekaa Valley at “only” 1.200 meters altitude.

Mersel’s wines are made naturally, with very little or no sulfites. They are unfiltered and unfined and fruits of organic farming methods.

Eddie Chami, the winemaker at Mersel Wine, was born and raised in Australia. He doesn’t speak French and didn’t want Mersel to be associated with the French wine making influence in Lebanon. He has a passion for wines made by local Lebanese indigenous grape varieties. This said, the red Leb Nat is made from cinsault. After almost 200 years in the country (first planted by jesuits in the mid 19th century) the grape has long been acclimatised to Lebanese conditions though. By the way, Mersel was the first winery in the country to launch a pét nat.

The grapes are pressed, then the juice and pulp spend 5 days together before fermentation starts. The wine then ferments for about 20 days at 14°C, is then bottled and completes fermentation in the bottle, where it rests on lees for 1 year.

Leb Nat 2022 (Mersel Wine)

Cherry red with small bubbles. Smells of cherry and raspberry, with herbs. Fresh in the mouth with energetic acidity, lightly bubbly, with a slight touch of tannins (the same structure or dryness as the still red cinsaults in the tasting), and finishes dry. Quite peculiar; in a way it reminded me of a clarete (a mix of red and white grapes), on the other hand I also found a surprising tannic dryness.

Price: Medium

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Wine of the Week

New saca of palma Caberrubia

Published 14. February 2025 by Vidar Kenneth Johansen

Luis Pérez is one of the leading producers in the new wave of Jerez. I reviewed a pasto wine in September last year. Here you can learn what it is, if you don’t already know, and also get an introduction to the producer.

Caberrubia is a non vintage wine from the El Corregidor estate in the Carrascal pago. It’s named a palma, a classification for especially fine wines in the fino style.

The grapes are palomino fino trained in gobelet, from a 40 years old vineyard. The producer’s website tells that the harvesters go through the vineyard from the beginning of August to the end of September selecting bunches for different types of wines. The first pickings are for the greenest bunches on the plant. From these they make a wine with low alcohol and high acidity, that is used to correct the rest of the wines. The third of five pickings is the base for the palmas such as Caberrubia.

The vinification is typical: Light pressing and fermentation in the barrel, packing in December and approximately three and a half years of biological ageing.

There have been various sacas (bottlings) of the wine. Now we have come to the seventh. With Saca VII they have expanded the selection to 17 botas (typical sherry casks), mostly 2017, 2018 and 2019, and small proportions of previous vintages. With this assemblage they seek a style that is representative for the vineyard, that is “an inland character, roundness and concentration, without losing the elegance and finesse that defines all the previous sacas”. According to the new legislation a wine can be called sherry even if it’s not fortified, only if it has reached 15º of alcohol. This saca has not reached that level, so it’s not released as a fino within the D.O. Jerez-Xérès-Sherry, but as a white wine.

Caberrubia Saca VII (Luis Pérez)

Deep golden. Complex aroma with fresh fruits like baked apples and peach, complemented by nuts, and a touch of flor and salt. Good volume in the mouth, concentrated and smooth, salty and long. It has more power than the previous saca, but it’s also very elegant.

Price: Medium-high

Food: Aperitif, various tapas incl. asparagus, cheese and nuts, also nice with rice and spicy dishes

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Wine of the Week

Beautiful Bierzo from Banzao

Published 7. February 2025 by Vidar Kenneth Johansen

To make the history short, Silvia Marrao from Madrid became interested in winemaking in Italy and fell in love with the vineyards of Bierzo after having spent some time in Rías Baixas. Her Banzao project began with the lease of a old 3 hectare vineyard in San Pedro de Olleros in 2017, located at 750 meters of elevation. We are in the in the Ancares valley, in El Bierzo. A banzao is a small, temporary dam that raises river or stream levels to channel water for irrigation. Made of wood and stone, it washes away with autumn rains, only to be rebuilt yearly -as Silvia puts it, mirroring the natural cycle, like the vine’s renewal through winter pruning.

Silvia has currently around four hectares of her own vineyards, thanks to private owners in San Pedro de Olleros who came to offer them to her. Currently is cultivated on a total of 18 plots in 8 different parajes in the Villa de San Pedro de Olleros. These have different orientation, altitude and type of soil. Being in the Ancares Leoneses Biosphere Reserve, she wants to work organic, integrating the plant into the biodiversity of the area and intervening as little as possible.

Eras la Ermita is one of Silvia’s 5 paraje wines. It’s from a vineyard of mainly mencía planted in the 1940s and 50s and been in recovery since 2017. The soil is slate with clay and quartzite. The wine was fermented with native yeasts in barrels and stainless steel tanks, 50% with stems and the rest gently destemmed without crushing. It was aged for 9 months in 500 and 225 liter barrels.

It is a fairly large field at the northern edge of San Pedro, gently sloping toward the city. Over time, the wind has eroded its loose soil, leaving a thin topsoil. Quarry stone and weathered slate define both the terrain and the character of the wine.

Eras la Ermita 2021 (Bodegas Banzao)

Deep clear red. Aromas of dark forest berries and raspberries, aromatic herbs, with an earthy note. The palate follows up with dark and red fruits, together with a stony minerality, and it has a good concentration and a lovely integrated acidity. It’s in a way delicate and juicy, but it also has a firm tannins that will help it through a few more years. It’s a wine with real nerve and energy.

Price: Medium

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Articles

A classic entry-level Rioja

Published 5. February 2025 by Vidar Kenneth Johansen

This wine I brought to a dinner to go with a terrine of grouse, a task that it fulfilled with excellence. Its creator Sandra Bravo is a favourite on this blog, and I wanted to take the opportunity now that this wine celebrates its 10 years anniversary. In fact the same wine has been featured before. Here is a link to the former blogpost.

The cultivation is organic, the must was fermented with natural yeasts in steel, clay and cement, and it spent some 6 months in used French oak barrels. In fact it was probably the first wine in Rioja to be elevated in amphora.

When I last reviewed it in 2017 the wine was at the height of its fruitiness, with a lot of cool, fresh red fruits, and also with a slightly roasted tone. Obviously, now all of that was gone giving way to the usual time markers. Drinking the wine was like a pleasant reunion with an old friend. I have another bottle that I will not save much longer though.

Sierra de Toloño 2014 (Sierra de Toloño)

Deep granate with brick rim. Blackberry, with figs and prunes, leather and hint of underwood. Mature fruit in the mouth, medium weight, with mature tannins, integrated acidity. It’s a bit drying and past its prime, but nevertheless truly pleasant.

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Wine of the Week

From Europe’s highest vineyard

Published 31. January 2025 by Vidar Kenneth Johansen

Three months ago I had contact with José Andrés Prieto that ended with an agreement to visit in Inazares, Murcia, when I was going on holiday. Then suddenly and unexpectedly he died, on the 30th of November. (Here is an article in Spanish from local paper La Verdad.) I didn’t contact the family then, but I will. All I did was to buy his wine again in the excellent delicatessen shop Sabor y Tradición, just down the road from our flat in Murcia city.

This project was started by two brothers-in-law and their wives in 2005. At the time they didn’t have any knowledge about farming or winegrowing, but got advice from Vinitech Bordeaux. After seven years oenologist María José Fernández Llamas joined the project. They follow a philosophy of minimal intervention and sustainability.

A few years ago I reported from Pedro Olivares’ vineyards nearby, in Inazares, a hamlet of Moratalla municipality. (Read about it here.) This project is now abandoned. This means that it’s little doubt that the highest (at least commercial) vineyards in Europe is now Alto de Inazares’ vineyard at 1.373 meters.

The grapes are viognier, chardonnay, gewürztraminer, sauvignon blanc and riesling, planted in 2011 and cultivated organically on trellises, with a simple cordon royat. The grapes are hand-harvested and destemmed. After a light pressing skin maceration is carried out for 6 hours. The clarification is done by a natural settling of the sediments. The wine is aged on lees in steel for 6 months.

Blanco de Blancas 2021 (Alto de Inazares)

Straw yellow. Plenty of aromatics, with citrus (lemon), floral and herbal notes, and a slight tropical hint (melon). Fresh in the mouth, concentrated, mineral, with a vivid acidity and a long aftertaste. Full of energy.

Price: Medium

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Wine of the Week

Rich white Jumilla

Published 24. January 2025 by Vidar Kenneth Johansen

This wine was enjoyed with a savoury fish dish at the restaurant Pura Cepa in Murcia city.

It’s made by the Pacheco family winery, or: Bodegas Viña Elena, in Jumilla. Elena Pacheco is third generation, the winery being founded by her grandfather Francisco in 1948, who then started making wine with modest equipment. 4th generation is today working in the winery, and in oenology Elena has great help from Pilar Abellán, who has been with the winery for more than 20 years. The cultivation is always organic.

The vineyard for this wine is located in the Estrecho de Marín valley, south of the town of Jumilla. They are young, planted in 2018 in bush and dry land. The varieties are white Mediterranean, including garnacha blanca.

The wine was fermented in stainless steel tanks at a temperature of 16 ºC and aged in 500L French oak barrels for 7 months. Plate and amicrobial filtration.

Familia Pacheco Edición Especial 2022 (Viña Elena)

Light golden colour. Aroma of melon and baked citrus, with a layer of nuts and butter, and with notes of vanilla. Rich and structured in the mouth, tasty, well-integrated wood, with decent acidity and long and persistent finish.

Price: Medium

Food: Tasty fish dishes, grilled fish, light meat

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Wine of the Week

Nat pinotage

Published 17. January 2025 by Vidar Kenneth Johansen

Last week I hosted a rather unlikely tasting, of wines from granite soils worldwide. There were some well-known wines. This one I would probably not have come across if it weren’t because I was searching for adequate wines from South Africa.

It’s made from pinotage, a cross between cinsault and pinot noir, that has become something of a national grape in South Africa. Usually made in a riper style, this one is lighter and fresher, somewhat reminiscent of its parentage. Alex Milner at Natte Valleij is otherwise known for his attraction to the cinsault variety.

The bush-vines were planted in 1997 in the Darling area, only 16km form the cold Atlantic ocean. The grapes were harvested by hand and sorted by hand in the cellar. Fermentation is spontaneous in large concrete open fermenters, with a gentle extraction only with punch-downs. The wine is then left undisturbed in 1500L concrete eggs and seasoned barrels for 9 months.

Nat Pinotage 2023 (Natte Valleij)

Dark cherry with a purple touch. Aroma of dark fruits (blackberry, morello), with some animal notes and a light touch of tarmac. Light to medium-bodied, firm but elegant tannins, and a fresh and balanced acidity.

Price: Low

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Wine of the Week

Outstanding from Ourense

Published 10. January 2025 by Vidar Kenneth Johansen

We had this wine at the Pura Cepa restaurant in Murcia. It was chosen from a quite extensive by the glass menu to go with a savoury turbot dish.

The Lagar de Sabaríz winery is located in San Amaro in Ourense, Galicia, that is just outside the boundaries of the DO Ribeiro. The founder Pilar Higuero works her vineyards biodynamically, though the climate is heavily influenced by the Atlantic and has high yearly rainfall.

The vineyard covers four hectares, at 400 metres above sea level, high for Ribeiro. The soil is granitic, which is typical for the area.

A Pita Cega is the Galician name for a children’s game. The varieties are mainly treixadura and albariño, with a collection of other grapes.

Grape bunches are pressed with stems and the must ferments with natural yeasts. The wine doesn’t undergo malolactic fermentation and there is no bâtonnage. It ages for 1 year in stainless steel, and a little sulphur dioxide is added before bottling.

The bottles weigh less than 400 g. And they bear no labels, as Pilar herself paints every bottle by hand. The corks come from protected forests.

A Pita Cega 2015 (Lagar de Sabariz)

Pale cold yellow colour. Fresh aroma of apricot, citrus (baked lemon), pears and white flowers, towards a flinty background. In the mouth it’s fresh with a granitic minerality, with a lot of nerve, and with a slightly bitter and pleasant, long aftertaste. This is outstanding quality, The freshness is impressive for a wine of this age, and it should have many years ahead.

Price: Medium

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Articles

Some reds at La Gracia, Murcia

Published 6. January 2025 by Vidar Kenneth Johansen

It’s always a pleasure to come back to La Gracia natural wine bar in the centre of Murcia. They have a small but carefully crafted selection of wines. And I know I can trust sommelier Esperanza Pérez and let her just chose something.

This Christmas and New Year I visited twice. Though the temperature was quite low we chose to sit outside, so the descriptions might suffer a bit. I had two wines that I have described before. You can read about the local Negrete 2021 (Negre- T Blue) here and Navaciegos (Cható Gañán), Gredos here. Sorry, I didn’t get the vintage of the latter, but it was probably 2019.

Here follow two wines that both were perfect for a cold winter’s afternoon, with 15 and 14,5% alcohol respectively.

Ninja de las Uvas 2022 is made by Julia Casado, or La del Terreno, as she calls her project. It’s located in the Sierra de Lavia regional park in Murcia, and the wine comes under the designation DO Bullas. We are in monastrell country, but this wine is in fact made of garnacha tinta. It’s made with grapes from 20 year old vines planted in clay and calcareous gravel soil at 750 metres above sea level and tended organically. The grapes are 90% destemmed and macerated for 15 days, with malolactic fermentation in used barrels. Bottled without being filtered, clarified or adding sulphur. It’s a unique wine with some warmth, but with a lovely fruit quality (morello, plums), complemented by aromatic herbs and coffee. It fills the mouth with its roundness and is perfect in the cold Murcian winter.

Ars Nova 2016 is from Navarra, made by Bodega Tandem, that is José Maria Fraile and Alicia Eyaralar. They are committed to little intervention. The grapes are cultivated in the Yerri valley, in western Navarra, that is, as sommelier Esperanza points out, close to Rioja Alavesa.

It’s made of Navarra’s trilogy of grapes, cabernet sauvignon, merlot and tempranillo. Fermentation took place at controlled temperatures of 28°C, with a careful extraction. Pumps were not used, instead, the wine was racked by gravity into concrete vats. The wine was not cold stabilised or fined. It spent 24 months in concrete vats, followed by nine months in French oak. Super black fruit, with olive and spice. It’s full in the mouth, with nice concentration. Perfect for this kind of setting.

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Wine of the Week

Sparkling new year

Published 3. January 2025 by Vidar Kenneth Johansen

This wine was opened to salute the new year 2025.

Raventós i Blanc is one of the leading producers of sparkling wine in Catalunya. Pepe Raventós has family links to the creator of the drink that came to be called cava. Still he was one of the first to leave the DO Cava, to establish his own appellation Conca del Riu Anoia. It is located in the Penedés comarca (area), in a valley between the Prelitoral and Litoral mountain ranges.

Raventós i Blanc makes mineral and saline wines, at a quality that is incredibly stable. I have never been disappointed.

De la Finca comes from a vineyard known as Vinya dels Fòssils. The old bush-trained vines were planted in 1964 on the highest terraces of the Anoia, on a soil covered with marine fossils. The orientation is predominantly northern, and there is spontaneous plant covers, that contribute to bring freshness to the wine. Viticulture is biodynamic. The grapes are the traditional blend xarel.lo, macabeu and parellada. Each variety and soil is vinified separately before settling together.

De La Finca 2021 (Raventós i Blanc)

Light straw yellow with fine bubbles. Aromas of lemon, yeast, lime and brioche, over a layer of smoke and herbs. Mineral in the mouth, a little austere, with a fresh acidity, completely dry. It’s Mediterranean in its ripeness, but it also shows a fresh side. Wonderfully balanced.

Price: Medium

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