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Month: February 2025

Wine of the Week

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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