Very, very wonderful Vega
Day 2 of our Spanish trip and the three of us have a profoundly wonderful time at Vega Sicilia after adventures in underground parking and before getting completely lost in Vallodalid.
Day 2 of our Spanish trip and the three of us have a profoundly wonderful time at Vega Sicilia after adventures in underground parking and before getting completely lost in Vallodalid. Vega Sicilia Visit – 19th July 2007
Up at a fairly civilized hour this morning – around 7am – and out of the hotel by 9am on the dot for our 3 hour drive west to Ribera del Duero. First, we had to get out of the hotel car park – a far more complicated endeavour than you might think. Parking was free overnight and the receptionist told me to first put the ticket from the previous evening into the machine and then a ticket which she gave me that morning. We duly drove up to the gate and inserted the tickets as instructed. Precisely nothing happened. Claire tried again, still nothing. Tom got out and tried and still, nada. A helpful Spanish man parked behind us came up and issued what seemed to be very complicated instructions. As none of us speak Spanish, this was not entirely helpful.
By now, there was a patient but probably slightly irritable line of people in cars stretching up the ramp so we decided to get out of the way and go back to reception with the problem. Again, a much more complicated procedure than it sounds. There was an unforgettable (and not in a good way) ‘reversing in a tiny, cramped underground garage in Spain ‘ incident with Jude in Seville 3 years ago that still brings me out in a cold sweat, not to mention the ‘reversing straight into another parked car’ occasion in an even more cramped garage in Jerez. The day, for me, was rapidly degenerating. Slowly, gingerly and with much encouragement from Tom and Claire, I started to swing the car around and out of the way. There seemed to be walls, pillars, scooters or other cars pressing in from every angle and with my inbuilt complete inability to judge spatial distance, it was a most unpleasant experience. Just as we had made enough space for the other drivers to get out, Claire shrieked ‘STOP’ really very loudly. The car was a very slender hairs breadth from loosing the left hand side wing mirror completely courtesy of a concrete pillar which I was astonishingly close to. I had in fact already managed 4 deep scratches and a slight dent in the left hand door which none of us had noticed. Second wine trip in less than a year (the other was southern France last September) in which I have managed to inflict semi serious damage on an innocent vehicle.
Tom returned with a ticket which worked and after all collectively breathing in, I managed to squeeze back past the pole without any further destruction. I seriously do pray for the day when Green & Blue will be able to hire drivers to take care of this sort of thing on wine trips. Please, please buy lots of wine and come in often for lunch and dinner so that this day comes as soon as possible. The car hire firms of Europe will thank you for it.
We finally got to Vega Sicilia at about 12:30pm after a journey enlivened by a sort of version of 20 questions (Tom : a bridge cannot be described as a ‘tool’ and Claire, Drew Barrymore is not even close to being an Oscar winning actress). Once there, we waited in the parking lot surrounded by their lush, peaceful gardens for Puri Mancebo, their very lovely export director. When she arrived, she suggested going down the road to Alion first before having a good look around Vega.
First, a potted history of the region. Ribera has been a DO since 1982, so it is still very young. The original owners of Vega were actually the pioneers here, founding the winery in 1864. The region had other growers then, but none were bottling their own wine and the original owner blazed a trail, establishing an impressive reputation all over the world and, one imagines, having a whale of a time before going spectacularly bankrupt at which point a bank took over and ran it for 60 years. It was then bought by a very wealthy German business man based in Venezuela as a wedding present for his son who took precisely no interest in it what so ever before the Alvarez family took it over in 1982. Their money has been made through a number of other companies and this is a project that they are not only devoted to, but which they are not expecting to make immediate or even mid-term returns on. An attitude which makes all the difference to how things are done.
Back to the history of the region though. A co-operative was founded in 1928 and the other wineries slowly started appearing from the 1930’s, Pesquera being the first. It was Vega though who bought the French varietals into the region in the late 19th century – a whole host of them, with Cabernet Sauvignon (often very difficult to ripen here), Merlot and Malbec emerging as varieties best suited while others like Pinot Noir never really took root. Contemporary producers here are much more likely to use 100% Tinto Fino (the clone of Tempranillo, generally higher in acidity than those from elsewhere in Spain) than a blend.
It was also Vega which put the region and indeed in many ways, the wines of Spain on the map both nationally and internationally.
At 750m, Ribera is generally higher than Rioja with a very continental climate, temperatures fluctuating greatly between day and night – a great influence on the subsequent intensity of the wines. Spring frost is a real problem here and most of the vineyards sport chimneys which blow out hot air and fans to circulate this as protection. On the plus side, this means that it is very easy to be organic here, the extreme temperatures keeping rots and mildew in check naturally.
I have rather well documented notes on the history of Alion in the posting on the recent London tasting, so please refer back to that for more details which I will not repeat here. The winery was hugely impressive though, small but immaculate and expertly set up to deal with the grapes as simply and unobtrusively as possible. Alion was bought into the world to be a more modern style than Vega and comes from 3 different vineyard areas in Ribera, all of which are owned by the Alvarez family apart from the grapes from the Burgos area, which come from 2 growers with much older vineyards.
After destemming, the grapes go into French oak tanks – 15,000 litre capacity- which are changed every 5 years and the fermentation then lasts 2 weeks and goes up to about 30º celcius with malolactic fermentation taking place in barrels after this. They now use vertical presses here, different to the horizontal pneumatic presses in use at Vega. There is one racking a year once the wine is in barrel and fining with egg white. After blending, it goes into stainless steel tanks for 3 months to settle and is then bottled. Vega are famous for numbering each and every one of their bottles and the control and traceability this affords is amazing. If there is a problem with any bottle, the exact date of bottling, cork batch and manufacturer are immediately obvious. The plans are to extend this still further so that soon, they will also be able to determine exactly which barrels and which vineyards any faulty wine came from. Impressive indeed.
Back in the car then and up the road to look at some of the Vega vineyards. Soils are a mixture of chalk and limestone on the hills with more clay on the lower lying ground. In all, 19 different soil types have been identified in this region. The vines are a minimum of 10 years old (all fruit from younger vines is never used) and a maximum of 60 – they are not believers in fruit from vines older than this. Most of these are bush vine trained but the Cabernet is trellised.
We also had a look at a 100 year old vineyard which dates back to the original owner who bought back all the French varietals after a shopping spree in the early 20th century. This is a higgledy piggeldy bunch of Cabernet, Tinto Fino, Pinot Noir, Muscat, Malbec and Merlot and although the fruit is not used for anything, this is kept on out of interest. It is a very beautiful spot on the slope of a hill, surrounded by pine forests, first planted 500 years ago and one of the original sources of wood for the Spanish Armada
So to the winery, not quite as modern as Alion but equally impressive in its orderly cleanliness. Here too, they have wooden fermentation tanks (18,000litre capacity) as well as concrete and the plan is to gradually phase out the stainless steel as they are finding (as is the case in Rioja at Palacios Remondo) that the wine cools far too rapidly at night in steel, meaning that there is real danger of fermentation stopping all together at very crucial times. This is a particular problem here as the harvest is often not till late October or early November when temperatures can be decidedly nippy. They also find they wood gives a more gentle, less reductive character to the wines with softer, silkier tannins form the beginning.
Three wines are made under the Vega label – Valbuena, the softer, more supple wine which has both Merlot and Malbec in the blend every year and which is released at 5 years old after spending 3 years in a mixture of French and American oak. Unico is of course the flagship, made from Tinto Fino and usually, just Cabernet – it depends entirely on the year. This has 7 years in total in wood and then 3 years in bottle, so it is released at 10 years old. It is not made in every vintage – most recently, 92, 93, 97 and 01, all fairly disasterous for one reason or another, saw none of it. Finally, there is Unico Reserva Especial, a blend of 3 vintages made in minute quantities – 10 – 15,000 bottles only – which is aged for 3 – 4 years in bottle before release and like Unico, is made for long term ageing.
All the American barrels used are made by their own cooper from staves which are seasoned outside for 2years and under a cover for 1. All of these are toasted.
Puri told us about a white that they are experimenting with – a blend of Roussane, Marsanne, Viognier and Chardonnay which has varying degrees of oak and which they hope to release a first vintage of in a few years. The family feel that Spain is lacking an iconic white wine. One built, like their reds, for medium or long term ageing, so this is the eventual goal.
It was then around 3pm and we all felt very ready for lunch, despite the amount of food we had eaten the day before and a service station breakfast (Spanish style – an entirely different proposition to the English equivalent) of tortilla and pepper sandwiches. This proved amazingly worth waiting for. We followed Puri to Fuenta de la Acena (www.fuenteacena.com) a hotel and restaurant opened 4 years ago in a restored Flour mill on the banks of the Duero. This is a beautiful place with original beams and thick grey stone walls, the restaurant being on a Mezzanine level which is a new addition. Puri bought along a magnificent selection of wines and the food was superb – all in all one of the meals of the year so far (and although we are only in July, it may well emerge as the overall winner without too much trouble).
We started with the 2004 and 2004 Mandolas Furmint from the property Vega own in Tokaji, Hungary. Please see further details on the posting about the Alion tasting. The 03 was tasting absolutely beautiful – great spiced, honeyed richness with a very fresh edge, it went very well with the tuna tartare which the kitchen sent out for us to nibble on.
We then launched into the Vega wines, starting with 04 Pintia, their red from the Toro region with is 100% Tinta de Toro, the local clone of Tempranillo. Rustic and rich, this is made as the others are, in large oak vats but the fruit for this is cooled over night before destemming and the juice then given a 4 day cold soak pre-fermenation to retain freshness and acidity – not easy in a region where the wines are routinely 15% alcohol and known for their huge, rustic power.
This was followed by the 02 Alion which tasted much as I remembered it from London – elegant with very fresh acidity perfectly balanced by red fruit and liquorice. It gives no hint at all of the fact that this was a difficult vintage.
Starters had arrived just before the Alion – Gazpacho (made with watermelon and tomatoes, an extra refreshing, unusual twist) with 4 plump prawns coated with almonds on a skewer for Puri and I. Tom had a dish I had been very tempted by - chickpeas with octopus in squid ink. Indescribably good – rustic, earthy and delicious and a mammoth portion to boot. Claire had a raw tuna salad which was similarly impressive – melt in the mouth meat with crunchy vegetables.
Onto the 01 Valbuena which was everything this wine should be - rich, glossy and utterly seductive. Puri said that if she had to choose just one from the range as her ultimate favourite, it would be this. Certainly, it is wonderfully consistent in my experience. I have yet to encounter a bottle of Valbuena which is not drinking well and it does so from its earliest years. With Unico, magnificent as it is, it can be frustratingly closed and dumb at times.
We already felt full as ticks and then the mains arrived. Tom had oxtail which he manfully ploughed through with a dreamy, blissful expression on his face while Claire had organic fillet of beef which comes from a farm north of the region, also owned by the Alvarez family. This was utterly simple but looked quite amazing and she said, worked incredibly well with the Alion.
I had a tomato, rocket and mojamo (thin strips of wind dried tuna) salad which was incredible as well and pretty much exactly what I felt like eating although needless to say, it was not really a perfect match with the wines. I was driving though and had to restrain myself after an initial taste – definitely the hardest thing I had had to do all day, and that includes my adventures with a concrete pillar that morning.
The mains were served with the 1998 Unico, drinking amazingly well, we all agreed. This bottle had not yet retreated back into its shell and was full of earthy but elegant red fruit, liquorice and spice with fine, utterly elegant tannins supporting it. Full of brooding power, the overall impression was never the less of a wine which was the epitome of finesse and each mouthful really was a complete pleasure.
We were all in grave danger of sliding slowly off our chairs and onto the floor in a crumpled heap after all of this but Puri was not finished with us yet. She had apparently requested something sweet in the middle of the table to all share but the restaurant staff had somehow heard ‘bring each of a us a large plate of dessert please’ and so, to accompany the Oremus 5 Puttonyos Tokaji, we had crisp caramel wafers with milk ice-cream and custard pastries. The wine was excellent as always – the intensely sweet orange blossom and marmalade flavours perfectly balanced by crystalised grapefruit acidity but I only managed to nibble on some of the caramel wafer before admitting defeat on the dessert front.
This was a fabulous meal with wines that I do really love very deeply and passionately. They are not cheap, but then the sort of attention to detail and loving care which they receive has to be paid for. Far too many ‘fine wines’ of the world are too much about hype and scarcity value and not nearly enough about what is in the glass but the wines from the Vega stable are a world away from these and I cannot recommend them highly enough, particular enjoyed in the magnificent surroundings and with the sensational food at Hotel Fuente.
We stumbled out in the hot, sunny afternoon afterwards and stood watching fishermen standing on a weir in the river, catching perch. Claire and Tom, not nearly as sober as I – although to be fair, they were hardly rolling drunk – decided that they wanted a walk along the river so after saying our goodbyes to Puri, we made our way down to the fishing spot. I had to make phone calls but they removed socks and shoes and waded in and along the weir to the far river bank. As I caught up with various things in London (we are still very much in the manic just post opening phase with Clapham), I watched as Claire, bit by bit got deeper and deeper until eventually she was well and truly swimming. Tom disappeared behind some trees, only to emerge in his boxer shorts and soon two small heads were bobbing merrily down stream. I felt to warm and relaxed to feel panicky but the Spanish fishermen were obviously hugely confused and probably more than a little annoyed at this intrusion on their fishing patch. Puri had assured us before that no-one ever swam in the river although people frequently sun bathed along its banks.
I was on the phone to Jude at the time and he reminded me that I we were too short staffed to loose two important members of the team somewhere down the Duero river but I still could not get myself too concerned. While he predicted all manner of dire outcomes including poisoning by sewage being pumped into the river (despite no evidence at all of this), I dangled my feet and suddenly felt my tiredness very acutely. How lovely it would be to throw exhaustion, responsibility and propriety to the wind and join them. I didn’t though, staying resolutely dry and decorous on the bank while two charmingly gnarled old Spanish gentlemen smiled and nodded at me while at the same time gravely shaking their heads at the conduct of the heads in the river.
We made it back to the car by about 6:30pm and I looked forward to what should have been a relatively short and easy drive to our hotel in Vallodalid. How wrong I was. Tom and Claire, although professing themselves very awakened and refreshed by their dip, soon dozed off and left me with the GPS lady who, on approaching the city centre, suddenly lost her mind and, I imagine, for the sheer hell of it, directed us down a small overgrown road into an area which was undoubtedly very much on the wrong side of the Vallodalid tracks. The car was rudely awakened to the sound of me cursing her in particularly colourful and creative language and Tom, to his credit, snapped to attention pretty smartish and tried to get us out of where we were.
This did not work and we seemed to plough deeper and deeper into nowhere. Frustratingly, we could see the main road we almost certainly needed to get back to and yet despite numerous twists and turns, could not get anywhere near it. Fearing for the health of the GPS system, he wisely turned off the commentary so that, on top of all the other issues we were facing, we did not have the annoying superior voice telling us to find a safe spot in which to do an authorised u-turn every 5 minutes –obviously the GPS code for ‘you have now fucked up completely and are so totally lost you may never arrive. Please turn back and get out of here’.
I will draw a veil over the rest of the journey suffice it to say we are now amazingly familiar with the less salubrious suburbs of Vallodalid as well as the incredibly complex one way system of the city centre and Tom and Claire have a full and varied range of new and, even if I say so myself, particularly expressive expletives which they can draw on in the future. We finally arrived at our hotel – lovely but hardly ‘central’ which is how Last Minute.com had described it – at 8:30pm.
Despite the fact that all I really wanted to do was fall into bed and sleep and the other two looked much the same, we decided it would be worth heading back into town (by Taxi) to a wine bar which Puri had recommended just off the main square called Mill Vinos . I am so pleased we did.
The food was not brilliant, although not bad, but they did have a truly fantastic wine list presided over by a very lovely Argentinian sommelier. We drunk a bottle of 1996 Guelbenzu Evo which was fantastic – still relatively youthful with more mature flavours starting to creep in around the edges. Greatly enlivened by this, we decided to go for broke and order a 1986 Valbuena after this – an absolute steal at a mere 90 euros a bottles. I really wanted Tom and Claire to taste these wines with some maturity and of course after having missed out somewhat at lunch time, I really wanted a bottle myself.
This was truly sublime – still utterly youthful with layers of ages and flavours – fresh red fruit, rich earth, mineral, liquorice and warm spice, it evolved constantly in the glass and did not really shut down completely till the very last mouthful – about 1.5 hours later. It was one of those bottles, the drinking of which becomes an occasion in itself. At the risk of sounding horribly precious, it is true to say that every single sip truly was a rare and wonderful pleasure and we all had fun reminiscing about what we had been doing in 1986. Tom had been 2 and Claire 4 while I was a relatively very mature 16. All of those memories and all of the multilayered complexity was in every glass – a magical and fittingly wonderful end to a very good trip.
Up at a fairly civilized hour this morning – around 7am – and out of the hotel by 9am on the dot for our 3 hour drive west to Ribera del Duero. First, we had to get out of the hotel car park – a far more complicated endeavour than you might think. Parking was free overnight and the receptionist told me to first put the ticket from the previous evening into the machine and then a ticket which she gave me that morning. We duly drove up to the gate and inserted the tickets as instructed. Precisely nothing happened. Claire tried again, still nothing. Tom got out and tried and still, nada. A helpful Spanish man parked behind us came up and issued what seemed to be very complicated instructions. As none of us speak Spanish, this was not entirely helpful.
By now, there was a patient but probably slightly irritable line of people in cars stretching up the ramp so we decided to get out of the way and go back to reception with the problem. Again, a much more complicated procedure than it sounds. There was an unforgettable (and not in a good way) ‘reversing in a tiny, cramped underground garage in Spain ‘ incident with Jude in Seville 3 years ago that still brings me out in a cold sweat, not to mention the ‘reversing straight into another parked car’ occasion in an even more cramped garage in Jerez. The day, for me, was rapidly degenerating. Slowly, gingerly and with much encouragement from Tom and Claire, I started to swing the car around and out of the way. There seemed to be walls, pillars, scooters or other cars pressing in from every angle and with my inbuilt complete inability to judge spatial distance, it was a most unpleasant experience. Just as we had made enough space for the other drivers to get out, Claire shrieked ‘STOP’ really very loudly. The car was a very slender hairs breadth from loosing the left hand side wing mirror completely courtesy of a concrete pillar which I was astonishingly close to. I had in fact already managed 4 deep scratches and a slight dent in the left hand door which none of us had noticed. Second wine trip in less than a year (the other was southern France last September) in which I have managed to inflict semi serious damage on an innocent vehicle.
Tom returned with a ticket which worked and after all collectively breathing in, I managed to squeeze back past the pole without any further destruction. I seriously do pray for the day when Green & Blue will be able to hire drivers to take care of this sort of thing on wine trips. Please, please buy lots of wine and come in often for lunch and dinner so that this day comes as soon as possible. The car hire firms of Europe will thank you for it.
We finally got to Vega Sicilia at about 12:30pm after a journey enlivened by a sort of version of 20 questions (Tom : a bridge cannot be described as a ‘tool’ and Claire, Drew Barrymore is not even close to being an Oscar winning actress). Once there, we waited in the parking lot surrounded by their lush, peaceful gardens for Puri Mancebo, their very lovely export director. When she arrived, she suggested going down the road to Alion first before having a good look around Vega.
First, a potted history of the region. Ribera has been a DO since 1982, so it is still very young. The original owners of Vega were actually the pioneers here, founding the winery in 1864. The region had other growers then, but none were bottling their own wine and the original owner blazed a trail, establishing an impressive reputation all over the world and, one imagines, having a whale of a time before going spectacularly bankrupt at which point a bank took over and ran it for 60 years. It was then bought by a very wealthy German business man based in Venezuela as a wedding present for his son who took precisely no interest in it what so ever before the Alvarez family took it over in 1982. Their money has been made through a number of other companies and this is a project that they are not only devoted to, but which they are not expecting to make immediate or even mid-term returns on. An attitude which makes all the difference to how things are done.
Back to the history of the region though. A co-operative was founded in 1928 and the other wineries slowly started appearing from the 1930’s, Pesquera being the first. It was Vega though who bought the French varietals into the region in the late 19th century – a whole host of them, with Cabernet Sauvignon (often very difficult to ripen here), Merlot and Malbec emerging as varieties best suited while others like Pinot Noir never really took root. Contemporary producers here are much more likely to use 100% Tinto Fino (the clone of Tempranillo, generally higher in acidity than those from elsewhere in Spain) than a blend.
It was also Vega which put the region and indeed in many ways, the wines of Spain on the map both nationally and internationally.
At 750m, Ribera is generally higher than Rioja with a very continental climate, temperatures fluctuating greatly between day and night – a great influence on the subsequent intensity of the wines. Spring frost is a real problem here and most of the vineyards sport chimneys which blow out hot air and fans to circulate this as protection. On the plus side, this means that it is very easy to be organic here, the extreme temperatures keeping rots and mildew in check naturally.
I have rather well documented notes on the history of Alion in the posting on the recent London tasting, so please refer back to that for more details which I will not repeat here. The winery was hugely impressive though, small but immaculate and expertly set up to deal with the grapes as simply and unobtrusively as possible. Alion was bought into the world to be a more modern style than Vega and comes from 3 different vineyard areas in Ribera, all of which are owned by the Alvarez family apart from the grapes from the Burgos area, which come from 2 growers with much older vineyards.
After destemming, the grapes go into French oak tanks – 15,000 litre capacity- which are changed every 5 years and the fermentation then lasts 2 weeks and goes up to about 30º celcius with malolactic fermentation taking place in barrels after this. They now use vertical presses here, different to the horizontal pneumatic presses in use at Vega. There is one racking a year once the wine is in barrel and fining with egg white. After blending, it goes into stainless steel tanks for 3 months to settle and is then bottled. Vega are famous for numbering each and every one of their bottles and the control and traceability this affords is amazing. If there is a problem with any bottle, the exact date of bottling, cork batch and manufacturer are immediately obvious. The plans are to extend this still further so that soon, they will also be able to determine exactly which barrels and which vineyards any faulty wine came from. Impressive indeed.
Back in the car then and up the road to look at some of the Vega vineyards. Soils are a mixture of chalk and limestone on the hills with more clay on the lower lying ground. In all, 19 different soil types have been identified in this region. The vines are a minimum of 10 years old (all fruit from younger vines is never used) and a maximum of 60 – they are not believers in fruit from vines older than this. Most of these are bush vine trained but the Cabernet is trellised.
We also had a look at a 100 year old vineyard which dates back to the original owner who bought back all the French varietals after a shopping spree in the early 20th century. This is a higgledy piggeldy bunch of Cabernet, Tinto Fino, Pinot Noir, Muscat, Malbec and Merlot and although the fruit is not used for anything, this is kept on out of interest. It is a very beautiful spot on the slope of a hill, surrounded by pine forests, first planted 500 years ago and one of the original sources of wood for the Spanish Armada
So to the winery, not quite as modern as Alion but equally impressive in its orderly cleanliness. Here too, they have wooden fermentation tanks (18,000litre capacity) as well as concrete and the plan is to gradually phase out the stainless steel as they are finding (as is the case in Rioja at Palacios Remondo) that the wine cools far too rapidly at night in steel, meaning that there is real danger of fermentation stopping all together at very crucial times. This is a particular problem here as the harvest is often not till late October or early November when temperatures can be decidedly nippy. They also find they wood gives a more gentle, less reductive character to the wines with softer, silkier tannins form the beginning.
Three wines are made under the Vega label – Valbuena, the softer, more supple wine which has both Merlot and Malbec in the blend every year and which is released at 5 years old after spending 3 years in a mixture of French and American oak. Unico is of course the flagship, made from Tinto Fino and usually, just Cabernet – it depends entirely on the year. This has 7 years in total in wood and then 3 years in bottle, so it is released at 10 years old. It is not made in every vintage – most recently, 92, 93, 97 and 01, all fairly disasterous for one reason or another, saw none of it. Finally, there is Unico Reserva Especial, a blend of 3 vintages made in minute quantities – 10 – 15,000 bottles only – which is aged for 3 – 4 years in bottle before release and like Unico, is made for long term ageing.
All the American barrels used are made by their own cooper from staves which are seasoned outside for 2years and under a cover for 1. All of these are toasted.
Puri told us about a white that they are experimenting with – a blend of Roussane, Marsanne, Viognier and Chardonnay which has varying degrees of oak and which they hope to release a first vintage of in a few years. The family feel that Spain is lacking an iconic white wine. One built, like their reds, for medium or long term ageing, so this is the eventual goal.
It was then around 3pm and we all felt very ready for lunch, despite the amount of food we had eaten the day before and a service station breakfast (Spanish style – an entirely different proposition to the English equivalent) of tortilla and pepper sandwiches. This proved amazingly worth waiting for. We followed Puri to Fuenta de la Acena (www.fuenteacena.com) a hotel and restaurant opened 4 years ago in a restored Flour mill on the banks of the Duero. This is a beautiful place with original beams and thick grey stone walls, the restaurant being on a Mezzanine level which is a new addition. Puri bought along a magnificent selection of wines and the food was superb – all in all one of the meals of the year so far (and although we are only in July, it may well emerge as the overall winner without too much trouble).
We started with the 2004 and 2004 Mandolas Furmint from the property Vega own in Tokaji, Hungary. Please see further details on the posting about the Alion tasting. The 03 was tasting absolutely beautiful – great spiced, honeyed richness with a very fresh edge, it went very well with the tuna tartare which the kitchen sent out for us to nibble on.
We then launched into the Vega wines, starting with 04 Pintia, their red from the Toro region with is 100% Tinta de Toro, the local clone of Tempranillo. Rustic and rich, this is made as the others are, in large oak vats but the fruit for this is cooled over night before destemming and the juice then given a 4 day cold soak pre-fermenation to retain freshness and acidity – not easy in a region where the wines are routinely 15% alcohol and known for their huge, rustic power.
This was followed by the 02 Alion which tasted much as I remembered it from London – elegant with very fresh acidity perfectly balanced by red fruit and liquorice. It gives no hint at all of the fact that this was a difficult vintage.
Starters had arrived just before the Alion – Gazpacho (made with watermelon and tomatoes, an extra refreshing, unusual twist) with 4 plump prawns coated with almonds on a skewer for Puri and I. Tom had a dish I had been very tempted by - chickpeas with octopus in squid ink. Indescribably good – rustic, earthy and delicious and a mammoth portion to boot. Claire had a raw tuna salad which was similarly impressive – melt in the mouth meat with crunchy vegetables.
Onto the 01 Valbuena which was everything this wine should be - rich, glossy and utterly seductive. Puri said that if she had to choose just one from the range as her ultimate favourite, it would be this. Certainly, it is wonderfully consistent in my experience. I have yet to encounter a bottle of Valbuena which is not drinking well and it does so from its earliest years. With Unico, magnificent as it is, it can be frustratingly closed and dumb at times.
We already felt full as ticks and then the mains arrived. Tom had oxtail which he manfully ploughed through with a dreamy, blissful expression on his face while Claire had organic fillet of beef which comes from a farm north of the region, also owned by the Alvarez family. This was utterly simple but looked quite amazing and she said, worked incredibly well with the Alion.
I had a tomato, rocket and mojamo (thin strips of wind dried tuna) salad which was incredible as well and pretty much exactly what I felt like eating although needless to say, it was not really a perfect match with the wines. I was driving though and had to restrain myself after an initial taste – definitely the hardest thing I had had to do all day, and that includes my adventures with a concrete pillar that morning.
The mains were served with the 1998 Unico, drinking amazingly well, we all agreed. This bottle had not yet retreated back into its shell and was full of earthy but elegant red fruit, liquorice and spice with fine, utterly elegant tannins supporting it. Full of brooding power, the overall impression was never the less of a wine which was the epitome of finesse and each mouthful really was a complete pleasure.
We were all in grave danger of sliding slowly off our chairs and onto the floor in a crumpled heap after all of this but Puri was not finished with us yet. She had apparently requested something sweet in the middle of the table to all share but the restaurant staff had somehow heard ‘bring each of a us a large plate of dessert please’ and so, to accompany the Oremus 5 Puttonyos Tokaji, we had crisp caramel wafers with milk ice-cream and custard pastries. The wine was excellent as always – the intensely sweet orange blossom and marmalade flavours perfectly balanced by crystalised grapefruit acidity but I only managed to nibble on some of the caramel wafer before admitting defeat on the dessert front.
This was a fabulous meal with wines that I do really love very deeply and passionately. They are not cheap, but then the sort of attention to detail and loving care which they receive has to be paid for. Far too many ‘fine wines’ of the world are too much about hype and scarcity value and not nearly enough about what is in the glass but the wines from the Vega stable are a world away from these and I cannot recommend them highly enough, particular enjoyed in the magnificent surroundings and with the sensational food at Hotel Fuente.
We stumbled out in the hot, sunny afternoon afterwards and stood watching fishermen standing on a weir in the river, catching perch. Claire and Tom, not nearly as sober as I – although to be fair, they were hardly rolling drunk – decided that they wanted a walk along the river so after saying our goodbyes to Puri, we made our way down to the fishing spot. I had to make phone calls but they removed socks and shoes and waded in and along the weir to the far river bank. As I caught up with various things in London (we are still very much in the manic just post opening phase with Clapham), I watched as Claire, bit by bit got deeper and deeper until eventually she was well and truly swimming. Tom disappeared behind some trees, only to emerge in his boxer shorts and soon two small heads were bobbing merrily down stream. I felt to warm and relaxed to feel panicky but the Spanish fishermen were obviously hugely confused and probably more than a little annoyed at this intrusion on their fishing patch. Puri had assured us before that no-one ever swam in the river although people frequently sun bathed along its banks.
I was on the phone to Jude at the time and he reminded me that I we were too short staffed to loose two important members of the team somewhere down the Duero river but I still could not get myself too concerned. While he predicted all manner of dire outcomes including poisoning by sewage being pumped into the river (despite no evidence at all of this), I dangled my feet and suddenly felt my tiredness very acutely. How lovely it would be to throw exhaustion, responsibility and propriety to the wind and join them. I didn’t though, staying resolutely dry and decorous on the bank while two charmingly gnarled old Spanish gentlemen smiled and nodded at me while at the same time gravely shaking their heads at the conduct of the heads in the river.
We made it back to the car by about 6:30pm and I looked forward to what should have been a relatively short and easy drive to our hotel in Vallodalid. How wrong I was. Tom and Claire, although professing themselves very awakened and refreshed by their dip, soon dozed off and left me with the GPS lady who, on approaching the city centre, suddenly lost her mind and, I imagine, for the sheer hell of it, directed us down a small overgrown road into an area which was undoubtedly very much on the wrong side of the Vallodalid tracks. The car was rudely awakened to the sound of me cursing her in particularly colourful and creative language and Tom, to his credit, snapped to attention pretty smartish and tried to get us out of where we were.
This did not work and we seemed to plough deeper and deeper into nowhere. Frustratingly, we could see the main road we almost certainly needed to get back to and yet despite numerous twists and turns, could not get anywhere near it. Fearing for the health of the GPS system, he wisely turned off the commentary so that, on top of all the other issues we were facing, we did not have the annoying superior voice telling us to find a safe spot in which to do an authorised u-turn every 5 minutes –obviously the GPS code for ‘you have now fucked up completely and are so totally lost you may never arrive. Please turn back and get out of here’.
I will draw a veil over the rest of the journey suffice it to say we are now amazingly familiar with the less salubrious suburbs of Vallodalid as well as the incredibly complex one way system of the city centre and Tom and Claire have a full and varied range of new and, even if I say so myself, particularly expressive expletives which they can draw on in the future. We finally arrived at our hotel – lovely but hardly ‘central’ which is how Last Minute.com had described it – at 8:30pm.
Despite the fact that all I really wanted to do was fall into bed and sleep and the other two looked much the same, we decided it would be worth heading back into town (by Taxi) to a wine bar which Puri had recommended just off the main square called Mill Vinos . I am so pleased we did.
The food was not brilliant, although not bad, but they did have a truly fantastic wine list presided over by a very lovely Argentinian sommelier. We drunk a bottle of 1996 Guelbenzu Evo which was fantastic – still relatively youthful with more mature flavours starting to creep in around the edges. Greatly enlivened by this, we decided to go for broke and order a 1986 Valbuena after this – an absolute steal at a mere 90 euros a bottles. I really wanted Tom and Claire to taste these wines with some maturity and of course after having missed out somewhat at lunch time, I really wanted a bottle myself.
This was truly sublime – still utterly youthful with layers of ages and flavours – fresh red fruit, rich earth, mineral, liquorice and warm spice, it evolved constantly in the glass and did not really shut down completely till the very last mouthful – about 1.5 hours later. It was one of those bottles, the drinking of which becomes an occasion in itself. At the risk of sounding horribly precious, it is true to say that every single sip truly was a rare and wonderful pleasure and we all had fun reminiscing about what we had been doing in 1986. Tom had been 2 and Claire 4 while I was a relatively very mature 16. All of those memories and all of the multilayered complexity was in every glass – a magical and fittingly wonderful end to a very good trip.
