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Explaining Spain

06 March 2006 By db staff writer

Wines from Spain recently held a tasting in London to demonstrate the quality and diversity of Spanish wines. Alvaro Palacios & Luis Hidalgo explained why Spain means so much more than just Rioja

For Maria Jose Sevilla, director of Wines from Spain, 2006 is a crucial year for Spanish wine in the UK – it’s time drinkers really understood the diversity and quality of Spain’s wines. And what better way to introduce the country’s range, with all its peaks, than to select and allow the trade to sample 60 Spanish wines from every corner of the country, as well as invite two of the country’s leading vinous lights to talk about the past and potential for Spain – what it has to offer, how it has changed, and where it is heading.

First of these formidable figures was Alvaro Palacios, famous for his L’Ermita wines from Priorato in Catalonia, and more recently a new project in Bierzo. He is positive about what he terms Spain’s “new wave of viticulture” and the future for emerging wine regions. As he says, “Historically, Rioja was the only region with a character, a background. It had connections with Bordeaux, and attracted investment from industrialists from the developing Basque country. It is a pity other regions got forgotten about, which weren’t helped by the lack of decent roads – they became cut off.”

Acquired taste
However, as he continues, “In the 1980s Ribera del Duero took off, followed by Priorato and then Somontano. Later, in the south, old appellations like Bierzo, Jumilla and Alicante have become successful.”

Palacios cites the increased presence of wines from California, Australia, South America and South Africa as influential in encouraging interest in Spanish wines from areas other than just Rioja. “New World wines have developed a new taste,” he says. “With all those hours of sunshine the wines are very ripe, with a much higher alcohol content than consumers had experienced in the 1970s and 1980s. This new taste helped Spain to be considered because Spain has, in general terms, a Mediterranean climate – it has lots of hours of sunshine.”

And for Palacios, after a stint of winemaking in France, Priorato proved irresistible, with its “tiny parcels of old vines”. He viewed Rioja “as too industrialised” and wanted to “take advantage of old regions”. Hence, after his success in Priorato, he turned to Bierzo, some 10 years later in 1999.
Overall, Palacios is excited by what he sees as a modern movement in winemaking in larger regions such as Alicante, La Mancha and Valdepenas. He pinpoints the ability of Spain to make mid-priced wines with “an intensity and richness”, wines that benefit from the country’s soils and winemaking history. As he says, “Spain can make beautiful wines for E10.” And, as he concludes, “Spain needs to promote the great values it has.”

Categoric apologies
Younger than Palacios by a year, but sporting a remarkably more traditional look, something accredited to a background in merchant banking, was the second speaker, Luis Hidalgo. Having alluded to his suit and tie image, Hidalgo, a member of the sixth generation of the Hidalgo family, producers of La Gitana Manzanilla among other highly regarded Sherries, then apologised for his category, saying that fortified wine is “perhaps not as fun as light wine”. Nevertheless, he quickly added that Manzanilla is “one of the most unique white wines in the world”.

He continued by conceding that, “Such are the challenges in the Manzanilla and Sherry category that we have had to look to Rioja,” where the family company has just acquired a winery, before adding, jokingly, that although the family are “dedicated to Sherry, we also have to feed the employees.

Out with the old
“We have come a long way since the heady days in the 1970s,” he explained, “when there were 22,000 hectares of vines producing 22m cases of Sherry.” Hidalgo cited the placing of Sherry in the official UK inflation basket in the 1960s as a sign of its past importance – though it was later replaced by red wine. He then reported that those 22,000 hectares are now nearer 10,000 hectares, or less than half the amount devoted to Sherry during its heyday.

“Two brands dominate the Sherry category in the UK,” he continued. “Bristol Cream and Croft Original represent 50% of sales, and around 35% of sales are buyers-own-brands – the cancer of the category. That then leaves around 15% for the rest of us.”

The situation isn’t helped by the fact that Sherry consumers are “literally dying out”, while the “occasions for drinking Sherry are diminishing and generally there is a lack of knowledge”.
He desperately wants Sherry to be treated like a wine and sees the future in drier styles, citing the success of dry Fino Tio Pepe and its wine-like approach, in particular its green glass, which inspired Hidalgo to do the same with the La Gitana brand.

At the top end, Hidalgo said that the advent of age-dated Sherries has helped develop a more premium image for Sherry, and while he sees the importance of generic Sherry promotional work, “the future lies with brands,” he said.

Legal constraints
However, one hindrance to Sherry’s development is restrictive legislation. Sherry was the first DO in Spain, formed in 1931, but as Hidalgo is the current director of the consejo regulador he should be able to inspire positive change. He mentioned the fact that by law Manzanilla and Fino must have 15% abv but that Hidalgo has tried producing Manzanilla at 13%, and without an adverse effect on taste. He’s also mentioned the fact that Hidalgo has taken the word Sherry off its Manzanillas because the link with the former negatively affects the latter – “We would like to have two different stamps,” he said.

He also wants to dissociate his brands with the BOB category and attract a younger generation of drinkers. “Selling wines made with less care and ageing under the Sherry label is doing harm to the category,” he argued. Nevertheless, he concluded, “I have tried so-called sherries from California or South Africa and Montilla wines, but nothing reaches the uniqueness and quality of Manzanilla Sherry, which is to do with the conditions under which we produce our wine.”

Taste of spain
Thank you to Gonzalez Byass UK for providing the wines at the lunch: Altozano Verdejo and Beronia Tempranillo.
Thank you also to Pineo Spanish Mineral Water, which was available throughout the tasting and lunch, supplied by HipEau.

Listed below are a handful of the 60 wines that were available to taste during the event:

Cavas