“Rediscovering” Spain

Spanish viticulture continues to undergo an unprecedented rebirth. Spain has made great strides in virtually every category. The quality of the average bottle has risen. The percent of product exported under place name labels has multiplied many times over. Premium Spanish wines challenge the world’s finest in virtually every category. And yes, the prices of some collectable Spanish wines have risen at a shocking pace. A Spanish feature in the wine press is more likely to be touting $30-$75 bottles than $5 “super savers”. It is not rare now to see $75 or $100 bottles from famous Spanish estates. Fortunately, the availability of fine Spanish wine (at reasonable prices) in the U.S. has expanded markedly. In shops where ten years ago we may have seen only a couple of the most common generic Spanish products for sale, we can now expect to find twenty or thirty well chosen selections. The market has gone beyond the common. The exceptional is now readily available.

Our number one wine import from Spain is Cava, bottle-fermented sparkling wine. Although Cava may come from a number of Spanish wine districts, it is most associated with Catalonia (the coastal area just south of Barcelona). Cava can be dry (brut) or sweet, but it should always be light, fresh, and alive with bubbles. Only the most rare special editions rival the wines of the Champagne district. Then again, the price of good Spanish Cava (all Cava is Spanish) is often less than a third the price of fine French Champagne (really, all true Champagne is French).

The other dominant category of Spanish wine imported to the US is Sherry. Most US consumers use the term “Sherry” as if it meant most any kind of fortified, oxidized wine. Many folks only call on Sherry for cooking. Nevertheless, Sherry is a complex, well-defined, and highly regulated regional category. Unlike Cava, Sherry is narrowly regulated as to place but appears in a wide variety of styles, from light and dry to dark and sweet.

The red wines of Rioja, Navarra, the Duero River regions, and Catalonia all merit attention. Each region seems to offer two versions, one traditional and regional, and the other modern and less tied to place. In Rioja the tradition is for leaner, long aged reds with lots of oak and nuance but little fresh fruit. Many producers now offer wines more in the style of modern Bordeaux (or California Cabernet) forgoing some of the traditional aging to adopt a youthful and vigorous style. In Navarra the traditional Garnacha grape yields soft, rich, early drinking, “rhone style” reds (and truly fine rosés). These traditional wines are abundant, inexpensive, and pleasant. The Navarra region is however the center of experimentation in northern Spain, and we are finding more and more blends of Tempranillo, Merlot, Cabernet and other grapes. These new arrivals can be in almost any style, some light and fresh like Beaujolais, others more substantial and long-lived. The reds along the Duero River are almost all in the modern mode, with full extract, deep color, tempered by moderate aging in small oak casks. These wines are finding great acceptance among our Cabernet and Merlot drinkers. Catalonia is broken into numerous sub-regions each producing a variety of wines. The best-represented section is Penedès, which seems to produce every kind of red wine imaginable. The region varies from coastal plain to extreme altitude and has seemingly found a place to grow every kind of grape. Priorat is another Catalonian sub-region of note. Less abundant, these reds are astonishingly dark and intense.

All Spanish regions have, for the most part, modernized their white wine production. Old style Spanish whites tended to be over-aged and oxidized, finished in a style that few U.S. wine drinkers ever accepted. Today, two modern approaches dominate. One is light and crisp, the other buttery and rich. The latter style, good as it may be, hardly seems necessary when we have a sea of soft rich domestic Chardonnay. The light crisp whites of Rueda, Rias Baixas, and Catalonia seem the more interesting. They are wines of style and grace with just a bit of lemony tartness, perfect for the long hot summer to come.

Sparkling, Red, White, Rosé – Spain has much to offer and local selection is good!

Richard deBondt has been President of Northampton Wines, a Greenville retail store, since its founding in 1975. In 2003 he and his associates opened “The Wine Café” featuring fine dining, and wines to match.

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