For most, Spain falls into the "Old World" of wine, as tradition and timeless adherence to ancient techniques marks much of the wine landscape. What began in the 20th century was a movement to become more experimental and leave some time-honored traditions aside to produce wines of a more international style, with early accessibility and more flamboyant character. As we have seen so frequently in the past decade or so in other regions of the world, there is a blossoming generation of winemakers who are turning back the clock to a more classic style in some more off-the-radar wine regions, albeit with more precision than their predecessors. Envinate has personified this in Spain, focusing on the coastal region of Ribeira Sacra and continuing out to the Canary Islands and beyond.

Envinate was envisioned in 2005 by a group of four friends, directly after their graduation from enology school. Roberto Santana, Alfonso Torrente, Laura Ramos and José Martinez dedicated themselves to producing wines of great purity and focus, with extraordinary measures taken to ensure the health and vitality of the vineyards that they work with. They do not use chemicals in the vineyards and only native yeasts are used for fermentations, resulting in wines which speak in a clear voice to their place.

There is no formulaic method to the production of wines, as the size and material of the fermentation and aging vessels vary widely, as does the stem inclusion and time macerating on skins. In essence, they feel that each and every vineyard should produce a wine of a character unique to itself, with the hand of the winemaker as invisible as possible. These are wines filled with personality that represent remarkable value given their rarity and the extreme quality that they so obviously display. 

On Saturday, December 2nd, Roberto Santana and Alfonso Torrente will be joining us at the store from 2-5PM to pour and chat about their wines. This is a special opportunity to learn about these wines before they disappear! The tasting is free, but please sign up above if you plan to attend. Space will be limited and we’re anticipating lots of interest.

We’ll be tasting each of the five wines below on Saturday, with a limited amount available for purchase afterwards. Notes are courtesy of José Pastor, Envinate’s importer.

Albahra 2016 - $19.99/bottle - This wine is sourced from a single 30 year old vineyard that is divided into 3 parcels at 800 meters elevation in the Almansa region, around the town of Albacete.  The grape is Garnacha Tintorera (or Alicante Bouchet), and the soils are chalky, clay-calcareous.  The wine is wild yeast fermented with 50% whole grape clusters in 4500 liter cement vats, with soft pigeage and a short maceration of 7 days; then raised in cement for 8 months.  The result is a remarkably fresh wine with earthy dark fruit and spice – a great wine to pair with savory dishes, like roasted meats, sausages, mushrooms, and rice dishes, like paella or arroz negro.

Benje Blanco 2016 - $27.00/bottle - This is sourced from several old-vine, untrained parcels of Listan Blanco. Each parcel is hand-harvested and vinified separately in a mix of concrete tank and open tubs. 75% of the fruit is pressed directly off the skins, the other 25% is skin-macerated 14-40 days. Following fermentation 60% of the wine sits in concrete, the other 40% in French Barriques. There is no stirring of the lees or sulfur added, and the wines are bottled unfiltered. Benje Blanco is a high-toned white wine, showing its volcanic terruño with smoky notes wrapped around the orchard fruit core, braced by Atlantic-infused high-elevation acidity.   
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Benje Tinto 2016 - $27.99/bottle | $75.00/magnum - This is sourced from 1,000 meters elevation, old-vine, pie franco parcels of Listan Prieto (Mission) with a bit of Tintilla, named “Masca,” “La Zanja,” “Valle de Arriba,” and “Llano Redondo”, all of them located in Santiago del Teide. Each parcel is hand-harvested and vinified separately, some in concrete and some in small open tubs. Maceration is 10-30 days (depending on parcel) with daily punch-down; malolactic fermentation is in neutral French barriques, then raised 8 months in the same barrels without battonage or added SO2. Bottling is without fining or filtration. This is a pure and vertical expression of high elevation, volcanic Canary terruño with notes of red fruits, peppercorns, flowers, and volcanic soil. 

Lousas Viña de Aldea 2015 – Normally $34.00/bottle but currently sold out - (Lousas - Is the name, in Galician dialect, or Gallego, for the type of slate soil that predominates in the Amandi sub-zone of the Ribeira Sacra region.) Aldea means “village” in Gallego; thus, this is Envínate’s “village wine”, produced from a combination of –minimum- 60-year-old plots located in the ancient vineyard region of Ribeira Sacra.  This cuvee is made up of 90-95% Mencía with other co-planted varietals blended in. The native vines are grown on steep slopes made of slate and sit in between 400-600 meters elevation.  This vintage Viña de Aldea was foot-trodden in open top plastic tubs, fermented spontaneously with wild yeasts, with 40% whole clusters included, and raised in old barrels for 11 months with no racking and no SO2 added until bottling.  It is a very fresh and elegant vino tinto with classic, lifted aromatics of black pepper, pomegranate, and herbs, which leads to an elegant and crystalline palate with loads of saveur, peppery tannins, and a dry finish.  This is more than a village wine in our book, but a superb example of Ribeira Sacra and a wonderful benchmark for the region.

Taganan Blanco 2016 - $34.00/bottle - This cuvee is made from many different white grape varieties native to the Canary Islands, some of them unidentified, but include Listan Blanco, Albillo Criollo, Marmajuelo, Gual, and Malvasia.  The parcels are very old and planted in between 75-300 meters elevation right on the Atlantic Ocean and are farmed by 15 different families and Envínate. The viticulture in the Taganan area of Tenerife is very old-fashioned: the vines grow untrained, the soil is worked by hand, and no chemicals are used. The wine is fermented with wild yeasts by parcel, with some parcels getting a bit of skin contact, and then raised on the lees in steel vats and barrels for around 8 months. This is an intense vino blanco with lots of personality and notes of nuts, smoke, and sea salt.