Winemaker Notes
El Velado is a beautiful and very old vineyard situated at an altitude of 600m. Its old age of over 80 years, its size, and the sculptural shape of the bush pruned vines, make this vineyard very special, full of light, which Bodega Lanzaga wished to capture and bottle separately. El Velado and its Garnacha vines ripen very well, offering a fantastic wine, mature and accomplished but at the same time nervy and of great balance.
Professional Ratings
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James Suckling
Another intellectual red from Telmo Rodriguez that is all about purity, refinement, depth and precision. This is implicitly mineral and focused, with orange zest, spice and red berries, driven by chalky, dusty tannins that melt into the linear palate. Long, mineral and subtle. From organically grown grapes. A big portion of grenache here with tempranillo and a few other varieties. Effortlessly drinkable now, but will hold beautifully.
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Wine Spectator
The Rioja single-vineyard 2019 El Velado comes from a southeast-facing plot in the village of Lanciego that has a high proportion of Garnacha from Viñaspre as well as other varieties in a field blend where Tempranillo dominates. The grapes were picked the 10th of October, a little later than anticipated. It fermented in an open-top 3,000-kilo oak vat with indigenous yeasts and matured in barriques and foudres for 14 to 16 months. All the 2019s feel quite homogeneous; there is a common thread in them all, balanced and serious, less heavy than other vintages, quite harmonious. The finest vintage of this wine?
Rating: 94+
Hailed as the star red variety in Spain’s most celebrated wine region, Tempranillo from Rioja, or simply labeled, “Rioja,” produces elegant wines with complex notes of red and black fruit, crushed rock, leather, toast and tobacco, whose best examples are fully capable of decades of improvement in the cellar.
Rioja wines are typically a blend of fruit from its three sub-regions: Rioja Alta, Rioja Alavesa and Rioja Oriental, although specific sub-region (zonas), village (municipios) and vineyard (viñedo singular) wines can now be labeled. Rioja Alta and Alavesa, at the highest elevations, are considered to be the source of the brightest, most elegant fruit, while grapes from the warmer and drier, Rioja Oriental, produce wines with deep color, great body and richness.