Winemaker Notes
Pair with: Grilled meats (pork sausages, lamb chops), patatas bravas, young sheep cheeses.
Professional Ratings
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Wine & Spirits
José Antonio García crafts this from his family’s vines in the clay soils of Valtuille de Abajo. Unculín is a joven-style of mencía; fermented in stainless steel, it sees no oak. What at first seems to be only ripe fruit and dense flavors slowly awakens in the glass to reveal its true essence: a wine of tension, acidity and black cherries. Pour it now with roast pork.
Primarily found in the Bierzo, Ribeira Sacra and Valdeorras regions of Spain and in the Dão of Portugal (where it is called Jaen), Mencia is an early ripening, low acid grape that can produce wines of great concentration, complexity and ageability. And yet Mencia once suffered from a poor reputation and deemed capable of producing simple and light red wines. Post-phylloxera growers would grow this variety on low, fertile plains, which produced high yields and uncomplicated finished wines. Somm Secret—The recent rediscovery of the ancient, abandoned vines planted on rugged hillsides of deep schist has unveiled the potential of Mencia and added discredit to its old reputation.
One of the few northwestern Spanish regions with a focus on a red variety, Bierzo, part of Castilla y León, is home to the flowery and fruity Mencia grape. Mencia produces balanced and bright red wines full of strawberry, raspberry, pomegranate, baking spice, pepper and black licorice. The well-drained soils of Bierzo are slate and granite.