Winemaker Notes
Professional Ratings
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Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
The 2017 La Vizcaína La Vitoriana has depth and power, inherent to the vineyard, a cool site that behaves well in a warm year like 2017, but in 2017 I still prefer El Rapolao. The fruit is a little darker and riper without excess (it's all relative when you compare, and sometimes comparisons are tedious...), as the cooler exposition takes the warmer weather better. It's textured and serious. 6,300 bottles were filled, as the north-facing exposures like this escaped the frost of the 2017 spring.
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.