’O Penedo’ - Caíño Longo & Brancellao (21)

Caíño Longo & Brancellao 50/50% | Val do Avia, Ribeiro | terroir van graniet | 170-230 meter hoogte | stokken +/- 60 jaar oud | whole bunch | vergisting in staaltank | rijping voor 16 maanden in 5 hl. foudres | wilde kruiden | stenig | iets aards | grafiet | puur | 11% alc. | fijne zuren | mediterraans | peperig | bloed(sinaasappel) | aards | iets zijde | heeft zijn tijd, en lucht nodig nu..

Adega a Barouta

Adega a Barouta is een samenwerking tussen Javier Alén (Viña Mein), Dani Landi en Fernando García (Comando G) en hun wijngaardmanager en keldermeester Roberto Núñez. Dani en Fernando zijn befaamde wijnmakers. De mannen maken van Grenache de meest indrukwekkende wijnen in Gredos. Er blijft goed contact met elkaar en een sterk gevoel voor de Ribeiro, en later kopen ze enkele wijngaarden in Leiro en Cabanelas om Adega a Barouta te starten. Met zo’n 2,5 ha aan wijngaard is de productie klein en specifiek. 

Review

I also tasted the second vintage of the single-vineyard red 2021 O Penedo, which was radically different from the 2020 I tasted next to it. The blend is different, 50% Caíño and 50% Brancellao, a first change, with 1% less alcohol. 2021 was rainy, cold and challenging, and the wine has stronger herbal notes. Even though it was a more complicated vintage (they had black rot) and they had lower yields (they lost half of the crop), the result is a much more delineated wine than the 2020. In the cellar, they were looking for more pleasure in the wine and decided to use more Brancellao, because Caíño can sometimes be too austere, and they did a shorter maceration with slightly higher temperatures, more Loire than Gredos, and it has some vegetal notes that can remind you of Cabernet Franc. The varieties fermented together with full clusters and indigenous yeasts, and the wine matured in a 500-liter oak barrel for close to 16 months, as they feel the Ribeiro wines need a long élevage and time in bottle. The whites will be given an even longer élevage. It has 11% alcohol, 6.6 grams of tartaric acid and notable acidity, which makes you salivate with flavors of acid strawberry and a stony, dry minerality, almost saline, very peppery/balsamic. They kept referring to Pinot d'Aunis when talking about this wine. They believe they have found the way for reds, after having experimented since 2014. This is the finest Ribeiro red I've ever tried. Only 600 bottles were produced. It was bottled in May 2023. This won't be released until May 2024. It should develop in bottle for a long time. 96/100 Luis Gutiérrez

A Barouta is a new small project in Ribeiro (everything in Ribeiro is small). It's a joint venture between Javier Alén, who is the ex-owner of Viña Mein and the promoter of the project, and Dani Landi and Fernando García from Comando G from Gredos and their Chilean vineyard manager and cellarmaster, Roberto Núñez. It was born from their friendship and the experience of working together in Ribeiro over the last eight years as they helped Alén to transform the vineyards and wines of Meín, which was later sold to the Pago de Carraovejas group from Ribera del Duero. They wanted to keep their links with the place and continue with their friendship by working together in something small. 

They purchased some old vineyards in the villages of Leiro and Cabanelas. The one in Leiro, O Penedo, is very close to Emilio Rojo and has a big granite boulder in the middle that somehow reminded me of the landscape of the vineyard in Gredos. They also bought an old stone building next to Alén's family house in Barouta, hence the name, and turned it into a very simple and functional winery. There is one white and one red, and the first vintage is 2020. They did the same in 2021; but in 2022, they introduced a new village red, and they are searching for the specific place that could produce a single-vineyard wine. Production will remain small; they only have around 2.5 hectares of vineyards. They started with some 2,000 bottles with the idea to produce between 7,000 and 10,000 bottles per year. Prices are still not 100%. This is a new name to follow in Ribeiro.