Dinner with Raul Perez was optional. Why some of us didn’t jump at the opportunity to get some face time with a groundbreaking, singular visionary winery is beyond me, but needless to say I jumped at the chance.
Raul’s red wines are confounding - sometimes they are massive, chewy, dense and aromatic; other times they are delicate, ethereal and dead ringers for a premier or grand cru burgundy. Over the course of 24 hours I had the opportunity to taste dozens of his wines. Some of them ranked with the best wines I’ve ever had, while others were confoundingly flawed.
Here’s a guy who knows each plot, each grape in the plot, and vinifies the wines according to micro terroir, climate and ripeness levels. Some whole cluster, some, with five month post fermentation skin contact, so with just free run juice, some destemmed, some not - all according to his internal compass for each plot and project. I’m calling this micro-terroir winemaking.
He makes wines in several DOs - Bierzo, Rias Baixas, Ribera Sacra - and is perhaps best known for his 98 Parker point Mencia project El Picado, from an impossible to farm vineyard in the Sil Valley of Ribera Sacra; and his Albariño that is wackily aged at 45 feet below sea level, ostensibly because of a transference of salts that occurs at that depth. Both of these wines are wine geek wines to be sure, but both were astoundingly good.
To say the Perez is singular and driven is an understatement.
But I am getting ahead of myself.
So we carpooled the few miles to a quaint restaurant-inn in an equally quaint town. About ten of us from the wine trip, joined by Raul and several of his winemaking partners and friends. We had the top floor of the rustic restaurant - exposed beams and thatching. The food was very ggod - pork and some dried beef, a great fried goat cheese with pepper sauce, pork riblets and lamb. But what was astounding was the wine.
Raul brought out library wines - some of which he had made, some made by friends - a 1989 Godello, a 1968 Mencia, as well as exemplars from his 2001-2003 bierzo mencia cuvées. The Godello was past its prime to be sure, but still had fruit and structure. The same can be said for the 68 mencia - brick brown, but it still had some of the compelling aroma that makes mencias so good.
His more recent cuvees seemed massive to me - perfect with the food, but I would have guessed that the grape was syrah, not mencia!
After the dinner, I caught a ride back with Raul. He drove like a madman! He deciede to have a drink at a local bar and my colleagues and I were “stuck” there - not an unpleasant experience really - for a few hours, drinking with his pals.
But it was 3:00 a.m. before I made it home!
The next day we piled into the bus for what was to be our last vineyard trip - eastwards into Ribera Sacra to taste more wines from Raul Perez. It was a beautiful drive - if you like stunning views and curvy roads. Each turn revealed a roadcut hundreds of feet high, or a serene river far below, rugged cliffs, lakes, and after a while, vineyards -impossibly perched vineyards, clinging to the hillsides.
After about an hour, we pulled over, to be met by Raul and some of his partners. We were perched high above a canyon, and a vineyard stretched above us as far as the eye could see.
Raul poured a Godello Treixadure blend from this vineyard - the Treixadura adding great lemony acidity to the floral Godello. It sure was refreshing on this sweltering and bright bay.
The we proceeded to hike up the vineyard along a dirt path for about fifteen minutes. It was hot, and there was lots of elevation, but I sure was glad to be getting some exercise! Nine days in a bus was starting to get to me and I relished the idea of moving about a bit.
This was a very steep vineyard, and we had trouble imagining how anuyone could tend the grapes here. Little did we know that this was nothing - we were about to see vineyards that make those in Condrieu and the Mosel look like putting greens!
We piled back into the bus and drove about an hour down to the Sil Rivel, where we boarded a large pleasure craft for snacks and a guided tasting of Raul’s wines - Sacrato Blanco, Sacrato, El Picado, Sketch, A Trabe, and Godello, as well as some Moterrrei wines that he had a hand in Gorvia and QDM, based on the local Bastardo grape.
You could have told me that we were drinking Côtes de Nuits cru burgundies! These mencia based wines were feminine, delicate and not the fruit forward wines I’d had in the states. These were wines for contemplation, and contemplate I did!
As far as his Sketch Albariño was concerned, I was a skeptic -wines finished 45 feet below sea level. What an absurdity - but, he had something going on. The wine had a pleasant saltiness and depth that I hadn’t experienced before in an Albariño before. Too expensive for the shop, but not too expensive for my cellar.
Then came the big boy - El Pecudo - picked from an impossibly steep vinyard of pure old mencia vines. Deep, rich, complex. Wow!!
Did I mention that we were on a boat? The Sil river valley is stupendously beautiful - a steep rocky valley with vineyards - originally planted by slaves in Roman times(!!!) - terrassed and laddered from river level up about four hundred feet.
We saw an occasional person tending the vines, but being the hopttest part of the day, most folks were taking a siesta.
I returned below deck for Tapeo - Joselito Jamón, barnacles, pulpo al la gallega, empañadas, and tortilla. Mmm, another pound and a few points on the cholesterol, but how often to you see food like this?!?!
The boat ride lasted another hour or so, then we piled back to the bus to visit Raul’s winery - a garage at the edge of a shabby industrial area outside of a small Mencia town. The winery was dominated by large Autrian oak vertical barrels and a few barriques. This was a guy who belived in oak, but neutral, dialed back, unobtrisuve oak.
We tasted through barrel samples of more of his wines: Vico (a $20 wine that will be in the shop before too long), Muti, ST Jacques Claudina, Valtuille - amazing wines with grace, depth, terroir and true individual winemaking.
Then Raul did something amazing - he started pouring barrel smaples of wines that he thought didn’t work - a barrel fermented Gewurz, a riesling, some old Godello. These were flawed wines, and here we were, witgh a world class winemaker, who was showing us wines, warts and all!
Then it was back in the bus, then off to a last night dinner in Bierzo with Raul - where he poured some of his personal library wines - a de Montille Volnay, some old Nierpoort ports. Wow!
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Pulpo!
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On the Boat with Raul and Noelia
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Raul Perez's Partners
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Sil Valley
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Me, on a boat, Sil Valley
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Wake, Val de Sil
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Raul Perez
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Tall Austrian Barrels, Raul Perez
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Barrels, Raul Perez