I. Distractions In 1987, when I was 18 and a dollar was worth more than twice as much as it is today, I started reading magazines: M, Esquire, GQ. Nearby, in our somewhat cultured Texas town, a new bookstore opened in a cavernous space that had formerly housed the shag-carpeted roller skating rink of our childhood. Through the front windows, which had before been darkly tinted to give the place an alluring den-of-prepubescent-iniquity vibe, now streamed bright, clean light, showcasing a look and layout that would become the interior design gestalt of today’s national-chain, big-box book superstore. The rows upon rows of open, dustless shelving bearing a veritable warehouse of volumes; the ceiling hung with its industrial innards on display; the enfilade of check-out cubicles; and the wall – the great wall – that displayed a preposterous-to-behold assortment of glossies, quarterlies, journals, newsweeklies, fanzines, tabloids, almanacs, and all other flora and fauna of magazines arrayed upon a rack perhaps 50 feet long.  I went in there to look for a book. I liked books, and, one day, I was sure I wanted to write one. But I got distracted and bought a magazine instead – that August’s issue of GQ, which still stands out in my mind as a thing of formative significance. At that time, the zeitgeist was defined by a Walkman-wearing version of the American Renaissance Man – the highly-ambitious, status-obsessed, money-motivated, health-nut known as a Yuppie. No magazine positioned itself more authoritatively in defining this new sociological creature’s lifestyle than GQ, and it did it with whiter teeth, snappier suspenders, better accessories, bigger polka dots and more caffeine in the ink of its display copy.  I remember that issue less for the photos by Richard Avedon or Steven Meisel, the words of Martin Amis or Frederick Exley, than for this: Erzeugerabfüllung. It was one of the longest, strangest strings of letters from the Roman alphabet I had ever seen. Neither did it seem designed to come out of someone’s mouth. But there it was in Alan Richman’s Wine & Spirits column, accompanied by a lovely still-life photograph of his topic: two bottles of Riesling Kabinetts on a white, sun-dappled tablecloth. Richman’s main point – made almost 35 years ago – still holds true: estate-bottled, table-quality German wines remain some of the least expensive, most delicious wines in the world, chiefly because – then as now – the labels, as he wrote, “cannot be understood by anyone who is not a part-time oenophile, linguist and cartographer”. One US dollar in Richman’s pocket, as I have already said, bought what roughly two-dollars-and-fifty-cents does today; what he was on the hunt for was a good dry white in a range that would now cost somewhere between 12 and 30 bucks, and he easily accomplished that by finding a dealer in New York City who carried a good selection of wines from the Mosel and Rheingau. At the time, I didn’t know the meaning or significance of any of this, but it staked a claim in my brain. The only wine I had ever tasted was the one served at our Episcopal church during Eucharist on Sundays. The flavour it had was of a strange, super-concentrated jam that somehow warmed your upper body. Even as a young kid, I liked it. But the adjectives these German bottles were squeezing out of Richman – “citrus-like”, “honeyed”, “tart-sweet” – weren’t close to describing what was in that chalice, even if you believed in transubstantiation. Was it because Richman’s wine was white, and the parish’s was red? Perhaps, but both colours of grape juice bottled by Welch’s tasted pretty much the same to me. No, I sensed there was something – a lot – I had to learn, and, along with the romance and beauty of the labels, and the contextual air of well-bred taste and cultural with-it-ness featured on the other pages, this, I feel sure, was the decisive moment, the true origin point, when I came to believe that among the many extraordinary things that make life worth living, not just words but wine reigns at the top.  I warned you about distractions, didn’t I? Because that would be my excuse for now informing you, as a quite apropos footnote, that, yes, there was something unusual about our church’s Communion wine. It was, as I have confirmed with the church, actually port (Taylor’s Tawny, to be more accurate), cut, according to tradition, with water. There is a good and fascinating reason for this. In 1701, when the War of the Spanish Succession kicked off, France also became an enemy of England, and its wines, as a result, were no longer made available for import. The Anglican Church searched for and found a replacement, the fortified wines of its new ally, Portugal, and port continues to be an acceptable option to pair with the Host.  II. Distillations A satisfying story, not unlike a satisfying life, is one that surprises you with the mystery of its unfolding. A thing pulls in a certain direction long enough to reach the proximity of something else which then turns toward a new destination. I had actually gone into that bookstore, as I said, to look at books. But I came out, even though I didn’t yet know it, with a different compass point. Within a few years, shortly after graduating from college, in 1992, I got hired by The New Yorker, where I stayed for almost nine years. I then met my future wife, who wisely laughed at the thought we might be able to survive in New York City on my meagre salary, so I went to Vogue, and soon after became the founding editor of Men’s Vogue. After 23 issues, and four years, the financial crisis laid an axe to many magazines, including that one. Eventually, I took on the editorship of Town & Country. Then, finally, in 2016, I moved up to Esquire, the magazine, as it happens, that didn’t offer me a job when The New Yorker did, and became that storied magazine’s editor in chief, until – well, you best read about that in The New York Times.  As far as distractions go, magazines were a good one. They made me who I am, gave me a tremendously worldly education, honed my taste, introduced me to all manner of accomplished people, required me to build quite a wardrobe, and paid me pretty well to do all of this, often with a glass of wine not far out of the picture. There was really no other way I would have ever got to taste all the bottles I have (a lot of the big names people whisper about from Burgundy and Bordeaux, Champagne and also Piedmont, Tuscany and Napa). I built a modest cave à vin of my own by buying the Smith Haut Lafittes of the world way before hedge-fund hoi polloi ran up the prices, and by having access to rare offerings, like 12 bottles of Fiorano, the legendary white wine Alberico Boncompagni Ludovisi, prince of Venosa, made before ripping out all his vines. I smelled the musty perfume of Margaux in the cellar as I watched the workers rack the wine by candlelight. I lured Jay McInerney away from the Wall Street Journal to become my wine columnist; and I once stood in Bordeaux’s town square, tight on 2002 Pétrus, trying with great focus to commune with the statue of Michel de Montaigne while my French friend, a true oenophile, extolled the majesty of the Big Mac’s special sauce.  As the editor of a magazine, curiosity is your profession, even to the point of distraction. Editors – writers, too – are prone to it. It’s a hazard of the gift, and having a jumble of ideas, if you’re any good, is key to making a magazine of any real intellectual or creative daring. Now as a husband and father of three, working from home and trying to be ‘present’, and a still youngish former editor and occasional micro-influencer trying to stave off the solitude to fathom and plot the next phase of a fruitful future, this skill of mine, the strength of which became even more magnified over two decades, is something of a family project.  The way I most often hear the word ‘distraction’ now, for instance, is when it’s being hurled at me in verb form by my wife or daughters accusing me of being more of a phone-enslaved screen vegetable than they are. (I respectfully disagree.) But it’s a sore point for two reasons. One, what I did as an editor is, in a nutshell, now what a smartphone essentially does. Not very imaginatively, of course, and not with taste or charm or originality, but with a bloody, money-grubbing ruthlessness that stalks every step of our digital peregrinations and doesn’t give a twist if the algorithms that are its brain make us its slave by retrofitting our attention spans for kindergarten.  The smartphone – not the former me or any of my fellow kind still in the media biz – is now the true croupier of culture, dealing out a targeted shuffle of Pavlovian temptations to the point of daily mental exhaustion. And, though this thing is in many ways my personal nemesis, I am, against every fibre of my being, too often its obedient servant. Aiming not to live according to the famous line by T.S. Eliot – “distracted from distraction by distraction” – I recently decided to at least take a serious inventory of my favourite ones, both those of the pre-digital sort (tennis, The Walking Dead, checking the mailbox, my sock collection) and those of the post-digital sort (the any and everything I do because my phone wants me to). Then I caught myself watching tennis on my phone and realised this might be harder than I thought. It’s enough to drive a person to drink, thank god! With that in mind, I like to keep a special something for the occasion around, in this case – what else? – two bottles of Riesling Kabinett, for it had struck me as more than a little weird that I’ve probably tasted fewer than a handful of German wines in my entire life. Part of the reason is that those I had were bad, and, like a lot of other simpletons about this great wine region of the world, I’d come to think of Riesling as a cloying elixir equal parts green Jolly Rancher, apple cider vinegar, and hairspray. This, I knew, was wrong, not true and, in terms of wine equity and inclusion, on the wrong side of history. But, if you happen to live in a place like I do – a bourgie swathe of Connecticut bordering New York City where the shops cater heavily to Cali-Fran-Taly banker’s tastes – it might take you a few stops to find what Richman recommended, an erzeugerabfüllung (estate-bottled) Kabinett (wine made from grapes with a minimum must weight/sugar content) Riesling, and when you do it will probably be coated in a fine sift of years-old dust. I bought a green (Mosel) bottle for US$16 and a brown (Rhine) bottle for US$20, both handsomely labelled. I opened them a few minutes ago and took several investigative swigs. The words bright, invigorating and snappy came to mind. One is indeed sweeter, and, though not my usual jam, it is tamped by a pleasing peachy tartness, and the classic overtone of honey isn’t making my palate feel doused with syrup. The other example is, as Richman said so long ago, a very finely layered creature with mineral clarity and an echo of baked bread, something a gluten-free person like me finds particularly appealing. A rather obvious thought: why haven’t I been buying this instead of throwing a ton of endless money at affordably bad white Burgundy, which is mostly a product aimed at fulfilling a desired outcome, like White Claw hard seltzer? III. Words But don’t let me get distracted, again. A writer really has to be careful about such things. Just think about it. Unlike, say, a painter or musician or actor or photographer, the process of writing requires zero physical exertion, no chance to score an endorphin release while sitting staring anxiously at a blank page. Of the many things in life that vie against the counter intuitive impulse to be glued to a desk, Cyril Connolly, in Enemies of Promise, his classic study of the things that distracted him (and others) from becoming a great writer, names the temptations but does not say much about why they’re so deeply tempting to someone who would otherwise be sitting alone in an empty room. Praise, money, fame, social prominence, affairs and journalism are the most common boltholes, according to Connolly, who, as a famously late sleeper that married three times, might have also added the bliss of unconsciousness and excessive alimony. In 1938, the year the book was published, he would never have imagined how hard the task might get without a cigarette. Smoking is a death wish, I know, but when you want to off yourself for still having a hundred pages to go, being able to snap open a nice lighter, flick some ash, stub a butt and inhale some lungfuls of focus-enhancing nicotine must have been kind of helpful. Connolly also doesn’t have much to say about drink except that artists who drink to excess do so “out of the consciousness of wasted ability”. According to that, the 20th century’s most famous literary alcoholics – Dorothy Parker, Truman Capote, F. Scott Fitzgerald, William Styron, Elizabeth Bishop, James Joyce, Raymond Chandler, William Faulkner – might have left behind even greater treasures than they did. Because Ernest Hemingway did almost everything with more gusto than any of his peers, including running up his bar tab, as a drinker he belongs in his own sentence. He is the novelist who most romanced a good drink or nice bottle of wine as one of life’s great pleasures. Who didn’t want to have a vermouth with Jake when reading The Sun Also Rises? (Don’t, it’s gross, at least if you order it at one of those kiosks in Montmartre where the bottles are hung upside down with spring-loaded dispensers.) Or, track down a bottle of Valdepeñas, Hemingway’s favourite variety of Spanish wine. Or, get a drink at the bar named after him at the Ritz, in Paris, and then go somewhere on the Left Bank to order “a dozen portugaises and a half-carafe of the dry white wine”.  In the early work, he is not boastful about drinking so much as he is the possessor of an unusual appetite for a good buzz. He is also, like Connolly, aware of the need to keep writing separate from drinking, and drinking within his control. It is hard to read the first paragraph of A Moveable Feast, in which he describes an “evilly run café where the drunkards of the quarter crowded together and I kept away from it because of the smell of dirty bodies and the sour smell of drunkenness”, except as a kind of terrifying admonition to himself. It is tragic that he didn’t heed his own advice. Late in his life, Hemingway became fond of rum daiquiris at the Floridita, his favourite bar in Havana, which might explain his taste for a prose style that soon became too often cloying self-parody. In one of the most extraordinary drinking sessions ever committed to words, in the roman à clef Across the River and Into the Trees, a 50-year-old Hemingway, who was smitten with a teenage Italian countess from Venice, fictionalises his infatuation with a last muse. In one stretch (that covers an evening-to-dawn crawl from Harry’s Bar, the grill at the Gritti Palace, a gondola and a hotel room), one half or another of the couple imbibes: one scotch whisky and soda; six Montgomery Martinis (15 parts gin; 1 part vermouth), two of which are described in size as ‘super’; a bottle of Capri Bianco; two bottles of Valpolicella; two bottles of Roederer Brut ’42; and two bottles of Perrier-Jouët. That is, I suppose, one extreme, and, clearly, not one to be tried at home.  The other might have been espoused by Dr. Samuel Johnson, the great critic and lexicographer. As a young man, he’d drained “many a bottle of wine” but loved port especially. (Perhaps Johnson, a devout Anglican who was born in 1709, in the midst of England’s 14-year war with Spain, also first encountered port as a boy at the Communion altar.) He describes himself to friend and biographer James Boswell as having been “apt to go to excess in it”, adding that, “therefore, after having been for some time without it, on account of illness, I thought it better not to return to it”.  Boswell, who worried about his own dependence on alcohol, even keeping a journal of his intake in an attempt to enforce moderation, argued for a third way, which some of the Romantics later adopted. Wine, he claimed, “produces truth; in vino veritas”. Hoping to persuade Johnson of his point, Boswell once convinced the critic to come down off the wagon for just one glass of claret, so Johnson “might judge, not from recollection, which might be dim, but from immediate sensation”. Boswell reports what happened after the glass was emptied: “Johnson shook his head, and said, ‘Poor stuff! No, Sir, claret is the liquor for boys; port, for men,’” adding, “‘A man would be drowned by it before it made him drunk.’”  That actually reminds me of something I think I forgot to mention about Riesling Kabinetts – they’re also highly admired for their low percentage of alcohol. On that note, I think I’ll have another glass.  This article was originally published in FONDATA, Issue Two.

Jay Fielden, former editor of Men’s Vogue, Town & Country and Esquire, recalls how a magazine column on wine, read in a Texas bookstore, shifted his ambitions beyond journalism and set him on the path to becoming a writer of books.

Former Esquire editor-in-chief Jay Fielden reflects on magazines, writing, Riesling Kabinett and the distractions that shaped a life in words and wine.

Jay Fielden on Wine, Words and Distraction

How one became another  

It has been an exceptional few weeks for FINE+RARE events. From Hong Kong to London, Milan to the Scottish Highlands, this run of extraordinary occasions – each distinct in character – has been united by the thread that runs through everything we do: bringing people closer to the world's most exceptional wines and spirits in settings that do them justice. Tiberio Dinner Table by Sandy Keung, Hong Kong — Wednesday 21 May The run began with one of the most eye-opening evenings of recent weeks, centred on the wines of Tiberio, the Abruzzo estate whose commitment to a no-oak philosophy — for both fermentation and ageing, with the sole exception of Archivio — continues to challenge assumptions about what Italian wine can achieve without the influence of wood. The evening opened with three vintages of Fonte Canale: 2016, 2018 and 2023. The 2023 drew immediate attention — many guests found it hard to believe that a wine of such depth and power had not seen any oak influence whatsoever. Vibrant acidity and a clear capacity for long-term ageing were immediately apparent. The 2016, with more time in bottle, had moved into more evolved territory, displaying nutty and dried fruit notes while retaining impressive freshness. The 2018 proved a wonderful companion to the mixed clam dish, its texture and salinity enhancing the natural sweetness of the seafood. Among the whites, the standout for many was the Quarmari 2023 — exceptionally aromatic, revealing layers of beeswax, jasmine, caramel, lemon cream, basil and sweet spice. It was universally appreciated around the table, with some guests going so far as to compare its quality and presence to Corton-Charlemagne. The reds were equally compelling. Four vintages of Colle Vota — 2014, 2018, 2019 and 2021 — demonstrated remarkable depth and character across the board. Full-bodied and structured, with pronounced notes of dark fruits, liquorice, cedar, cinnamon and spice, the 2018 and 2021 in particular showed great power and concentration, their style subtly reminiscent, for some guests, of Château de Tours from Rayas. Paired with the lamb neck course, these wines were in their element. What surprised many most was that, despite their weight and complexity, not one had been aged in oak — a testament to the intrinsic power and expression of old vines. The inaugural 2014 vintage of Colle Vota was a particularly memorable moment. Despite showing early tertiary notes, it retained excellent fruit, freshness and structure, offering a compelling demonstration of the outstanding ageing potential these old-vine wines possess. It was an evening that left a very strong impression on everyone present, and a powerful reminder that great winemaking is, above all, about the vine and the land. Update by Jonathan Leung, Sales Manager, Hong Kong Castello di Ama — Vigneto Bellavista Vertical Dinner The River Café, London — Thursday 18 June One of the most memorable evenings of the year so far took place at The River Café, where proprietor Lorenza Sebasti guided a remarkable retrospective of Castello di Ama's Bellavista — the estate's defining wine, drawn from one of the highest and most historic sites in Gaiole in Chianti. Presented across nine vintages spanning more than three decades, from 1990 through to the newly released 2022, the dinner offered a rare opportunity to explore both the evolution and the extraordinary consistency of one of Tuscany's great wines. The oldest vintages were deeply impressive. The 1990, 1995, 2004 and 2006 demonstrated that great Chianti Classico belongs among the world's most ageworthy wines, maintaining freshness, detail and vivacity decades after harvest. For many around the table, however, the greatest surprise came from the 2011 — universally praised and the favourite of numerous guests — which has now entered an ideal drinking window, combining maturity, complexity and harmony in a way that rewards the patience Bellavista has always asked of its admirers. Among the younger vintages, the 2018 impressed for its purity and transparency, while the 2021 and 2022 elevated the conversation further. Both displayed remarkable polish, power and refinement alongside the freshness that has become an increasingly important hallmark of the site. It was the 2022 Bellavista that generated the greatest excitement. Awarded a perfect 100-point score by Antonio Galloni, the wine was the subject of considerable discussion throughout the evening, though the consensus was clear: the score tells only a small part of the story. What made the 2022 so fascinating was what it represents — a convergence of decades of technical progress, viticultural understanding and winemaking refinement in a single wine. It possessed concentration and potency, but delivered these with remarkable elegance, precision and energy. More than any previous vintage tasted, it felt like a blueprint for the future of the estate. Throughout the evening, Lorenza and Arturo offered invaluable personal reflections on the evolution of Castello di Ama, transforming the dinner from a vertical tasting into a living history of one of Italy's great estates. The River Café, with its understated elegance and deep connection to Italian cuisine, proved the perfect setting. The main takeaway was a simple truth: Bellavista is one of Italy's great wines, and only growing in stature and completeness. Across more than thirty years, through changing vintages and shifting climates, it has maintained a consistency of purpose and identity that very few wines anywhere in the world can match. Update by Dara de Lacy, Senior Sales Manager, UK EAWCO Rarities Selection — Bowmore & Springbank Masterclass FINE+RARE HQ, London A masterclass that set the bar high from the very first pour. We were delighted to welcome Christian Leusder, founder and owner of East Asia Whisky Company, to FINE+RARE headquarters for an evening dedicated to some of the rarest independent bottlings in existence. East Asia Whisky Company has been a longstanding and deeply valued partner of FINE+RARE. An exclusive independent bottler built on principles of understatement, exclusivity and meticulous attention to detail, EAWCO's portfolio spans blue-chip distilleries including Macallan, Bowmore, Springbank, Chichibu and Caroni. They remain the only independent bottler to have released multiple successful Mizunara cask bottlings from these houses — releases that have, remarkably, achieved higher prices than the original distillery bottlings of the same vintages. Christian guided guests through the history of the company before leading a tutored exploration of five extraordinarily rare expressions from Bowmore and Springbank: Bowmore PX Mizunara, 31 Year Old Bowmore Japan Edition, 30 Year Old Springbank Lumen Refill Sherry, 30 Year Old Springbank Yokai Series Asanoha Dragon, 24 Year Old Springbank Yokai Series Yurei (Ghost) Cat, 25 Year Old With a few surprises woven in along the way, the evening was a genuine privilege — one of those rare tastings where every bottle opened carries real weight and significance. For those who were unable to attend, a small number of these bottlings remain available, though given how few exist, they are being offered very selectively. All come very highly recommended. Update by Morgan Richards, Senior Account Manager An Extraordinary Journey Through Bordeaux's Greatest Estates Trattoria de La Trebia, Milan — Tuesday 23 June In Milan, an evening of extraordinary ambition brought together a side-by-side exploration of the 2012 and 2014 vintages through Bordeaux's most celebrated First Growth estates and the legendary Petrus. Far more than a tasting, this was a rare opportunity for guests to compare the expression of each château across two very different vintages — discovering how terroir, philosophy and vintage character shape wines that stand among the finest ever produced. The lineup was nothing short of remarkable. Across both vintages, guests tasted Château Margaux, Château Cheval Blanc, Château Haut-Brion, Petrus, Château Lafite Rothschild, Château Mouton Rothschild and Château La Mission Haut-Brion — fourteen wines in all, representing the very pinnacle of Bordeaux winemaking. The tasting was complemented by an exclusive five-course menu designed by the culinary team at Trattoria de La Trebia, crafted to enhance and showcase each wine served throughout the evening. If one wine captured the room above all others, it was the Château Haut-Brion 2012. Explosive from the first moment, with blackcurrant, smoke and herbs, it simply grew in the glass — every passing minute revealing more power, richness and intensity. Full-bodied, multi-layered and framed by wonderfully chewy tannins, this is a wine of real charm: approachable now yet built to last another twenty years with ease. A blend of 65.5% Merlot, 32.5% Cabernet Sauvignon and 2% Cabernet Franc, it offers extraordinary quality for its level — the kind of Haut-Brion that gives joy from the very first sip. Not to be missed. The Château Margaux 2012 also showed beautifully, drawing considerable admiration from guests throughout the evening. Designed for collectors, enthusiasts and connoisseurs alike, the dinner brought together extraordinary wines, great conversation and a shared passion for excellence — everything a FINE+RARE evening in Italy should be. Update by Jonathan Bruni, Sales Director, Continental Europe Visit to Hazelwood House Speyside, Scotland — Thursday 25 to Friday 26 June The series closed with something truly special: a private, two-day visit to Hazelwood House, the Gordon family home in the Scottish Highlands and the inspiration behind the House of Hazelwood collection — one of the world's greatest inventories of aged and rare Scotch whisky. Over two days, a small group of guests were given rare access to a world that very few ever see: private tours of the Balvenie and Glenfiddich distilleries, a whisky tasting drawn from House of Hazelwood's private reserves, a Gordon family archive session led by archivist Andy Fairgrieve, and an evening of wine, whisky and storytelling over a four-course dinner at the house itself — each course paired with exceptional wines from FINE+RARE alongside whiskies of extraordinary age and provenance. It was the kind of experience that simply cannot be replicated — not just rare access, but a genuine connection to the family, the place and the history from which these remarkable whiskies come. These past few weeks have captured everything we love about what we do at FINE+RARE – connecting people with the world's most remarkable wines and spirits, in the most exceptional settings, surrounded by the stories and the people that bring them to life.  We look forward to sharing what lies ahead for the rest of the year. Interested in joining us at future events? We are pleased to announce that it is now possible to browse, book and purchase event tickets directly through our website, with all tickets viewable in your portfolio. Get in touch with your account manager or visit frw.co.uk/events to see what's coming up — we'd love to see you at the next one.

Tiberio in Hong Kong, Castello di Ama and rare whiskies in London, First Growth Bordeaux in Milan and a private Scottish estate — a glimpse of our events programme week to week. Plus, you can now purchase event tickets directly through our website.

From a Tiberio dinner in Hong Kong to rare whiskies in Scotland, a look back at recent FINE+RARE tastings, dinners and experiences.

Looking back at our recent events

Xiao-Li Meng, professore di Statistica Whipple V. N. Jones a Harvard e fondatore e direttore responsabile di Harvard Data Science Review, si è lasciato ispirare da uno studente per combinare vino e statistica — ottenendo intuizioni ben oltre quanto entrambi si aspettassero.

From wine tastings to data science, Xiao-Li Meng explores how statistics reveals simplicity in complexity – one glass, experiment, and insight at a time.

Wine, statistics & serendipity: A Harvard journey

Semplicità nelle statistiche, complessità nel vino, il resto nei biscotti della fortuna.

Spain didn’t know what we had or that we were able to make world-class wines…we are still not sure what we have, what we can do. It is a super exciting time. Just 15 years ago Spanish wine collectors just bought French and Italian wine, now today we have a real variety of fine wines coming from all over Spain.” But Spain’s history has been a little less than smooth. Whilst Spain might have the highest quantity of vines planted in the world it has one of the lowest consumption rates in Europe. This disconnect with its own produce is one of the reasons behind Spain’s slow uptake in a more qualitative approach to winemaking. 
Wine as nourishment: days of hardship Luis recalls his grandfather used to drink wine for nourishment. Following the struggles of civil war and dictatorship, most of the country lived under extreme hardship. A lack of fresh drinkable water meant wine would often be mixed with water. Wine offered the cheapest means to nutrient intake.  At this time there was also a huge disconnect with the wineries and grape growers in Spain. The wineries in Spain were operating at an industrial scale, producing masses of cheap wine. There was almost no relationship between growers and producers and no concept of quality, when quantity was the benchmark of economic viability. During this time, even these cooperative wineries struggled to survive.   The vignerons' relationships with herbicides is a good example of just how much things have changed in viticulture, not just in Spain but the whole of Europe, over the last century. During this difficult period, herbicides were the only viable way to produce wines under such economic hardship, and an educated workforce in the vineyard was a luxury most could not afford.  It was thanks to herbicides that the wine industry effectively survived through this period, despite its negative long-term consequences, acting as a poison to the soil. Luis contrasts this with today’s richer Spain where a qualitative approach has taken hold with a more long-term sustainable future in which herbicides are no longer necessary nor appreciated. The survival of the iconic wineries of Spain Despite the difficulties of the times, there were historic / iconic qualitative producers that existed throughout this period, iconic wineries of Vega Sicilia, Marques de Murrieta and Marques de Riscal for example. But according to Luis most of these survived simply because the wine production was not their main source of income.  These historic estates survived on incomes from elsewhere as landowners and property developers. Luis identifies how the 1925 Ygay Rioja was not bottled until 1964 and not released onto the market until 1973, stating this is not the sort of business plan that could sustain a business without other income! 
Spain reaches out to Europe in search for identity But when democracy arrived in Spain and the country became less isolated and wealthier, history of circumstance again stifled Spain’s wine industry. For many producers who looked
to Europe for inspiration chose to copy rather than invest in its own indigenous grapes varieties and traditional wines. Instead in regions like Navarra all the indigenous old vines were uprooted and French varieties of Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot and Syrah were planted. For those producers who took the qualitative approach Luis recalls how they took all the excesses of modern winemaking fashionable in the 1990s and threw them all at their wines with little reflection on the consequences. Picking grapes super ripe, over-extracting them, ageing them in 200% new oak. Whilst these wines hit the headlines in some respect, for Luis, it did little to recapture the essence or identity of Spanish wine. Luis states how some of the wines that are most praised today in Spain were unsaleable during this time. For instance Lopez de Heredia, one of the most traditional producers in Rioja, who never swayed under the pressure of fashion during this period and who continued to only ever release their Gran Reserva 20 years after harvest.  However, during the mid-90s, these wines were so out of fashion amongst Spanish wine drinkers and collectors they could barely sell a single bottle. Due to the economic restraint that this put on the winery they were forced to stop producing their flagship Gran Reserva from the mid-nineties. So today we have one of Spain’s now most celebrated and respected wineries unable to release their top cuvee, since they were not able to make the wine 20 years ago. Their last release of the Gran Reserva Red was the 1995 vintage, released in 2015. Their next release will be their 2001, due for release in 2021. Luis recalls a similar story with Vega Sicilia. Their much praised 1970 vintage remained unbottled at the winery for years, simply because there were no orders for it. Therefore, these wines became known for their super long élevage often remaining in barrel and tank for years due to lack of interest rather than for qualitative reasons! 
The global success of Rioja Rioja is an interesting anomaly in Spain’s fortunes as a region heavily influenced, first-hand, by Bordeaux. Following the outbreak of phylloxera in Bordeaux many Bordelais travelled south to Rioja to reestablish their wine businesses. They introduced the use of small oak barriques to mature the wine. Traditionally, Luis recounts, Rioja was made using carbonic maceration and no oak. The use of American oak became adopted, more likely due to its lower cost. This positive influence from France saw Rioja become a hugely successful brand in itself and an export success for Spain’s struggling wine industry. However, fast forward 100 years and now the “Rioja” brand is in some ways its biggest issue. This, Luis states, is a broader debate over how the DO classification system in Spain has become outdated. What was good for the region when it was initially created in 1926, is not good for it now. Back then Spain was poor and isolated. In order to create a wine for export it had to create an overall brand – Rioja.  “Everyone was on the same train” and “it was a way to open up markets”. But today the language of wine has changed. A similar issue has happened with Cava too. Luis states that wine from Rioja and Cava is not all the same and if there is wine of poor quality associated with that name then it can become a liability to a producer who is more focused on a qualitative approach. Not all wines are great under a DO, not all vineyards are the same quality. The DO now needs more differentiation. Luis looks to the Burgundy model as a guide. Here there is differentiation, something a collector can grasp and decipher. But it is not just “terroir” but also better winemaking. We discuss the comments made by Robert Parker who attacked producers for using the phrase “terroir” to hide what was effectively bad winemaking. Now there is so much more communication between
winegrowers, thanks first to the country being less isolated, but perhaps more importantly the world of information opening up thanks to the internet. Luis remembers winemakers he met in Spain who didn’t even know what malolactic fermentation was. They were just not educated on modern winemaking concepts and techniques. Today this is not the case and terroir has started to mean something more tangible than merely a distraction attributed to bad winemaking. Luis states “wine is so complex. We know so little about it but we have never been so connected and that has helped enormously in bringing confidence to winemakers in Spain, bringing courage for them to rediscover their own indigenous varieties and trust in their unique terroirs.” Spain’s Renaissance Spain in the last few years has become tremendously exciting as a fine wine region with great variety, seemingly from every corner of the country, rich with a sense of identity, authenticity and uniqueness. Asked what the catalyst was for this Luis believes it has been a gradual change over the last 25 years following Spain coming out of its political isolation. We are a result of our history.  “It created an inferiority complex that has been part of our DNA, especially the last 80 years, when Spain was an isolated country after a civil war. It took a long time to believe in ourselves. There was a tendency to think that the stuff around us was better than our own. Now we have a new generation of producers who have a belief that their indigenous varieties and their terroirs can produce wines as fine as anywhere else in the world." This Luis states has also been helped by consumers becoming more adventurous and open to discovering new regions, new styles. This quality revolution as “a phenomenon that has really accelerated in the last ten, and perhaps perceived globally in the last two.” Be in no doubt the top wines of Spain being produced today stand head to head with other fine wine regions around the world and deserve a place in everyone’s collection. Explore more Editorial 

We speak to one of the world’s leading wine critics, a specialist in Spanish wine, Luis Gutierrez about the cultural history of wine in Spain, the reasons behind today’s renaissance and why it has taken so long to arrive.

One of the world’s leading wine critics, Luis Gutierrez on the cultural history of Spanish wine and the reasons behind its renaissance 

Luis Gutierrez on the Spanish wine renaissance

The Spanish Renaissance: a rediscovery of its roots

Everything about Glenfarclas is venerable. For almost 200 years, the distillery with one of the most enviable addresses in Scotland has remained fiercely independent and committed to quality. Where countless others have amalgamated and joined behemoths of the industry, Glenfarclas has remained family-owned – amassing enviable stocks of aged single malt in the process. Today, the sixth generation of the Grant family maintains many traditional practices, including direct firing its stills, to produce the highest quality, full-bodied sherried Highland single malt possible. This resolution and myriad difficult decisions made by the family during times of immense hardship have led to genuine innovation and secured Glenfarclas a place as one of the most coveted and collectable names in Scotch whisky. But just how has one of the only family-owned Scottish distillers become such an icon and which Glenfarclas bottlings are the most highly sought after? The history of Glenfarclas The Glenfarclas distillery was built on the River Spey in 1836 when Robert Hay was granted a licence to distil whisky. Cattle breeder John Grant took over the farm and distillery following Hay’s death for 511 pounds and 19 shillings and leased it to John Smith who left five years later to build Cragganmore. The site passed between Grant generations until the Glenfarclas-Glenlivet Distillery Company was formed with Pattisons of Leith in the 1890s. This partnership wasn’t to last long and Glenfarclas was fortunate to weather the Pattisons Crash in 1898 that threatened to bring the entire industry down with it. The distillery has firmly remained under the Grant family’s ownership since. George Scott Grant is one of the key figures in the distillery’s long history. During his 52-year tenure, which ended with his death in 2002, George built up Glenfarclas’s name and brand image. George had the foresight to restrict the supply of stock to blenders and squirrel away stocks. This decision has proven extremely lucrative as Glenfarclas now boasts a depth of stock that few other whisky distilleries can rival. John L. S Grant, the current chairman, has been with the company since 1973 and succeeded his father in 2002. The sixth generation is represented by George S. Grant who joined Glenfarclas in 2000. George works as the larger-than-life global brand ambassador, introducing the world to the remarkable Glenfarclas story and spirit. The distillery’s fortunes oscillated throughout various whisky booms and busts. Production has increased, been scaled back, and considerable stock laid down when times were hard. Throughout all this, the Speyside distillery can legitimately lay claim to a series of firsts – it was one of the first single malts to be consistently available when others were concentrating on blends and it was among the first Scottish distilleries to open a visitor centre. It was also the first to introduce a cask-strength single malt whisky. Today, Glenfarclas operates the biggest stills in Speyside and its Highland single malt accounts for two-thirds of the distillery’s annual production – sold in more than 90 markets worldwide. Glenfarclas’s distillery character The distillery, located one mile from the River Spey, is situated on a stretch of land that boasts the likes of The Macallan,  Balvenie,  Glenfiddich and Aberlour. The distillery sources its water from the neighbouring Ben Rinnes mountains. Glenfarclas is famed for its full-bodied, Sherry-matured expressions. The distillery only releases expressions at natural colour, often at cask strength, aged for extended periods of time. The unique still shapes and sizes, alongside the traditional ingredients and distillation techniques add to the distinctive distillery character. Glenfarclas new-make spirit is only ever matured in a combination of first-fill and refill ex-Oloroso casks from the highly regarded José y Miguel Martin. John Grant makes an annual pilgrimage to the bodega in Jerez to ensure his Highland single malt will eventually slumber in the finest quality oak. To this day, all six of Glenfarclas’s stills, which are the largest in Speyside, are direct-fired. The distillery team experimented with steam heating in 1981 to no avail as the family believed the final product to be inferior and lacking its characteristic full-bodied style. The distillery is capable of producing approximately 3.5 million litres of spirit annually. Normally, two of the stills are kept in reserve, while four work around the clock. Glenfarclas single malt whiskies Glenfarclas has consistently released single malt whiskies of exceptional quality from its enviable stocks. The Grant family has more than 50,000 casks slumbering in its expansive on-site warehousing at any one time to draw from. In 2007, Glenfarclas gave the world a glimpse at its incredible depth of stocks with the first release of its highly collectable Family Casks bottlings. The series of 43 (and counting) single-cask, vintage single malts spans seven decades and is highly sought after by whisky lovers. In addition to the limited releases, Glenfarclas bottles a “made to age” core range, which includes the 10 Year Old, 12 Year Old, 15 Year Old, 17 Year Old, 21 Year Old, 25 Year Old, 30 Year Old and 50 Year Old. The distillery also produces an incredibly popular cask-strength bottling named “105 Cask Strength”. Some of the most collectable Glenfarclas bottlings Notable limited releases include the Glenfarclas 50-year-old (released in 2005) and the 175th anniversary commemorative bottling, released in January 2011. The latter was an impressive vatted whisky from casks from 1952 and five successive decades. In June 2015, Glenfarclas launched the highly collectable limited expression £511.19s.0d Family Reserve to mark 150 years of the Grant family’s ownership of the distillery. The bottling was named after the amount (511 pounds and 19 shillings) John Grant paid for the Glenfarclas farm in 1865, and came with a copy of the original bill of sale for the distillery. One of the most remarkable limited releases is the Glenfarclas Family Trunk, released in 2018. Only 60 of the leather shipping luggage trunks containing 50 bottles of 200ml single malt from the Family Casks collection, dating back to 1954, were ever produced. Today, a single trunk, available to purchase from the distillery, costs £120,000. In 2020, the distillery released another highly collectable whisky for the Spirit of Speyside Festival, which was cancelled due to the global pandemic. Each year, a member of the team chooses a spirit to be bottled for the annual whisky celebration. In 2020, the responsibility fell to the men behind the still, and The Stillmen’s Dram was born – a 10-year-old matured in a first-fill Oloroso butt, bottled at cask strength. The Glenfarclas Family Casks Collection The Glenfarclas Family Casks collection is a highly collectable series of single cask bottlings from the family’s extensive stocks. Since the first bottle was released in 2007, the Family Casks whiskies have garnered a loyal following and become a real collectors’ item. The single-cask whiskies, which span seven decades, are some of the finest expressions from each vintage since 1954. Glenfarclas Pagoda series The highly collectable Pagoda series features two of the oldest Glenfarclas whiskies ever released. The extremely limited vintage whisky bottlings are inspired by the famous pagoda kiln which was decommissioned at the distillery in 1972. Each Glencairn crystal decanter is a unique work of art. No two are exactly the same and each element – from the side graphics to the exquisite pagoda stopper – have been painstakingly crafted. The Glenfarclas Pagoda Series is available in extremely limited quantities. Only 180 bottles of the 1954 vintage Pagoda Ruby Reserve (62-year-old), and 1953 Pagoda Sapphire Reserve (63-year-old) were ever made. The outrun of The Pagoda Reserve Trilogy (1956 vintage 59-year-old, 1967 vintage 48-year-old and 1971 vintage 43-year-old) was limited to 100 sets. Browse Glenfarclas whiskies or read more Editorial

Glenfarclas is an iconic, family-owned single malt Scotch whisky producer. As bottlings from the Grant family’s impressive aged stocks become ever-more collectable, Holly Motion charts the fascinating history of this fiercely independent whisky maker

A spotlight on Glenfarclas. We explore how the traditional, independent Scotch whisky distiller became one of the world’s most well-respected names.

Exploring the Scotch whisky icon, Glenfarclas 

Everything you need to know about Glenfarclas

The glitterati of the food world gathered in Antwerp last night to celebrate the World’s 50 Best Restaurants. It’s perhaps no surprise that Copenhagen’s Noma came out on top yet again (with its original location having won four times before, 2010-2012 and 2014). René Redzepi’s iconic New Nordic concept, championing the finest foraged ingredients and the art of fermentation, is rightfully at the top of many gastronomic wish lists.  This year’s list includes eight new entries – including Lido 84 (Gardone Riviera, Italy) which came in at no 15. Other new entries were: Diverxo (no 20 – Madrid, Spain), Burnt Ends (no 34 – Singapore), SingleThread (no 37 – Healdsburg, USA), Florilège (no 39 – Tokyo, Japan), Atomix (no 43 – New York, USA), Nobelhart & Schmutzig (no 45 – Berlin, Germany) and Wolfgat (no 50 – Paternoster, South Africa).  Hong Kong’s The Chairman climbed a massive 31 places to no 10, while two chefs earnt special recognition. Victor Arguinzoniz of Asador Etxebarri (Atxondo, Spain) was named Chefs’ Choice and Will Goldfarb (Room4Dessert – Bali, Indonesia) took home the title of the World’s Best Pastry Chef. Steirereck (Vienna, Austria) won the Art of Hospitality Award and Boragó (Santiago, Chile) was recognised for its sustainability. Spain and the US were confirmed as gourmet hotspots – each having six restaurants in the top 50.   Previous winners of the top spot include El Bulli (2002, 2006-2009), The French Laundry (2003-2004), The Fat Duck (2005), El Celler de Can Roca (2013, 2015), Osteria Francescana (2016, 2018), Eleven Madison Park (2017) and Mirazur (2019).  The list is decided by 1,000 industry experts who vote for the establishments they feel are the best. Voters are given certain freedom, with no strict criteria to consider – and previous winners of the coveted number-one spot are no longer allowed to vote. The 1,000 voters are food writers, critics, chefs, restaurateurs – in short the globe’s most experienced diners. The group is evenly split between male and female, with a panel of 40 members in 26 different regions. Each year, 25% of any panel has to change. The process and results are even independently adjudicated by Deloitte.  The 2021 awards are based on a combination of pre-pandemic votes and more recent updates, depending on restrictions in each region.  The top 10 restaurants in the world 2021  Noma (Copenhagen, Denmark)  Geranium (Copenhagen, Denmark)  Asador Etxebarri (Atxondo, Spain)  Central (Lima, Peru)  Disfrutar (Barcelona, Spain)  Frantzén (Stockholm, Sweden)  Maido (Lima, Peru)  Odette (Singapore)  Pujol (Mexico City, Mexico)  The Chairman (Hong Kong)  Explore the full list here 

After a year off, the 2021 edition of the World’s 50 Best Restaurants has been announced. Here’s a run-down of the year’s biggest winners – and the establishments that should be on any post-pandemic dining hit list 

A rundown of the 2021 World’s 50 Best Restaurants biggest winners – and the establishments that should be on any post-pandemic dining hit list 

The best restaurants in the world right now

“Meet my girlfriends,” calls Telmo Rodríguez down the phone, laughing as he flips his camera to show two enormous shaggy-haired mutts. The skies are crisp and blue on the other side of the screen, the sun beating down on Remelluri, his family estate in Rioja Alavesa. The camera swings across the horizon as he introduces me to one of his team before rushing indoors to sit down for our call. There’s an almost frenetic energy to Rodríguez – and that energy is what in many ways defines the maverick winemaker, who has been one of the transformational forces in Spanish wine.  His parents purchased La Granja Nuestra Señora de Remelluri – a farm that has been home to vines since at least the 14th century – in 1967. Growing up on this special property, young Rodríguez went off to study winemaking in Bordeaux, then trained at properties including Cos d’Estournel, Domaine de Trévallon, Chave and more. He returned home inspired and excited to use his new-found knowledge on the family property in the early 1990s. But his father didn’t welcome Telmo’s ambition: the market didn’t want great or even good Rioja, he told his son – the market wanted cheap Rioja. Although he wasn’t allowed to make changes to the red, Rodríguez was given free rein to create the property’s first white wine. And that wine rocketed him to fame. White Rioja has always been niche (today just 9% of the vineyard area is planted to white grapes), but in the 1990s its future was looking uncertain – with the traditional, oxidised style of wines such as López de Heredia’s Tondonia Blanco fallen from grace, and many producers had given up on making these wines (as with CVNE’s Monopole Clásico, which has since been revived). Rodríguez wanted to create a wine of place, rather than a wine of style, and used complex field blends planted at higher altitudes to do so. Fermented and aged in a combination of tank and oak, Remelluri Blanco was unlike any other wine in the region. Robert Parker wrote of the 1996 vintage that it was “the finest white wine [he had] ever tasted from Spain”. The multi-variety blend doesn’t include the region’s trademark white, Viura, and is technically illegal – a fact that perhaps has only increased its appeal.  But Rodríguez was frustrated by his father, by the limitations put on him and his wines. Restless and with a rift in the family forming, he flew the coop to focus on his own project. In Bordeaux he had become friends with a fellow Spaniard, Pablo Eguzkiza, who had been working at Pétrus, and together they had already started making wine – beginning with an old-vine Garnacha from Navarra in 1994. With that wine, Compañía de Vinos Telmo Rodríguez was born.  Their vision was to make real Spanish wine – the wines that had been made before, as they saw it, France started to sway the industry. When the deadly louse phylloxera had swept through France in the late 19th century, killing its vineyards, the nation looked south, across the Pyrenees to Spain. Producers travelled there to make wine and feed demand, and Rioja in particular saw an influx of business and money – but this uplift also came with French influence. In Rodríguez’s view, this was the ruining of the trade – Rioja, which had once been a wine of site, became a wine of oak. And soon, across Spain, the variety that once defined its many regions was being over-written with international varieties. Spain became known for cheap wine – and producers were racing to the bottom.  “The worst are the British,” says Rodríguez. “They say they know Rioja and they know Sherry, but, in a certain way, the British market killed Sherry and killed Rioja because they are very happy to have a cheap Reserva for a few pounds.” The dominance of what he describes as “industrial brands”, the larger houses that buy in fruit from across the region, aged in American oak for “traditional” styles, and French for “modern”, is abhorrent to him.  “I’m sorry, you don’t know anything about Rioja. Tell me one village. Tell me one taste. Tell me one landscape. Tell me one mountain. Nobody knew anything,” he says. He explains how Labastida – a village neighbouring Remelluri – was once the Vosne-Romanée of Rioja, home to 330 different wine producers in 1680. But over the years, that history has been blended away.  Together, Rodríguez and Eguzkiza set out to uncover and reveal the Spain of yesteryear, working with old vines, native varieties and traditional methods to champion what they saw as the true Spanish wines. From their beginnings in Navarra, they looked to Arribes del Duero, to Rueda, to Málaga, to Aragon and back to Rioja, then Ribera, Toro and Sierra de Gredos.   “Now we are showing what is real,” Rodríguez tells me, with a sense of satisfaction. In Rioja, for example, they created Bodegas Lanzaga in 1998, looking to focus on the terroir around the town of Lanziego. The Consejo (regulatory body), however, didn’t allow them to use the name of a village on the label until 2017. For almost two decades they protested this rule, featuring the name on the label, but redacted (inspired in part by the art of Jenny Holzer). Today, there is a clear, and growing, movement of producers looking to focus on single-site expressions of Rioja’s best vineyards, shifting away from cross-regional blends and the dominance of oak. This echoes what is happening elsewhere in Spain, as producers focus on indigenous grapes and identifying what makes each of its varied regions unique. It’s a revolution – one that Rodríguez has been at the forefront of. It's easy to think of this rockstar duo as flying winemakers – having so many projects scattered around the country, only touching down briefly to sign off on blends before they’re off to their next event. While inevitably their schedule is intense, their focus is firmly in the vineyard and on reflecting each individual place and site – rather than crafting a range that speaks of their influence. “It’s a very honest approach to a place,” Rodríguez says. The references throughout our conversation only emphasise this: Burgundy, the ultimate “terroir” wine, is where he finds his inspiration; while the Super Tuscans are repeatedly scorned for their internationality.  Matallana is quite possibly Telmo Rodríguez’s most ambitious project to date. He and Eguzkiza first made wine in Ribera del Duero in 1998, and have slowly built up 21.5 hectares of vines around the region.  “My dream was to do a very good Vega Sicilia. I wanted to do the Vega Sicilia that I used to drink in the past,” explains Rodríguez, talking about bottles from the 1940s, ’50s or ’60s. Back then, he says, it wasn’t an estate wine but fruit was sourced from around the region. For him, Vega Sicilia is now too “Bordeaux-style”. He argues that while in Rioja the soils are quite consistent, Ribera del Duero is incredibly varied. They have chosen to work with a range of vineyards across five villages – Sotillo de la Ribera, Roa, Fuentecén, Fuentemolinos and Pardilla – ranging from quartz-rich or pebbly soils reminiscent of Châteauneuf-du-Pape to chalky albariza and clay-heavy sites. This diversity is what helps bring complexity to the wine, with each one producing a different expression of Tinto Fino.   The work involved in each of the Compañía de Vinos Telmo Rodríguez projects is painstaking, tracking down special parcels, reviving soils and replanting or grafting where necessary, working organically and biodynamically, to achieve the quality they’re looking for. For Bodegas Lanzaga, for example, it was over a decade before they produced the first vintage of their top wine, Las Beatas, from a 1.9-hectare plot of the same name (first made in 2011).  For Matallana, they wanted to track down the region’s very best, historic vineyards in each of the five villages. But it’s not been easy. All too often they’d been abandoned, some needed re-planting entirely, or otherwise re-grafting with massal selections, and serious work to bring the soils back to life. They wanted to work with unirrigated bush-vines and field blends – vineyards farmed as they might have been in the 19th century. And then there’s the complex ownership: to buy just six of their 21.5 hectares took seven years, purchasing tiny plots from 40 different families.  Although they’ve been making wine here since the 1999 vintage, it wasn’t ready until relatively recently – and Rodríguez considers the 2014 the first “real” vintage of the project. Before that point they had made three wines, a selection of fruit from the oldest vines that went into the “Grand Vin” Matallana, a second wine M2 and the unoaked Gazur from younger plots. “They were prototypes, we were learning,” explains Rodríguez. From 2014, there is only one wine, with a change in the label to reflect the shift.  As with the older vintages from Bodegas Lanzaga, the label shows a list of redacted vineyard names – which are still not permitted to feature on the labels in Ribera del Duero. “All those vineyards are the guarantee of the purity of our wines,” says Rodríguez. In fact, the label is embossed, so beneath the censored text, you can feel the names of these terroirs. He’s moved to reduce the oak, using some foudres and tinajas (amphorae), while also acknowledging that the wine needs movement and oxygen to polymerise the tannins. The result, however, is a more delicate wine. At the end of the day, he says, “We don’t care about the winery… our wine is the landscape, is the soils.” The difference between the “new” and “old” Matallana is striking. The 2020 is pure, vibrant – a mineral wine with crystalline fruit that speaks of place.  “I don’t want to be pretentious, but we want to create another iconic wine from Ribera del Duero,” says Rodríguez. There’s no shortage of ambition here – and they’re looking to increase production to around 40,000 bottles a year (up from around 25,000 currently). “It took us 25 years… but we knew we were doing something rare, different.” The latest move has been to partner with Jean-Guillaume Prats (currently of Ch. Léoville Las Cases, previously of Ch. Lafite Rothschild and Cos d’Estournel), and start distributing the wine via La Place de Bordeaux, to bring the wine to an even bigger audience.  Rodríguez is now 61 – but there’s no sign of him slowing down. “People say that I’m too old to plant vineyards,” he says, clearly finding such a thought absurd. He’s just planting three hectares he tells me – vineyards that will be amazing, he feels, maybe in 15 years’ time. On the day we talk, he had five local youths coming to meet his team, the children of local viticulturalists in Labastida; they’d be making wines together with the best 2,000 kilos from each of their family’s plots – a project that has been going four years. There’s no looking back from this vigneron, whose eyes are firmly on the horizon, as he continues to push boundaries and forge a future for those that will follow him.  Explore all wines from Telmo Rodríguez and Matallana or read more Editorial 

Telmo Rodríguez is one of Spain’s most famous names. Since the 1990s, he has been a controversial figure, fighting for the nation’s vinous heritage. We caught up with the relentless revolutionary to talk about his journey, the real Rioja and his most challenging project to date

Telmo Rodríguez is one of Spain’s most famous winemakers. We caught up with him to talk his journey and his most challenging project to date, Matallana

Telmo Rodriguez – the eternal battle

Telmo Rodríguez: the eternal battle

From a backwater in southern Catalonia, Priorat took its rightful place on the world wine map in the early 1990s. Its meteoric rise to fame was propelled by low-yielding, old Cariñena and Garnacha vines clinging to precipitous and ancient slate slopes. The best producers including Mas Doix, Alvaro Palacios and René Barbier were making wines that were turbo-charged: rich, ripe and powerful yet zinging with vibrant acidity.  But its rapid ascent to fame created growing pains: the region has struggled to define what makes Priorat Priorat, while overzealous winemaking and the inclusion of international
varieties has led to a regional identity crisis. Fortunately, Priorat has nature on its side: its distinctive llicorella slate soil limits yields and provides these Mediterranean-climate wines with a distinct mineral freshness. Combine this with the extreme fluctuations in temperature between day and night and, an extremely dry, sunny climate, and you have the potential to produce rich yet vibrant reds.  Priorat: troubled times The timing of Priorat's emergence as a fine wine producer could be the source of some of its nascent troubles. Its renaissance coincided with the heyday of Robert Parker and a global demand for reds with masses of new oak, super-ripe grapes and intense extraction to
maximise colour and tannin. It wasn't just the winemaking trends of the '90s that saw Priorat become the most intense, powerful and overbearing wine in Spain. Valentí Llagostera, founder of Mas Doix, explains that it had long been a supplier of bulk wine and a blending partner to bolster weaker wines from cooler climates – adding concentration, power and alcohol.  Lacking a tradition of fine winemaking, the idea of what a Priorat wine should be was fluid. Consequently, it became a region producing many different styles, leaving the wine drinker confused. Llagostera adds that the region had a real inferiority complex, with many growers
believing if the wine wasn’t big, powerful and as intense as possible, it wasn’t Priorat. This mentality also led to the incursion of international varieties: Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot and Syrah were planted, in a bid to emulate the success of Bordeaux and the Rhône.  From the industrial to artisan Industrial-like estates, predominantly based in Rioja, have not been interested in reflecting a specific place but rather more focused on producing a homogenised house style with grapes sourced from as far as 300km away going into the same wine. This approach is therefore completely at odds with the concept of terroir. It is common for older vines to be uprooted to maintain high production levels and wines to undergo lengthy ageing in oak barrels to create greater homogeneity. "Spanish wines made in this way are more about a process than a place," according to Luis Gutiérrez, The Wine Advocate's critic for Spain.  Of course this homogenised style proves incredibly popular: Rioja remains one of the most
successful wine exporters thanks to its reliability and high volumes, offering value for money. However, wine lovers have become increasingly discerning; there is more demand for wines with a sense of place, whether they hail from a plot of old vines or from an indigenous variety. Priorat’s move towards a fresher, more elegant style is part of a wider movement in Spain. There's a revolution underway, with a younger generation of vignerons who have actively rejected the larger estates' approach, instead they're focusing on crafting unique wines with a strong sense of place, whether it be the saline-rich, volcanic soils of Tenerife to the high-altitude mountain-vine Garnacha from the Gredos Mountains, or the incredibly vibrant, taut perfumed wines of Ribeira Sacra.   The intensely concentrated yet mineral wines of Priorat should fit into this more terroir-driven movement. The unique slate soil, Priorat's mountainous landscape and old vines meant that it
was not possible for the region to become a Rioja lookalike. The trend toward fresher, more mineral wines aligned with a rediscovery of the region's indigenous varietals (Cariñena and Garnacha) has allowed Priorat to experience a second coming. Could Priorat be on the verge of discovering its true self? Will the real Priorat please stand up? Llagostera feels there is plenty of room for experimentation in search of Priorat's true identity. The team at Mas Doix is carrying out many trials, including ageing wines in amphora, maturing Garnacha in larger barrels to avoid oxidation, and fermenting in wooden vats to
achieve greater textural sophistication. There are also more radical approaches: German native Dominik Huber of Terroir-Al-Limit doesn't destem his reds, instead practising whole-bunch fermentation, leading to an intensely fresh style. Huber believes it required a generational change before Priorat could find its new identity. Despite the varied stylistic interpretations, the goal is to better understand Priorat's voice not disguise its raw beauty. Explore all Mas Doix listings or read more Editorial 

We talk to Mais Doix’s founder Valentí Llagostera about Priorat’s identity crisis and how a new generation of Spanish winemakers is putting the focus firmly on terroir

Mais Doix’s founder Valentí Llagostera on Priorat’s identity crisis and how a new generation of Spanish winemakers is putting the focus firmly on terroir

A new Priorat dawn

Priorat: a new dawn

Spann Vineyards

United States

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