2018 Descendientes de J. Palacios Moncerbal

The 2018 Moncerbal, a "vino de paraje," was produced from different plots in the same zone of the village of Corullón. It comes from seven small parcels that make up 1.74 hectares of 60- to 90-year-old vines on a slope with a south-southwest orientation at altitudes from 610 to 730 meters. It fermented with stems (every year they use a variable percentage of stems, between 10% and 30%) and indigenous yeasts (a constant here) in oak vats with a 70-day maceration, and it matured in oak casks of different sizes for 10 months. The winery describes it as juicy and crystalline, with the energy of the quartz that is intermixed with the slate and marble soils. This is a stonier and more austere vintage, mineral and tasty, with terrific balance, great precision and symmetry, detailed and precise, very focused and incredibly tasty. Like many of its siblings, this 2018 could very well be the finest vintage to date. There's not a lot of acidity; there's not a lot of tannin; there's not a lot of anything, but it's all there, all in place, with impressive depth, nuance and complexity. This is going to be a classic Moncerbal for the long haul. 2,103 bottles and some other larger and smaller formats were filled in December 2019.