By Spence Porter

Wine grapes were growing wild in Spain millions of years before humans arrived. (This, of course, raises the urgent question, “Were dinosaurs oenophiles?”) And once people arrived, wine followed relatively quickly. Grapes have been cultivated in Spain since some time between 4000 and 3000 B.C.

The Phoenicians, great lovers of wine, arrived around 1100 B.C., and, after they founded Carthage, the wine-loving Carthaginians were also a major presence in the area. Then Rome took over, and Spain quickly became a major source of cheap low-quality wine throughout the Roman Empire.

As Rome declined, thirsty Visigoths arrived, and they, in turn, were tossed out by Islamic conquerors in 711 A.D. As it happened, Islamic law to the contrary, the new Arab rulers were wine-lovers too. This resulted in oddities in the legal code. The sale of wine, for example, was illegal. And the sale of wine was also taxed.

Then, of course, came the Christians, and more wine and more wine, bringing us up to today, when Spain has more land devoted to wine grapes than any other country in the world. Yields are low, however, so Spain is only the world’s third largest wine producer.

For most of the twentieth century, Spanish wine, aside from a handful of renowned Riojas, has had a deservedly poor reputation. But in recent decades there has been a stunning transformation of the Spanish wine scene. Quality has skyrocketed, and, better yet, prices have not yet caught up with quality. If you’re searching for a great wine at a sane price, Spain is one of the first places you should look.

One especially big change has been in the white wines. The white wines of Spain used to have a particularly bad reputation. Not any more.

For a tasting I recently put together in New York, I sampled a wide range of young Spanish wines. There’s an amazingly large number of terrific Spanish wines out there, and my final selection for the tasting was somewhat arbitrary. But these are the wines I eventually settled on. Every one of them is both a really good wine and a bargain at its price.

THREE WHITE WINES

1. Bodegas Muga Blanco 2004 (Rioja)

Bodegas Muga is a really first-rate winery in Rioja, which has long been Spain’s most famous red wine region. Muga was founded in 1932 by Isaac Muga and his wife Aurora Caño. It continues to be a family firm, and is in many ways a very traditional firm. Their methods for their red wines are pretty much what they have been from the start, down to making their own oak barrels. However their methods for making white wines have been drastically changed and improved.

This wine is 90% Viura, a native Spanish grape also known as Macabeo. The remaining 10% is Malvasia, a grape (really a family of closely related grapes) of ancient Greek origin grown in both Italy and Spain. The “selection” of which grapes actually make it into the wine is very strict—about half of the harvest is rejected. The wine is slow-fermented in French oak and spends 3 months on the lees.

This is a straightforward and food-friendly white wine, and it’s available at around $13 per bottle. It would be difficult to find a better dry white wine at the price.

2. Bodegas Pazo de Señoráns Albariño 2004 and 2005 (Rías Biaxas, Galicia)

I’ve tasted both the 2004 and 2005 vintages of this wine, and recommend both of them enthusiastically.

Rías Biaxas is the most important wine region in Galicia in northwest Spain. It is Spain’s most important region for the indigenous Albariño grape, a grape that is quickly acquiring international cult status for its distinctively peachy aromas and tastes.

Pazo de Señoráns is widely considered one of the greatest producers of Albariño. The winemaker, by the way, is a woman, Señora Mariol Bueno, something worth mentioning in the still male-dominated world of wine.

The wine is 100% Albariño and is not oaked. This is serious Albariño, restrained, elegant, subtle, and complex. Strongly recommended, it’s selling at around $22 per bottle.

3. Burgans Albariño 2005 (Rías Biaxas, Galicia)

Luciano Almoedo, who makes this wine, was one of the first to recognize Albariño’s potential as a great white wine grape.

This wine is so different from the previous wine that it’s hard to believe they’re both made from the same grape. Where the previous wine is “serious” Albariño, this one is just wonderful fun—and it sells for around $14 per bottle.

THREE RED WINES

4. Celler de Capçanes Mas Donis Barrica 2003 and 2004 (Montsant, Catalonia)

In 1933, five families in the village of Capçanes joined together to create a cooperative winery. Soon the cooperative had eighty members and was handling all of the village’s wine production, turning out high quantities of dreadful bulk wine.

However, Capçanes is just outside of Priorat, and in recent years Priorat has become one of Spain’s trendiest and best regions for frighteningly expensive but truly great wines. And the growers at Capçanes were starting to look at what their neighbors were doing, and beginning to wonder whether cheap bulk wine was really the smartest thing for them to make, when, in 1995, the Jewish community of Barcelona asked them to produce a kosher wine. The new equipment needed for this suddenly opened up the possibility of trying to produce better quality non-kosher wines from the village’s vineyards. They started doing this in 1996, making major investments in the winery, cellar, and vineyards.

The results have been extraordinary. This wine is 80% Garnacha, a grape also known as Grenache. It’s a wonderful grape, one of my favorite red wine grapes, widely grown in Spain, Mediterranean France, and Australia. The remaining 20% is Syrah, the grape responsible for some of the greatest wines of France’s Rhone Valley and, under the name Shiraz, for some of Australia’s best wines. The Garnacha grapes come from very old vines, more than 60 years old. The wine is aged for 9 months in American oak barrels.

OLD VINES

You’ll notice a lot of wine writers talking about “old vines”. What’s the big deal? Well, it’s a good general rule that the fewer grapes a given vine produces, the more intensely flavored each of those grapes will be. And as vines get older, they produce fewer and fewer grapes, and those grapes have more and more flavor. So, if you have old vines growing in the right soil and the right climate and they’re taken care of the right way, and if those grapes are then turned into wine by a gifted fanatic perfectionist winemaker, if everything goes well, the resulting wine can be very special.

I’ve tasted both the 2003 and 2004 vintages of this wine, and, at around $13 per bottle, both vintages are very real bargains.

5. Bodegas Hermanos Pérez Pascuas Viña Pedrosa 2003 (Ribera del Duero)
In recent years, Ribera del Duero in north central Spain has been challenging Rioja’s position as Spain’s most important red wine region.

This wine is from a family winery, created in 1980 when the three Pérez Pascuas brothers decided to break away from the local cooperative in order to try to make the most of the potential of their father’s vineyards.

This wine is made from 100% Tempranillo, Spain’s best known high quality red wine grape. It is aged for 12 months in American and French oak barrels.

At around $20 per bottle, this is another terrific buy.

6. Descendientes de José Palacios Petalos del Bierzo 2004 (Bierzo)

Alvaro Palacios is one of Spain’s most famous winemakers. He is most renowned for his wines from Priorat, but he has been setting up ventures in an assortment of other regions. His Bierzo operation is run by Alvaro Palacios with his cousin Ricardo Perez Palacios.

Bierzo is a little-known wine region in north west Spain. The local grape Mencía is only just being discovered as a grape with extraordinary potential.

This wine is 100% Mencia, and was made from extremely old vines, between 60 and 100 years old, grown using biodynamic farming methods—this is an extreme fanatic version of organic agriculture that includes factors like the phase of the moon. It is aged for 4 months in French oak.

This was my personal favorite of the reds in my New York tasting. It’s absurdly (and wonderfully) underpriced at about $20 per bottle.

AND ONE SWEET WHITE WINE

7. Compañia de Vinos de Telmo Rodríguez “MR” 2004 (Málaga)

Telmo Rodríguez is another of Spain’s best-known winemakers. He runs his family’s renowned Remelluri estate in Rioja, and he also has numerous winemaking ventures all over Spain, buying or renting run-down vineyards and renovating them. The wines are fermented with wild yeast.

Málaga usually produces a rich, very sweet, high-alcohol dessert wine from the Moscatel de Alejandría grape (better known as Muscat of Alexandria). These wines can be amazingly wonderful, and, in fact, Telmo Rodríguez makes one of the best of these. But that’s not what this wine is!

Because Telmo Rodríguez has also been experimenting with making a lighter, fresher style of wine from the same grape, and he bottles this wine as MR. Unlike the traditional Málaga wines, Rodriguez’s MR is intended for immediate drinking rather than for aging, and it’s an absolute delight.

The 2004 vintage is already vanishing from stores, but my guess is that this is not the sort of wine that will vary wildly from year to year. When the 2005 vintage comes out, get some—but remember that this isn’t a wine that will age, so don’t buy more than you’ll drink in the next six months or so! I’d expect the price to be somewhere in the range of $20 per 500 ml bottle.

Image Courtesy Corbis