If you hear bells you have no illusions, it's just Las Guillermas from the Tentenublo winery with 93pts from Tim Atkin! It impressed us for many reasons...Are you ready?
The owner of Tentenublo, Roberto Oliván, born "Riojano", changed the image of the well-known cask wines of Rioja, in 2011, when he launched the Tentenublo Wines project. This started as a simple extension of the family business and back then, no one would have imagined that in 2015 he would take the title of Rioja's most revolutionary new winemaker. And at the age of only 37 years!
The name of the winery Tentenublo, is inspired by an old tradition in Rioja which literally means "ringing bells"! By ringing the bells, the locals chased away storms and hail, which destroyed the grapes as they ripened. Roberto Oliván of course applied more efficient methods... He is a 4th generation winemaker and knows the secrets of Rioja very well! The oldest family vineyards are between 40 and 100 years old and grow in the Rioja Alavesa region (north of Rioja), while the youngest are in Vinaspre and are all organically grown. A family innovation, is that in red blends, he always puts a small percentage of white variety. This explains their juicy character, freshness and complexity!
Roberto's name has now taken a place next to that of Rioja, and is an inspiration to many young winemakers!
In Las Guillermas Tentenublo, Tempranillo takes the lead with a well-deserved accompaniment of some white Viura! They come from vineyards almost 70 years old, which means little production, but great concentration of fruit. For Roberto Oliván, the musts are: manual harvest, separate vinification for each vine and minimal interventions. It is followed by spontaneous fermentation with indigenous yeasts and no filtering. In Rioja, barrel-aged aromas are very much loved, but in Las Guillermas, Roberto wanted them to be very subtle, which is why he only aged the wine for 9 months, in second-hand French oak!
Get it!
