Raúl Pérez {Part 2}: The Real Experience Begins

He pours me the Atalier Albariño first. A newer project of his from Rías Baixas in Northwestern Spain close to Atlantic Ocean. There he works a unique vineyard with vines 150-160 years old with Rodrigo Mendez a conservationist for the area. 

Having had only one other white wine that he has made, ‘Sketch’ another Albariño that is aged in bottle on the bottom of the ocean floor in the area, I was excited to try more. It struck my intrigue first and foremost because of my love of Spanish wines, especially whites. Their perfect harmony of high acids (that mouth-watering sensations that keeps you coming back and craving more), high aromatics (that perfume aroma of walking through a flower field after a rainstorm when the sun finally shines drying the pedals once again), and lower alcohol (so you can be guilt-free about indulging in a couple of glasses without the worry of over consuming). 

As unique as my only other experience this wine did not disappoint and will stick with me forever. It transcends you at first sip from everything a white wine from Spain usually is. They are typically simple, flavorless, and honestly forgettable. Much like a watered down sip from a glass of wine during communion.

Atalier however is more like your first kiss. The overwhelming sensation and excitement that comes from the surprise of not knowing what to do and having it exceed expectation. It tastes like something you would have from Burgundy, France with the words “Grand Cru” on the bottle. Stopping you in your tracks to think about what you just tasted because it creates a dictionary long list of so many familiar flavors. Fresh peaches, apricots, and apples with a saltwater rinse and orange blossoms in bloom. Simply amazing! It commanded another glass.

Next he poured a unique offering from the Ultreia label of his. Coming from Valtuille de Abajo an area landlocked with desert climate in Northwestern Spain West of Lèon. This white coming from the Godello grape and a tiny single vineyard called La Claudina.

Godello is a kind of funky and rare grape you’ll have a hard time searching for. This version lived up to just that. It’s not as lively and expressive as the first wine, but offers up its own story just the same. The story about place. Not jumping out of the glass with fruit, but more subtly pulling you closer with dust and the soil itself you would expect from a red.

Lastly we finished off the whites with another Godello called La del Vivo. This wine truly defined by the uniqueness of winemaking. Almost going against grain of press the grapes and bottle the juice to create a whole new breed of white wine. The skins are left to mix with the juice, which is the only practice that gives a red wine its color. It doesn’t start the next steps like a normal wine, but has to wait for spontaneous fermentation to occur. Meaning natural yeast particles that are always flying in the air have to land in such a perfect way that it mixes with the grape juice to start making it into wine.

As that process starts, a layer of what looks like foam on a beer forms on top of the wine. Inputting oxygen and bacteria into the wine giving it more of a stale beer taste. Nuttiness and bruised rotting pears and apples show. Significantly changing everything we usually know about what white wine tastes like.