Making up Spanish in Laguardia, San Vincente de la Sonsierra, and Briones: Friday, Aug. 23rd

Last night was rough. I had a sore throat yesterday, and was hot and cold and up and down all night (and we hadn't even been drinking, if someone was trying to read between the lines there.) Maybe it was the two-hour siesta. Didn't take one of those today, so we'll see how tonight goes. Also, to attempt to prove Rosie wrong that it was dehydration, I drank a lot of water, which definitely helped, even if dehydration wasn't the root cause. But a bleak, chilly morning was a slow start to our day. (Though there was a giant bull in the distance.)

We had an 11am appointment in San Vincente de la Sonsierra, at an adorably small winery called Miguel Marino. Our tour group was just six people, and it was a "large" tour for our hostess. 

Miguel Sr. had been working in the wine exporting business, but wanted to start his own, so found some vineyards to buy in 1993. The vines were between 20 to 60 years old, and he started using them for his wines. 

What impressed me about Marino wines was the times they were aged. A crianza needs 18 months in a barrel - there's were two years. A reserva is required to have two years, theirs had three, and so forth, making their wines better aged than the typical Riojas. 

Miguel Jr. was also fun to hear about as well. He was the experimentalist, with different varieties of grape growing out front of the fermentation warehouse. He was also trying Hungarian oak, which gives a toasty flavor to the wines. The Rioja D.O.C., which regulates what can be called a Rioja, is the oldest and strictest such organization in Spain. Clearly, Miguel Jr.'s wines don't have this official seal. 

While looking at these experimental vines, we learned some of the tricks for the vineyards. Roses at planted at the end of each row as indicators. Firstly, the color indicates the type of grape (red being Tempranillo in this case) and, secondly, as an indicator for disease because fungus will take down the rose about two weeks before the vines succumb, enough time to act. They also grow grass between the vines to increase the competition and force the grape roots further down. 

Besides Miguel Jr., most of the winery is traditional with an extra emphasis on quality. They sort out "purgatory" grapes to make into wine that isn't for sale, just for friends and family. In 1997, that was 30% - a bad year for grapes, but they got award-winning wine with their selectivity. This year is looking like another bad year: not a lot of snow, but very cold winter, cool and wet spring, and what will be a late harvest. 

They, like the other vineyards, sort out the worst grapes to give to others to make grappa or "orujo." The other grapes are put mostly whole, which is unusual, into the fermentation tanks. Only about 10% are crushed to be the starter for the fermenting. 

This first fermenting takes twice as long as if all the grapes were crushed, and during that entire 3 weeks period the "cap", where all of the seeds and skins pile up on top of the juice, needs to be kept wet to keep from rotting, so they stir it frequently.

The juice mash is pressed, with the more concentrated final juice separated from the earlier juice that just "cried" from the tanks to be mixed as desired later. Then juice goes back in to do the malolactic fermentation, then comes out as wine. 

The barrels it goes into for aging have been sanitized by burning a candle in them then pressure washed. They use the barrels for three years, with six uses a piece. Each wine is rotated through barrels inversely with the age of the vine -  younger (50-year-old) vines are put in the 2-year-old barrels and the 80-year-old vines are in the new barrels at the beginning. They are rotated through the barrels, and when moved, the bottom of the barrel, with its sediments, is taken out and turned into "fondos de barrica", this wine that I can't find anywhere on the Internet, because the guide mentioned that they used egg whites somehow to congeal the sediments or whatever else egg white might be used for in a wine-making process. (That's why I didn't understand either.) Because of this, Miguel Marino doesn't filter their wine at all, just let's gravity do the work. It is also why they have to be more patient. 

She brought us in to the even chillier wine cellar, which was underneath a grass roof to help with the temperature and humidity (which is programmed at 70% so the barrels don't dry out and the wine doesn't evaporate). They commissioned barrels that were a "medium toast" made of both American and French oak - "AFF."

They, like all the wineries we've visited, use natural cork. Because the wine can be aged for up to 20 more years (if kept in a cool, humid place), the cork can help it breathe. We also learned that if the cork has the wine soaked up into it, or the cork smells like cork and not like wine, the cork has gotten stale (or whatever the word may be) and the wine quality has suffered. 

At Marqués de Riscal yesterday, we noticed that the magnum (1.5 liter) bottles were selling for more than double the regular bottles, even though they are just double the size. This is because there is less oxygen in the bottle per liter of wine, so the wine can stay less oxidized. The corks and bottles (which are darker to prevent the light from changing the wine) are more expensive as well! We saw magnums and double magnums and triple magnums and one that I think she said was 37 liters (though that doesn't make sense in my head).

After the tour, we tried three wines she had selected: a "young vine" wine from the vines planted in '93, a crianza, and a reserva. Then, we asked to try a fondo, since that was recommended to us by Rosie's parents, and another couple asked to try one of Miguel Jr.'s wines. So we tried 5 types then left with 6 bottles of just one type - the fondos. They don't export it, so we took matters into our own hands. 

We were recommended Casa Toni in a neighboring town for a meal, so we drove across the Ebro River to San Vicente de la Sonsierra. We parked quickly so we could just wander and find the restaurant, which wasn't what we were expecting. Lots of patrons were at the bar, but the restaurant in the back was deserted. 

With enough confused looks and "donde est restaurante" attempts, a hostess took us next door to "Toni Traditonal" were a few other families were lunching.

While it wasn't the modern place we were expecting, we ate well and enjoyed the camaraderie of the place. We had paella and gazpacho (a delicious one - creamy with a hint of melon, similar to what they gave us at Amelibia, but in a big bowl instead of a small cup). Then, had some beef cheek, which was incredibly rich, served with French fries and gravy, and neither of us could finish. I found out later that our 12€ meal included a dessert and wine, but we didn't take advantage of that. 

While we were there, only one waitress was in the dining room. She moved like a whirlwind, so service was slow but never came to a complete stop. There were clearly some regulars - one guy got served a half-finished bottle of wine with a napkin wrapped around it. Maybe his bottle from yesterday? Another guy was greeting people and keeping the mood light. A few different people coming in helped clear and set the tables, and then there were the two kids eating their lunch at Mom's restaurant. A cute (if windowless) environment. 

We walked down a few alleys, but didn't explore too much. We did drive the car down to the river, with the new bridge (for cars) and the medieval bridge (for pictures).

This afternoon, as we had checked into our cute hotel, we asked our Spanish-speaking innkeeper about bodegas to see this afternoon. She called one called Daniel Puras, and we had an appointment for 4:30. 

We scoped it out first with the car, then returned the car to the hotel and hiked back up into Briones. We managed to find it again (with no map, just Rosie's sense of direction) and were two minutes late. But the door was locked!

It seemed deserted, so we poked around it for five minutes until our hostess showed up. And began prattling at us in Spanish. We clearly hadn't booked an English tour. 

We did some creative interpretation of what she was saying, and she did the same for us. We decided to skip the tour, though we got to see the fermentation tanks, since we were on the metal grating right above them, and go straight to the wine tasting. While we tasted, we attempted to ask questions like "uno anõs, quantos botellas?" The number 9000 seemed agreeable, so this bodega was even smaller than Miguel Marino if so! We have gone from 30 million to 10 million to 40,000 to 9,000. I don't think we can get much smaller!

She served us some cheese from the area, which we have no idea what type, but it was hard and white and had some holes and delicious. And not Manchego. We had a completely unaged Tempranillo and a crianza, with the typical 18 month aging.

We bought some of the crianza, which we then got to carry around the town of Briones when we got a map and explored. The "little English" that the woman spoke at the tourist info center was much more that the tour guide, so we learned there was a free museum in the plaza as well as different points on the map we could visit. 

The museum was hilarious in our lack of understanding of Spanish. It had historical house furnishings and tools, from wool spinning to bassinets to "colandor"s (colanders!) and more. We walked through all of it, and I just appreciated where they kept their chickens. 

Rosie walked us around the village, pointing out casas and other buildings that didn't even have plaques on them. There were some cute arches, and an awesome spiral staircase to the top of some ruins overlooking the surrounding valleys (but still lower than the church steeple!)

Oh, it also got warmer and the sun came out! We finished our walk back on the side of the town with our hotel, and an exercise playground. It motivated us to do my Jazzercise squat routine to Pink's "Try," during which some old Spanish gentlemen probably thought we were crazy. 

It was a steep downhill to get back to the hotel, where we read in the sun, then took just a short (20-40 minute) nap before heading back info town for dinner. 

It is a Friday night, so we expected things to be hopping, but it was really just people drinking and casually watching Bilbao play "OSA" or something like that. 

We went to the only restaurant which wasn't a hotel that we found, which our guide at Miguel Marino had also mentioned. It was deserted. But it was 9:30! That's dinnertime!

Apparently, according to the guy serving us and Rosie's translation of what he said, people would be eating out tomorrow night, but not tonight. We got the best service we've had yet, with two waiters and zero other customers. We got a peppers and sardine dish (soaked in olive oil, which we sopped up with bread) then shrimp in garlic sauce (which we sopped up with more bread), then our cod "Briones-style", with more of the oil and peppers and other toppings. Don't worry, we sopped that stuff up with our bread too. It was all very tasty. 

We wanted to find a hopping bar to get a drink at, but we found a mostly dead bar to get an ice cream sandwich in instead. The soccer game was still playing, but all of the patrons left at 11:30, so we left as well. Not a crazy party city, Briones.