¡A vendimiar! The wine harvest has begun
The grape harvest has begun in earnest in the Castilian terroir of La Ruta de Don Federico, a little earlier this year, with around 80 wineries of the Ribera del Duero having already picked some 3 million kilos of grapes across the appellation. For comparison, as of this date last year scarcely a single kilo had been carried to the bodegas.
In the denomination of Rueda too the vineyards are beginning to see pickers hard at work harvesting the white grapes destined for conversion to light-bodied, intense and citrus verdejo wine — often considered to be Spain’s native answer to sauvignon blanc.
Here in the deep sandy soils rich with pebbles surrounding the wine hamlet of La Seca, in the province of Valladolid, the hardy bush vines of Bodegas Ababol require back-breaking manual stripping of their fruit, which will then be processed by entirely ecological methods — a labour-intensive process which will be rewarded with an intense, zesty and delicious must which is perfect for spontaneous cold fermentation and subsequent ageing on the lees for 8 months. The resulting wine is delicate and complex, mineral, fruity and floral at the same time, and will continue to evolve in the bottle.
Bodegas Ababol is a small family winery of generations dating back to the late 1800s which has tended these particular parcels of the high ground of La Seca since the 1950s under the stewardship of Rosario Mena and her husband Alfredo Sacristán. Their children Teresa, Charo and Eusebio now carry on the family tradition and passion for authentic viniculture and I’m extremely grateful to Teresa for generously inviting me to see the harvest up close and in full flow.
Exceptional conditions for cultivation
The area is characterised by its extreme and continental climate, with influence from the Atlantic. It is an arid zone, with an average annual rainfall of only 300 to 500 mm and temperatures that range from -13°C to 40°C. Although within the Mediterranean region in terms of its latitude, it is located on the first alluvial and flood terraces of the river Duero at close to 700m altitude and as such it is considered to be under continental influence. The climatic conditions – extreme cold during the winter, a great temperature differential between day and night in the summertime and around 2,600 hours of annual sunshine each year – provide exceptional conditions for the cultivation of vines.
The governing authorities (known as consejo reguladores) of both Ribera del Duero and Rueda have assessed the grapes picked so far in their respective appellations of control as ‘magnificent’ and hopes are high for an excellent vintage of wines from the 2019 harvest. In the meantime – back to the picking.
¡A vendimiar!
