Again, Again, ... : Coto de Gomariz Ribeiro Gomariz X 2009, Ribeiro

And again back to the North-West of Spain. I guess, my fascination with the whites from Galicia & Co. is getting a bit bugging! Well, whatever … as long as it is good wine ;-).

This time, for the first time on this Blog, it is Albariño Time. Probably the most impressive and prestigious white grape varietal of Iberia. This one was produced by Coto de Gomariz from the Ribeiro region. The “winemaker” Caco Careiro is one of the restorers or pioneers (depending on how one looks at the history of wine in Galicia) of Galician quality wine. What else to know? 100% Albariño – sloppy schist, granite and sand soils – influenced by not so rainy Atlantic climate – mostly bio-dynamic production.

The Albariño was surprisingly densely yellow coloured, almost a bit dark yellow and crystal clear – without any particles. In the nose I sensed camomile tea, yellow-red pears, maybe hints of Oolong, very ripe quince, Golden Delicious apples, in the background some green spices and wet stones. A very filigree and detailed bouquet. Not expressively fruitful! A couple of hours later and on the second day I sensed a bit more fruit, herbs and less camomile tea. The taste was pretty rough at first. Very dry, very stony mineral, a lot of petrolish features, diffuse green spices, some camomile tea and highly reserved fruit flavours of yellow pears + some yellow apples. A rather stern bitterness on my palate (after 3 to 5 seconds) and the slightly difficult rustic style disturbed me … at first! About 5 to 6 hours after the opening, these minimally repulsive features faded away. Lucky me! But a certain amount of bitterness, which isn’t that atypical for Albariño based wines, remained throughout my two day tasting session. Besides this light bitterness or rather acerbity, lean and distinct fruitful flavours of yellow very ripe pears and even some apricots evolved. The green herbal and expressively mineral character persevered the whole session. On the second day I sensed certain Riesling associations. Rather weird and perhaps blasphemous, I am aware of that ;-)

In conclusion: a decent and fairly priced white from the North-West at the age of a cheeky teenager with certain ambitions. I’d recommend to a wait another year or two!