Nanclares y Prieto | "Soverribas" | Albariño | Ribeira Sacra, Spain 2019

🧑‍🤝‍🧑 Pair with: shellfish, fish tacos, fresh salads, soft cheeses

🧑🏽‍🌾 Farming: Practicing Organic with some biodynamic principles

🥶 Serve: Cold

🌎 Region: Ribeira Sacra, Spain

🍇 Grape Varieties: Albariño

🌱 Vine age: 35-100 years

🤓 Geek Out: Alberto Nanclares became a vigneron in the mid 1990's after retiring from his career as an Economist. He and his wife moved to Spain's North Atlantic seaside village of Castrelo to relax and enjoy retirement. The property itself happened to have some vineyard land which he eventually began to farm as a hobby with the help of some neighbors. The first vintage was vinified in his garage in 1997. Today, Alberto, with the help of his friend, Silvia Prieto, farms a mere 5 hectares of vines in Rias Baixas that are dispersed amongst 13 tiny parcels. 

Nanclares y Prieto's focus is to make classic age-worthy Albariños that express both variety and terruño via organic viticulture and VERY minimal intervention in the cellar. The coastal Atlantic town of Cambados, where many of these parcels are located, is considered the ancestral home to the Albariño grape. 

The vines range in age from 35 to 100 years and are largely west-facing and planted on sandy, granitic soils and clay deposits. The grapes were harvested by hand, sorted, and gently pressed without destemming in whole-bunches using a pneumatic press. The juice ferments with its native yeasts in a 2200L used French oak barrel before resting on its lees for 9 months, with weekly batonnage for the first month.