This day tasted everyone’s wardrobe alittle bit as we were basically told to pack for moderate weather and cool nights. It was in fact pretty chilly and rained sporadically throughout the day. The new Mike Scioscia style Angel pullover I got for my birthday was quite welcome today. It was on this mornings drive that the bus driver Jose Maria told us that there was a serious hail storm the night before in Rioja Baja. The deluge included 18 inches of golf ball sized hail that pretty much trashed the vintage for that part of Rioja, stripping the vines of tender leaves and, most important buds that would flower and then become grapes. Much of the area will likely have no crop.
Tom Puyaubert of Exopto
Our first stop was Exopto Cellar, one of the stops I was most looking forward to because this particular Rioja producer had become one of my go-tos at home for its high quality and relatively modest fare, under $30 in our place. This was an interesting stop because it was a little bit like some of the ‘sheds wineries’ in California. The winery was in an industrial park type of setting with several of the partitions containing wine operations. What was different about this place was that part of the expense was underwritten by the Spanish government. That sort of thing doesn’t happen here in the U.S. of A..
Frenchman Tom Puyaubert, general manager of barrel maker Demptos in Spain, former rugby player, and part owner of Exopto met the group. This part of the Alavesa is one of the cooler areas (as in termperature) of Rioja, giving the grapes more structure and longer hang time.
The view of the Siera Cantabrias fro the front of the business park was absolutely stunning on this day and the meteorological occurrences served to demonstrate how the climate in this part of the region was mediated by a phenomenon called the foehn effect. Cooler continental air blows over the top of the Cantabrias from the north and hits the warmer currents coming up from the south. The cooler moist air cools things off for the vineyards but the rain doesn’t get past the mountains. It all works most of the time, although 2007 proved to be maybe a little too cool.. We tasted some 2008 barrels (not bad but we’ll see) and the 2007, which was kind of edgy. The acids were a little firm and the fruit was pretty subdued on this occasion, so for now it’s not on our hit list.
The 'foehn' effect
We left the winery and headed to a little hilltop town where Tom’s mother presented a lovely lunch a light handed, French styled bites at a quaint little bed and breakfast that was owned by someone who had his own wine made for him by Tom. The skies threatened but held and we exited this pleasant respite to visit David Sampedro, who will be a recurring character from here on. David is one of the rising stars in this part of Spain and quite a character. Patrick Mata told us not to mention n that we had just left Exopto as David and Tom were not necessarily on friendly terms (David had been part of Exopto until recently, a mutual split I am sure). The second part of the day was like a day unto itself. We’ll cover that next time.
In the end, there was the first of many jamons Iberico, the cured hams traditional in Spain. Having been in the meat business some three decades ago and pretty handy with a knife, I assisted in slicing as there was no jamoncero (a server who specializes in slicing up a the jamons). A little bit more red wine and off on the bus to the small town of Tudela.
