Saturday 9 August 2014

Jesus Barquin in Scotland

Over the last couple of days we have had the privilege of meeting Jesus Barquin, who along with Eduardo Ojeda runs the amazing Equipo Navazos. Jesus was in Scotland for holidays with his family and kindly took the time to offer us a couple of incredibly informative and interesting tastings.

He brought with him some fabulous wines, not all Sherry, but fabulous nonetheless. It is worth pointing out here that Equipo Navazos is about much more than just introducing us to the finest, rarest and most interesting Sherries. It is not so much a producer as a project, a club even, run by two extremely knowledgeable mega-enthusiasts with inquiring minds who have day jobs but also lots of ideas about wine, and are prepared to show us just how interesting it can be. And not even for profit!

Jesus Barquin (pic:wineanorak.com)
They are involved in all sorts of interesting things like working with bodegas to produce table wines in Montilla (OVNI) as well as the classic Montilla, and Sanlucar (Navazos Niepoort and the lovely La Bota de Vino Blanco “Florpower”), Cava of the highest quality (Colet Navazos) and also spirits - there is rum, whisky, and brandy as well. Many of these projects have common themes such as terroir, flor, oxidation or bottling without stabilisation, and the results are astounding.

The wines we tasted were:
OVNI: (Table wine from Montilla PX grapes)
La Bota de Vino Blanco No 44 “Florpower” MMX: (effectively unfortified Manzanilla)*
La Bota de Manzanilla No 42: (From Sanchez Ayala, approaching Manz. Pasada)*
La Bota de Fino (Que va para Amontillado) No 45: (From Montilla, PX grapes, a Fino-Amontillado)
La Bota de Palo Cortado (Sanlucar) No 52: (Really young, amazingly good)*
La Bota de Oloroso (Montilla) No 46: (Montilla PX between 15-20 years old


As this blog is really about Sherry, only the wines marked * will be found in the tasting notes (soon). I must admit I am tempted to include other wines from Andalucia – they are so good and not necessarily so very different. And they all need our attention.

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