Amontillado Fino 18%, Bodegas Pedro Romero

Appearance

Antique polished light mahogany fading to amber with copper glints.

Nose

Slightly closed at first but its complexity soon opens out and it is really quite intense with lots of toasted bread, hazelnut and almond, savoury hints of salted caramel and a briny salinity giving it that Sanlúcar touch. In fact one can still detect traces of Manzanilla. There is a faint trace of oak which contributes to its serious air, but it is elegant too.

Palate

Attractively light yet quite intense with beautifully harmonised elements of minerality, nuttiness, and salinity and just enough glycerine to give the perfect roundness without balancing out too much of the acidity which gives it its slightly racy edge. Almost crisp and very elegant and long, delicious.

Comments

This delicious wine must easily have ten years in bottle judging by its shyness and a certain amount of light sediment. In 2012 the term Amontillado Fino was dropped, so it was certainly bottled before then. Once one of the most important bodegas in Sanlúcar, Pedro Romero closed its doors in 2014 after over 150 years, tragically going bust. Rather than being a Fino Amontillado which is a Fino at the crux of Amontillado, this is an Amontillado Fino or a fine (quality/elegant) Amontillado, and it certainly is. It was probably about 15 years old at bottling and at a lovely stage of development, then and now.

Price
30 euros per 50cl, Burcamer, Sanlúcar

Amontillado VORS Prestige Don Pedro Romero 20%, Pedro Romero

Appearance

Bright mid depth antique mahogany with copper glints fading through amber to a hint of green, legs.

Nose

Super fragrant, fresh and complex, bursting with toasted almonds and hazelnuts, praline, beautifully integrated oak and traces of orange peel and tobacco. There are background traces of salinity and bitterness which must come from the flor of all those years ago and the whole ensemble is held together with an attractive glyceric sweetness. 

Palate

Perfectly balanced between volatile acidity, the crispness of its Manzanilla origins and the sweeter nutty glyceric side. It is definitely a Sanlucar wine with its slightly wild side, and has has great finesse. Dry and intense, it has very little aggressive tannin for its age and has terrific length.

Comments

This stunning wine is way older than VORS, having more like 50 years' solera age. The solera itself was located in the bodega known as the Sacristía de la Cruz, part of the Müller-Ambrosse bodega complex built around 1837 and belonging to Pedro Romero. Here all the very old wines were stored for the Pedro Romero Prestige range, to which this wine belongs. The solera dates from 1860 and only 1750 bottles were filled annually. It was a terrible shame when this prestigious bodega closed down but at least its best products are safe in other hands, mainly Yuste and Alonso, even if some of the brands have been lost.

Price

65 euros per 50cl, Er Guerrita

Brandy Punto Azul Prestige Solera Gran Reserva 40%, Pedro Romero

Appearance

Deep, walnut/mahogany to amber with a trace of green at the rim, legs.

Nose

Powerful notes of wood, old barrels, leather and Oloroso with traces of vanilla, allspice, dried fruit - pasa - dried orange peel, toffee, toasted almond, just the complex array one would expect from such an old brandy. And it doesn't hold back.

Palate

A gentle sweetness greets the palate, fading slightly as the full force comes through. It is big concentrated and dry yet has remarkably little aggressiveness in the tannin. Oloroso, dried fruit and wood are the principal flavours, between which nestle subtle sweeter notes of fruit and caramel. It is a very serious brandy, and a little drop of water would be forgiven just to make it easier.

Comments

I was very lucky to get hold of this, as it is not only the original, bottled by Pedro Romero, but also about 26 euros cheaper than the current price for the brand which is now owned by Francisco Yuste. Even at 96 euros it is cheap for what it is.This legendary Sanlúcar brandy comes from soleras consisting of some 200 butts or more established at the end of the XIX century and located in their own bodega. The firm was one of the first to sell brandy in bottle in 1891. There were three small sacas of Prestige each year. The name Punto Azul or Blue Spot derives from the quality markings used on American oak staves imported from Costa Rica, in which the blue spot was the finest. There are two Punto Azul brandies: Prestige, with over 50 years solera age and Heritage, with over 80. Both were 100% holandas, 65% of which was distilled from Palomino wine. The butts were seasoned with Oloroso. Each bottle carries a card stamped with the bottle's number tied with gold string to the neck. In the days of the bodega's Club Punto Azul Heritage this number equated to a person's membership number. Among their benefits, members had access to some of the bodega's finest products - but in limited quantities.

Price

69.75 Roali, Mijas

PX Tres Álamos 16%, Pedro Romero

Appearance

Very deep blacky walnut through mahogany to amber at the rim, legs.

Nose

Sweet juicy sun dried pasas with notes of dried figs, black toffee and dates and the faintest hint of honey greet the nose followed by a certain well integrated complexity, but while there are not enough phenolic notes or depth of colour to presume it is of any great age, it is certainly good quality.

Palate

Intensely flavoured, very sweet and very smooth with a gentle refreshing acidity. It is at a point where it still retains youthful simpler fruity notes but it is developing more depth and complexity. There is a lot of highly caramelised toffee and early signs of black coffee. Good length, too.

Comments

This great family bodega, established in Sanlúcar in1860 went dramatically bust in 2012 and all the assets were sold off by the receivers. The soleras went to other bodegas, but wines already bottled are now rarely encountered. It is the rarity of this bottle rather than its age which accounts for the price, yet the wine is very good and almost justifies it, though it used to sell for more like 5 euros. The name refers to the vineyard the company once owned, Viña El Álamo.

Price

25.00 euros per 50cl bottle from La Casa del Jerez

27.6.16 Ex Pedro Romero Director Charged with Fraud

Only his initials E.H.A. have been released but he is in big trouble for defrauding Hacienda, the Spanish tax authority, of 451,622.68 euros by underpaying tax on alcohol in 2009. He also faces a potential 15 months in prison. The tax must be declared and paid monthly, and apparently the staff was told to declare much lower amounts than were in fact leaving the premises. It seems that this continued after 2009, and a further 261,060.99 euros was defrauded in 2010, but E.H.A. no longer worked there.

According to the authorities the bodega’s books showed that firstly sales far outweighed invoicing (demonstrating cash sales without invoice and therefore avoidance of tax), and secondly that these sales were much greater than the alcohol tax which was being declared. The judge said that this was “deliberate and fraudulent” bearing in mind that the bodega had the means to pay the tax since it is included in the sale price of the wine, but this money was “obviously used for other purposes.”

All this only recalls to mind the sad demise of a once great bodega which was struggling to finance its takeover of Gaspar Florido and thus insolvent led to the suicide of its owner, Pedro Romero Candón in 2014.

Bodegas: Alonso

Fran Asencio made a lot of money as a construction engineer, investing some of it in an excellent bodega in Asturias: Dominio del Uragallo. Since they came from Sevilla, he and his brother Fernando were keen to invest in a project in the south and came across the tortuous demise of the great bodega Pedro Romero in Sanlúcar. Francisco Yuste bought the Manzanilla Aurora soleras, and Fran and Fernando bought one of the bodegas in Calle Rubiños known as Bodegas Méndez, an almacenista bought by Pedro Romero, the name being used as a sous-marque. Many of the 10,000 or so butts which were owned by Pedro Romero are now stored in other bodegas round the town.

The brothers want to retain the brand names of Pedro Romero and Gaspar Florido and intend to bottle a limited quantity of the GF wines to show the world that they still exist. However they have been inundated with retailer requests to bottle large – even ridiculous – quantities, like 3,000 bottles of solera GF25.

Fran Asencio posing with a rather good wine

The Asencios have bought 13 hectares of vineyards in the Pagos Balbaina and Miraflores, and these musts will be used to refresh a solera based on 40 butts of maturing "vino blanco" from Pedro Romero. This will be the upmarket Manzanilla with complete traceability from grape to glass, but unfortunately it won't be available for a while.

Meanwhile they have already bought Manzanilla from almacenistas to establish another solera and are buying grapes and making wine to feed it which will hopefully be profitable enough to pay for the upkeep of the old wines. This wine was launched  in early spring 2017 under the brand name Velo Flor. They are not in a hurry; everything will be done the artisan way. Other ideas are also being considered, such as unfortified wine.

The bodega, which is in a pretty poor state, is actually just below sea level in the Barrio Bajo with virtually perfect exposition to the west wind, and is thus perfect for Manzanilla. Luckily the sacristia is in better condition which is just as well as it stores the legendary soleras GF 25, GF 30 which consists of only 5 butts and Ánsar Real (2 butts dating from 1840) soleras, all kept under lock and key – wisely, as  Carbon 14 tests show its age to be 126 years.

Since the bodega is only large enough for ageing wine, they have had to vinify in rented premises and want to build their own winery, which will raise the question of whether to ferment in steel tanks or in butts, but not being in a hurry, they have allowed themselves 3 years to get this sorted. According to the capataz, José Antonio Palacios, who has worked at the bodega for the last 15 years, some of the soleras have not been properly run in 4 or 5 years except for tiny sacas and rocíos to maintain some sort of freshness, but he says that the bodega needs to be reorganised and some proper running of the soleras is necessary.

The Asencio brothers are acutely aware of the enormous scale of the work needed, and that they are now responsible for a part of the history of Sanlúcar but are dedicated to the task of keeping these wine jewels alive.

Wines:
Manzanilla Velo Flor (9-10 years old), Amontillado from Gaspar Florido (90-100 years old), Palo Cortado from Pedro Romero (60-70 years old), Oloroso from Pedro Romero (60-70 years old)

Address: Calle Rubiños, 1 Sanlúcar de Barrameda, Cádiz

Telephone: (+34) 956 360 266

Website: www.bodegasalonso.com (under construction)

Visits? Not for a while

15.1.16 Yuste Re-launches Pedro Romero Brands

Francisco Yuste, Sanlúcar businessman and owner of Bodegas Francisco Yuste, bought much of the wine at Bodegas Pedro Romero after it went bust. He has spent months organising things and is now re-launching some famous old brands: Manzanilla Aurora and the brandies Pedro I and Punto Azul. Interestingly, Francisco's wife and daughter are both called Aurora. The Punto Azul comes in two versions: Prestige and Heritage aged for 50 and 80 years respectively. During the next six months Yuste also plans to release some VORS wines from the pre-phylloxera soleras of the Conde de Aldama. This is fantastic news!

Manzanilla Aurora 15%, Pedro Romero

Appearance
Pale strawy gold with very light legs.
Nose
Quite full with an attractive slightly savoury hint from autolysis. Lots of bread dough, flor and a trace of wood with a distinct dampness and strong briny maritime aroma. Complex and attractive with a classic Sanlucar character.
Palate
Full, assertive, multifaceted and serious, lots of flor bitterness still with that autolytic note. Very briny and quite saline with lots of character and excellent length. Delicious - real Manzanilla.
Comments
Launched in 1907 the brand was named by Pedro Romero in honour of his wife Aurora Ambrosse y Lacave whose portrait is on the back label. She assumed control of the bodega after his death in 1911, later leaving it to her sons. It was initially a Manzanilla pasada, but is now simply labelled as a Manzanilla though it is about 9 years old and certainly has some pasada characteristics, and there is an en rama version. The solera has 7 criaderas and the bodega is in the Barrio Bajo area of Sanlucar and one of the closest to the estuary of the Guadalquivir with all the concomitant fresh sea air. The bodega is currently in receivership which is a terrible shame as its wines are such classics.
Price
About 7 Euros in Spain, in Britain try Robert Anthony Wines

Bodegas: Gaspar Florido

The Florido family has a long and proud history in the Sherry trade. They are first heard of in Rota in the XVI century, moving to Chipiona at the end of the XVII. They seem to have established themselves as producers in 1800 when Jose Maria Florido y Calderon de la Barca set up in business.

In 1880 the company was known as Florido Hermanos and grew to become one of the top ten exporters in the district, but was bought by Domecq.  Gaspar Florido’s father re-established the firm as almacenistas in 1942, supplying wines in bulk to the bodegas as well as to bars and restaurants. In 1997, conscious of the quality of their wines, they decided to create their own brands and sell them in bottle on the marketplace.

A view of the bodegas (foto:busKalia)

The firm owns 33 hectares of prime vineyard, Viña El Armijo, in the Pago Miraflores in which there is a beautiful XVI century vineyard house. There were various bodegas housing a total of 7,000 butts. They were diehard traditionalists, eschewing “modern bad habits” and while they did export a little to Germany, they preferred to deal with the home market. They described their work as “absolute artisanship” but nevertheless realised the importance of the internet.

Eventually they decided to centralise their operation on the Carretera de Trebujena, as they had bodegas all over Sanlucar, and then In 2007 the firm and its brands was bought by Pedro Romero SA for 6.5 million Euros, since the family had no children who were interested in carrying on the business and Gaspar was getting on a bit. This purchase made Pedro Romero the second largest bodega in Sanlucar after Barbadillo.

Most of their wines came from their own vineyard and some carry the name Viña Armijo, but they did also buy in must and wine to meet their requirements. Their best known brands are Manzanilla Pleamar and the GF range of GF AB Cream, GF Oloroso Muy Viejo, GF Manzanilla. The most outstanding wine is Palo Cortado 25 GF, originally a Rodriguez Lacave solera, which Gaspar never labelled as Palo Cortado but just “Jerez Viejisimo”, feeling that the lines are slightly blurred between styles with wines of this age. Pedro Romero continued to sell the Florido wines, thank goodness, and all the really old wines were in their sacristia until Romero went bust.

There is also a 30 GF, an outstanding Palo Cortado in very limited quantities, some of which was bottled by Equipo Navazos as La Bota de Palo Cortado No.41 Bota “No”. They bought the wine just a few months before Florido was bought out, and it is still available. After the bankruptcy of Pedro Romero, the old GF wines were bought by the Asencio brothers for their Bodegas Alonso which is located in one of the old Pedro Romero bodegas. They have relabelled the wines. Meanwhile the Florido family continue to sell tiny quantities of wine from Viña El Armijo.

Bodegas: Pedro Romero

The first we hear of the Romeros is in XVIII century Ronda (Malaga), where they had a great reputation and influence on bullfighting. We next hear of them in Huelva, now distillers making spirit to fortify wines. Around 1820, one Florencio Romero moved to Sanlucar and married a local girl called Angela Carranza.

Forty years later, in 1860, this great Sherry firm was established by their son, Vicente Romero Carranza. The firm started out, as most did then, by buying mature wines and establishing soleras in bought bodegas, in this case in the Calle Trasbolsa. With their distilling history, they started out with brandies destined for the Spanish Caribbean colonies, and with some success. Brandy was always important to the firm, and their brand Punto Azul was their best seller.

When Vicente died in 1890, his three sons, Vicente, Baldomero and Pedro Romero Villarreal continued with the business which they called Hijos de Vicente Romero Carranza, and started doing more with wine.  They owned a vineyard called Viña El Alamo, which was later sold, though the name continued as a brand. The company then bought in musts from local cooperatives.

In 1904 Pedro took over the entire business from his brothers, and gave his wife’s name, Aurora Ambrosse Lacave, to his finest Manzanilla pasada – Aurora. When he died in 1911, Aurora, of French descent, took over the business herself as her children, Aurora, Pedro and Fernando Romero Ambrosse, were still very young. It was not easy for a woman in such a traditional world, but she earned the respect of her peers simply for quality. Following her death, her children took over, naming the business Hijos de Pedro Romero Villarreal – Pedro Romero, which became simply Pedro Romero in 1953, and remained its name as an entirely family-owned business, in the hands of the sixth generation until the end. 

The last Romero was Pedro Romero-Candau, a brilliant lawyer in Sevilla. He took control of the bodega in the early 2000s and set about expansion. In 2006 turnover was 7 million euros - double the previous year, and in 2007 it reached 9 million. That year he bought  the local firm Gaspar Florido which is more of an almacenista, but which had important brands and stocks which would undoubtedly help with the expansion. He paid 6.5 million. However while all seemed well, it was not, and facing huge costs for finance the firm ended up in receivership owing 22 million, despite increased sales. Pedro himself owed even more and committed suicide in 2014.

The historic old bodegas, which covered 12,500 square metres, were situated in the Barrio Bajo (lower part) of Sanlucar, in the Banda Playa, very close to the estuary of the Guadalquivir and west-facing, opposite the protected marshland of the Coto Doñana. This allows access to the westerly winds which provide the essential fresh, moisture-laden air which allows ideal conditions for the flor. The firm also had a modern vinification plant on the road to El Puerto, which had all the stabilisation and bottling equipment as well as offices. The old bodegas were strictly for ageing.

Pedro Romero prided itself on being the most traditional bodega in Sanlucar. They still used egg white to fine (some) wines, and their capataz (cellar master) had been there over 50 years. After the collapse it took a long time to find a buyer for the bodegas, which are currently closed and mostly empty and desolate. Francisco Yuste bought Manzanilla Aurora and the brandies while Bodegas Alonso bought the Gaspar Florido wines.

Pedro Romero offered a complete Sherry range, which included brandy and vinegar. The Manzanilla Pasada Aurora went through no less than 25 criaderas before arriving at the solera, and even the vinegar went through 15!!

The Wines were:

Three Manzanillas:

Maria Cristina (@ 3years old);  Manz. Fina Pedro Romero (@ 5years old); Aurora (@ 9years old)

Viña El Alamo range:

Oloroso Cream, Dry, Medium, Amontillado, Moscatel, Pedro Ximenez

The VORS Gama Prestige range:

Amontillado Don Pedro Romero, Palo Cortado Hijo de Pedro Romero Villarreal; Oloroso Don Pedro Romero. These wines have an average age of over 50 years.

There were also four brandies and a rum. Oh yes, and an Oloroso flavoured with orange…