Roll out the barrel

An interesting day today. The International Club in Salobreña organised a visit to a winery in Jete, a few km inland from Almuñecar. I don't normally go to their events -- I'm only a member for the purposes of the walking group (that I haven't been out with once on this visit). But this visit interested me, especially as they were laying on a bus to get there and back.

Calvente is very well known around here, but as a small family business it's not exactly a global brand -- it started out as a hobby that grew. They do sell their wine in other parts of Spain, and in Brazil for some reason. S and I actually visited the winery some years ago, when we first discovered the wine, but only to buy some. The winery is tiny, basically a large garage with a cellar. They do everything by hand and produce 250,000 bottles a year.

Judith, the daughter of the founders, gave us a very interesting tour with a complete explanation of how they make their wines (they produce rosé, white, red, and sparkling wine) and the various challenges of harvesting grapes in the heat of August (they bring them back to the bodega and store them in a fridge at 2C overnight before pressing them). All the vines are planted above 800m and as high as 1200m above sea level. My blip is of  the (mostly) French oak barrels they age the red wine in. They have a very complex process of ageing different grape varieties in multiple different types of oak and then blending 15 different grape/barrel combinations to make the wine.

We then sat down in the tasting room to taste five different wines along with some tapas, including the most delicious tortilla I've ever had, cooked by Judith's mum behind the bar while we tasted the wines. When we left, everyone was carrying clinking bags and boxes. I bought some rosé even though it's November, because it is so unusually good for a Spanish rosé.

Back home for a bit of a rest, including a necessary short siesta, and then out to the intercambio in the evening, enjoyable as ever. ¡ Buenas noches !